Center for the Study of Religion and American Culture

Center for the Study of Religion and American Culture
Name	Center for the Study of Religion and American Culture
Established	1990s
Location	United States
Parent institution	University
Director	Scholar

Center for the Study of Religion and American Culture The Center for the Study of Religion and American Culture is a research institute that examines intersections of Religion in the United States, American culture, and public life through historical, sociological, and interdisciplinary methods. It supports scholarship linking figures and institutions such as Jonathan Edwards, Martin Luther King Jr., Susan B. Anthony, Harriet Beecher Stowe, Abraham Lincoln, Frederick Douglass, W.E.B. Du Bois, Dorothy Day, Reinhold Niebuhr, Woodrow Wilson, Franklin D. Roosevelt, Eleanor Roosevelt, Billy Graham, Jerry Falwell, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Henry David Thoreau, Mark Twain, Emily Dickinson, Langston Hughes, T.S. Eliot, Harper Lee, Flannery O'Connor, Toni Morrison, Alice Walker, Elisabeth Kübler-Ross, Susan Sontag, Reverend, Cardinal and other prominent personalities and institutions in American public life.

History

The Center was founded amid scholarly debates about American religious history and the rise of cultural studies, engaging with work by historians associated with Columbia University, Harvard University, Yale University, Princeton University, University of Chicago, Stanford University, University of Michigan, Brown University, Rutgers University, Duke University, University of California, Berkeley, University of Pennsylvania, Johns Hopkins University, Cornell University, Northwestern University, Vanderbilt University, New York University, Indiana University, University of Notre Dame, University of Virginia, University of Minnesota, University of Texas at Austin, University of Wisconsin–Madison, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Georgetown University, Boston University, Emory University, Princeton Theological Seminary, Yale Divinity School, Union Theological Seminary and other centers of scholarship. Its formation paralleled the publication of influential works by scholars connected to Harvard Divinity School, Princeton University Press, Oxford University Press, Cambridge University Press, University of Chicago Press, Columbia University Press, Johns Hopkins University Press, Rutgers University Press and other academic publishers.

Mission and research focus

The Center advances research on historical and contemporary interactions among denominations, movements, and public institutions, engaging topics associated with Second Great Awakening, Abolitionism, Temperance movement, Women's suffrage, Civil Rights Movement, Prohibition in the United States, New Deal, Cold War, Civil Rights Act of 1964, Vietnam War, Reagan administration, September 11 attacks, Patriot Act, Immigration and Nationality Act of 1965, Affordable Care Act, Supreme Court of the United States, and other landmark events and institutions. Faculty and fellows pursue comparative work linking archival collections from repositories such as Library of Congress, National Archives and Records Administration, American Antiquarian Society, Smithsonian Institution, Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, Newberry Library, Bodleian Library, Huntington Library, and hold fellowships with organizations such as American Academy of Arts and Sciences, Fulbright Program, Guggenheim Fellowship, National Endowment for the Humanities, National Endowment for the Arts.

Programs and initiatives

The Center sponsors graduate fellowships, postdoctoral appointments, public history projects, and digital humanities initiatives in collaboration with programs at Fordham University, Georgetown University, Temple University, University of Rochester, Syracuse University, Rutgers University–Newark, Princeton University, Yale University, and regional historical societies. It runs curricular partnerships with seminar series modeled on conferences like American Historical Association, Organization of American Historians, Society for American Music, American Sociological Association, American Anthropological Association, Modern Language Association, and topical networks tied to Religious Studies Association and denominational archives such as Presbyterian Church (USA), United Methodist Church, Roman Catholic Church, Southern Baptist Convention, Episcopal Church, Lutheran Church–Missouri Synod.

Publications and scholarly output

Faculty and affiliates publish monographs and edited volumes with Oxford University Press, Cambridge University Press, Princeton University Press, Harvard University Press, Yale University Press, University of Chicago Press, Columbia University Press, Rutgers University Press, and articles in journals such as Journal of American History, American Historical Review, Church History, Journal of the American Academy of Religion, Sociology of Religion, American Quarterly, Journal of Southern History, Ethnohistory and other leading periodicals. The Center produces working papers, digital archives, and edited series that intersect with projects funded by Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, MacArthur Foundation, Ford Foundation, Carnegie Corporation of New York, and Alfred P. Sloan Foundation.

Conferences, lectures, and public events

Regular events include annual conferences, invited lecture series, public symposia, and workshops that draw scholars, journalists, clergy, activists, and policymakers linked to institutions such as Pew Research Center, Public Religion Research Institute, The New York Times, The Washington Post, NPR, PBS, CNN, C-SPAN, Brookings Institution, Heritage Foundation, American Enterprise Institute, Center for American Progress, Brennan Center for Justice, Human Rights Watch, and civic organizations. Special panels have addressed intersections with cultural texts and figures including Uncle Tom's Cabin, To Kill a Mockingbird, Beloved (novel), The Grapes of Wrath, Invisible Man (novel), Native Son, and performances by artists connected to religious themes such as Bob Dylan, Aretha Franklin, Mahalia Jackson, Kurt Weill.

Partnerships and collaborations

The Center collaborates with archives, libraries, museums, seminaries, and denominational historical societies, creating joint projects with entities like Library Company of Philadelphia, Historic New England, Smithsonian Institution National Museum of American History, Museum of the City of New York, National Museum of African American History and Culture, American Jewish Historical Society, National Museum of American History, National Trust for Historic Preservation, and theological schools including Harvard Divinity School, Yale Divinity School, Union Theological Seminary, Princeton Theological Seminary, Candler School of Theology, Duke Divinity School, Vanderbilt Divinity School, and international partners at University of Oxford, University of Cambridge, University of Toronto, Australian National University, Leiden University.

Notable faculty and alumni

Affiliated scholars include historians and public intellectuals who have held positions or fellowships associated with Harvard University, Yale University, Princeton University, Columbia University, University of Chicago, Duke University, Vanderbilt University, Northwestern University, Rutgers University, Brown University, University of Michigan, Stanford University, Cornell University, Johns Hopkins University, Georgetown University, Emory University, Boston University, Notre Dame Seminary, and who have received awards such as the Pulitzer Prize, MacArthur Fellows Program, National Book Award, Guggenheim Fellowship, Bancroft Prize, Brewster Medal, Holberg Prize, National Humanities Medal, and fellowships from the National Endowment for the Humanities.

Category:Research institutes in the United States