Matter and Spirit: Ecology and the Non-Human Turn

“The periwinkle is blooming but I’m looking here.” Professor Don Pfister said with amusement, redirecting a group of thirty, rain-gear clad participants to look away from the delicate purple-blue flowers to where green lichen had formed between bricks on...

Over the years, the Center for the Study of World Religions (CSWR) has encouraged student-led reading groups that center around a topic, author, or text. Groups meet twice monthly throughout the academic year. Reading groups have included, The Divine...

It has been another rich year of programming at the CSWR, much of it centering around the Transcendence and Transformation initiative – about to enter its third year. We were pleased to host a fascinating cohort of T&T affiliates, including visiting...

Wednesday, April 26, 2023 - As part of the T&T Gnoseologies Series, CSWR Research Associate Giovanna Parmigiani engages in a fascinating conversation with Black Feminist ethnographer and African diaspora studies scholar, Assitant Professor N. Fadeke...

Residents at the CSWR are scholars deeply committed to the study of religion. Below, we spoke with Matthew J. Dillon, a Transcendence and Transformation Postdoctoral Fellow historian of religions with a focus on mystical and gnostic currents in...

Artist and author Rachel Sussman shares her physical, intellectual, and spiritual journey around the world and through time-space. FULL TRANSCRIPT: [MUSIC PLAYING] All right, thank you so much. So good evening and welcome to the Center for the Study of...

Graham Harvey, professor of religious studies at The Open University (UK), discusses animism and how our relations are damaged by ongoing efforts to separate (human) culture from ‘nature’ and humans from other species. Engaging with Indigenous knowledges...

Michael Marder discusses the paradox of “excessive heat” that, on the one hand, signals the ardency of faith and the love of God and, on the other, the effect of sin configured as ariditas (dryness), undoing viriditas (the greening green, a self...

Author, activist, and farmer Leah Penniman discusses the movement for food sovereignty and building a food system based on justice, dignity, and abundance for all members of our community. FULL TRANSCRIPT: Good evening, everyone. Good evening. Good...

“We always begin by thanking our ancestors,” said Leah Penniman, a Black Kreyol farmer and food justice activist, at the start of her September 17 talk, “Farming While Black: African Diasporic Wisdom for Farming and Food Justice,” hosted by the Center for...