In Memoriam: Dale A. Johnson (1936 – 2014)

Last updated on: August 27, 2014 at 1:17 am By Miles Mullin

Feeling a vocational calling to teach, I completed all of the graduate school application necessaries in the fall of 2000. I secured recommendations letters, practiced and sat for the GRE, wrote essays, ordered transcripts, and made contact with potential supervisors at the schools to which I considering applying. Fatigued from the process and the other demands on my time, I considered not completing my application to Vanderbilt’s Graduate Department of Religion. At the eleventh hour, however, I completed my application,... Read more

Choosing a research topic

Last updated on: August 25, 2014 at 9:47 am By Thomas Kidd

Philip Jenkins’ recent post on choosing a subject for a book or research project is well worth your time. If there’s anyone who knows how to pick a topic, it is Professor Jenkins! From my own time in a Master’s and Ph.D. program, through the present as I advise Baylor doctoral students, I am mindful of the challenge of picking a good topic, especially when you are just starting as a researching scholar. The dynamics of picking a topic change... Read more

She Treasured It In Her Heart

Last updated on: August 25, 2014 at 8:10 am By Philip Jenkins

I’m wondering when it is possible to argue from silence when reading historical sources, and particularly in a Biblical context. I have been writing recently on the Virgin Mary in early Christianity, and was initially taken aback to find how even I tended to attribute statements to the wrong gospel, and thus the wrong historical tradition (and I have been busy in these matters for some years). It just underlined for me the problem all Bible readers have of overcoming... Read more

Finding a Subject

Last updated on: August 25, 2014 at 8:45 am By Philip Jenkins

Beth Barr, Tommy Kidd and myself have all been posting on the subject of writing and publishing, particularly of academic books. All of us trod lightly on one of the most important aspects of all, namely how someone goes about choosing a topic in the first place. In some cases, it’s easy. You might for instance find a key event that has not been covered in the recent past, or a significant historical figure who is long overdue for a... Read more

Writing in the In-Between

Last updated on: August 15, 2014 at 2:01 pm By Thomas Kidd

Today’s guest post is from Dr. Beth Allison Barr, Associate Professor of History at Baylor University. She writes on women, gender, and religion in late medieval England, and is the author of The Pastoral Care of Women in Late Medieval England. She tweets at @bethallisonbarr. I intended to write 1000 words yesterday. I began at 8:15 in the morning. I had already run five miles; the kids had eaten breakfast and were playing with Legos (which I hoped would continue for another... Read more

Notes to Freshmen on Mystery and the Liberal Arts

Last updated on: August 19, 2014 at 8:52 pm By David Swartz

At Asbury University, where I teach, the fall semester is already ramping up. After welcoming nearly 400 new students to campus last Tuesday for orientation, we didn’t waste any time starting up academic conversations. All incoming students are reading G.K. Chesterton’s mystery thriller The Man Who Was Thursday for their liberal arts seminar, which met each day of orientation in both small group and plenary sessions. What follows are notes of my concluding plenary address. *** A few years ago... Read more

Hating One’s Enemy in Early America

Last updated on: August 18, 2014 at 2:01 pm By Thomas Kidd

1755 was one of the bleakest years in the history of Britain’s American colonies. That year, Britain launched a massive campaign to stop French aggression in the Ohio river valley, in the early stages of the Seven Years’ War (also known as the French and Indian War). Benjamin Franklin tried to warn British General Edward Braddock about the “ambuscades of Indians, who, by constant practice, are dexterous in laying and executing them.” But Braddock smiled “at my ignorance,” Franklin wrote, and... Read more

On the Selfie and the Self

Last updated on: August 17, 2014 at 1:47 pm By Agnes Howard

This summer a relative put aside resistance and got his first smartphone, soon after sending us a picture of himself taken with his phone, captioned: “My First Facie.” Initial mirth over this mistaken terminology—“facie” instead of “selfie”—gave way to conviction that his was, in fact, the much better word. That strange new-ish cultural form the selfie is usually a picture of the face, sometimes captured in an odd expression, sometimes decorated with the presence of others or an interesting backdrop.... Read more

An Interview with Mark Cheathem, Author of Andrew Jackson, Southerner

Last updated on: August 12, 2014 at 1:31 pm By Thomas Kidd

Mark Cheathem is associate professor of history at Cumberland University. His book, Andrew Jackson, Southerner (Louisiana State University Press) framed this interview with guest blogger David George Moore. Dave blogs at www.twocities.org. Dave is author most recently of The Last Men’s Book You’ll Ever Need (B & H Publications). [DM] What circumstances led you to tackle this project? [MC] While finishing my first book, Old Hickory’s Nephew: The Political and Private Struggles of Andrew Jackson Donelson, I began looking for... Read more

Bonhoeffer Biography a Masterpiece

Last updated on: August 13, 2014 at 11:34 pm By johnturner

Charles Marsh’s Strange Glory: A Life of Dietrich Bonhoeffer has received much attention since its release several months back, partlyfor two reasons. First, Marsh discusses Bonhoeffer’s apparently homoerotic relationship with Eberhard Bethge at considerable length. For a figure beloved by many American Christians themselves uneasy with same-sex attraction, this is controversial terrain. Second, Marsh’s biography follows Eric Metaxas’s Bonhoeffer in relatively short order, thus attracting inevitable comparisons. For the most part, though, Strange Glory has received the praise it deserves.... Read more