Tag: Richard Newton


American Examples S04 E01: “Religion Scholars are not human”

Opening scene from Lauren Thompson's american examples video.

As an MA student in the “public humanities” core course at REL, Lauren Thompson observed a 2023 American Examples workshop. After making a video, she realized something about religion scholars: they’re inhuman. Read more to find out how and why! […]

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Humans and Nazis: Reevaluating the Conversation of Us and Them 

Kadence D. Jackson is a freshman majoring in Political Science and Religious Studies, along with a minor in Judaic Studies. “Evil, animals…,” “Devils, monsters, equivalent to Satan himself…”—these are expressions commonly used when we reference those who belonged to the National Socialist German Workers’ (Nazi) Party during the Second World War. This language is usually voiced casually, perhaps as a means of rationalization; but ironically, I believe it’s actually disassociating Nazis from mankind. […]

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Should I “Public Humanities”? A Process for Thinking about Whether to Get Involved

puddle with reflection of legs wearing converse sneakers

  The Event I recently hosted a two-day workshop with Richard Newton as part of the American Examples project. Our aim was to think about “public humanities” with the 12 participants in the 2021 cohort. The first day’s over-arching question was, “should I “PH?” I thought it might be useful to share the process that guided our session, since others may be asking that question, too. We planned this workshop with the assumption that none of the participants have a […]

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Faculty and Staff Honors 2021

Honors Day, last week, is an annual opportunity not just to celebrate student successes but also to recognize REL faculty and staff accomplishments. But, given our continued concern for hosting in-person events, we again relied on a video, created once again by Prof. Richard Newton (with the help of a variety of faculty), to celebrate another year — one full of challenges, to be sure, but one in which we saw the members of the Department going above and beyond […]

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New Titles in REL: Second Virtual Book Event (Zoom)

Cover art for Identifying Roots featuring a profile, Africa, and a slave ship.

Join us for another evening of conversation, this time hosted by REL’s own Dr. K. Merinda Simmons and celebrating the recent publication of another new title in REL, Identifying Roots: Alex Haley and the Anthropology of Scriptures, by Dr. Richard Newton. Due to pandemic protocols, our book events for Spring 2021 are virtual and open to guests both on and off campus. We invite you to join us virtually, via Zoom, on February 23, 2021, at 7 p.m. (US central time). […]

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New Titles in REL: Upcoming Zoom Event

Join us for an evening of conversation hosted by REL’s own Dr. Richard Newton to celebrate the publication of a new title in REL, Race and New Modernisms, co-authored by Dr. K. Merinda Simmons and Dr. James A. Crank (Department of English, University of Alabama) — a book that was a finalist for a 2020 PROSE book award (in the category of Literature). In past semesters we would have gathered in person at the local bookstore, Ernest & Hadley Booksellers, […]

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