Constructing Data in Religious Studies - Examining the Architecture of the Academy - Leslie Dorrough Smith

Constructing Data in Religious Studies - Examining the Architecture of the Academy - Leslie Dorrough Smith

The Gatekeeping Rhetoric of Collegiality in the Study of Religion

Constructing Data in Religious Studies - Examining the Architecture of the Academy - Leslie Dorrough Smith

Russell T. McCutcheon [+-]
University of Alabama
Russell T. McCutcheon is University Research Professor and, for 18 years, was the Chair of the Department of Religious Studies at the University of Alabama. He has written on problems in the academic labor market throughout his 30-year career and helped to design and run Alabama’s skills-based M.A. in religion in culture. Among his recent work is the edited resource for instructors, Teaching in Religious Studies and Beyond (Bloomsbury 2024).
Aaron W. Hughes [+-]
University of Rochester
Aaron W. Hughes is the Dean’s Professor of the Humanities and the Philip S. Bernstein Professor in the Department of Religion and Classics at the University of Rochester. His research and publications focus on both Jewish philosophy and Islamic Studies. He has authored numerous books, including Situating Islam: The Past and Future of an Academic Discipline (Equinox, 2007); Theorizing Islam: Disciplinary Deconstruction and Reconstruction (Equinox, 2012); Muslim Identities: An Introduction to Islam (Columbia, 2012); and Abrahamic Religions: On the Uses and Abuses of History (Oxford, 2012). He currently serves as the editor of the journal Method and Theory in the Study of Religion.

Description

Using as a test case the membership requirements of a longstanding private association for scholars of religion—but also noting such other diverse sites as tenure and promotion criteria and ongoing debates on method in the study of religion—this article examines the practical, gatekeeping function of the discourse on collegiality as it is practiced in the academic study of religion. Given its generally undefined nature and undisclosed criteria, this value is argued to conserve an orthodoxy in the field, inasmuch as it can be used in the service of unprofessional criteria that are strategically useful in patrolling the boundaries of dominant discourses.

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Citation

McCutcheon, Russell; Hughes, Aaron. The Gatekeeping Rhetoric of Collegiality in the Study of Religion. Constructing Data in Religious Studies - Examining the Architecture of the Academy. Equinox eBooks Publishing, United Kingdom. p. 267-291 Oct 2019. ISBN 9781781796764. https://www.equinoxpub.com/home/view-chapter/?id=34188. Date accessed: 23 Nov 2024 doi: 10.1558/equinox.34188. Oct 2019

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