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News From MC Religious Studies Faculty


Its been a busy year for MC Religious Studies Faculty. We've done our share of globetrotting--to France, England, Belgium, Italy, the Bahamas and the Dominican Republic--but we've also done plenty of hunkering down in Riverdale. We've been teaching and reading and writing and lecturing. We've planned symposia and launched new programs. We're ready for summer, too.

Below is a sampling of the things MC Religious Studies faculty have been up to:

Robert Geraci

  • Invited to include an essay in the exhibition catalogue for the PERSONA exhibit at the Museé du Quai Branly, an anthropological museum in Paris. The PERSONA exhibit revolves around the role of objects in our lives, and the ways in which objects take on lives of their own. My essay addressed the ways in which contemporary technology puts leverage on people, inclining them toward transhumanist notions of the self. The exhibition is ongoing in 2016, and the catalog was published in January.

  • I was awarded an American Academy of Religion Collaborative Research Grant for 2016. The grant, titled "Ayudha Puja in Academia and Industry," provides funding for me and Dr. Renny Thomas (Jesus & Mary College, New Delhi) to travel to Bangalore, India in October, 2016 and observe Ayudha Puja festivities. The festival, generally translated "worship of the machines" is a traditional South Indian festival in which tools are honored for their crucial role in human work.

  • On March 30, I will participate in the Rutgers University Geek Week, discussing my NSF-funded research and subsequent publications on Star Wars: The Old Republic. The discussion with students will be part of an evening of Star Wars themed activities, culminating in a showing of Star Wars: The Force Awakens.

  • On April 20, I will deliver the Kathryn Fraser Mackay Memorial Lecture at St. Lawrence University. My talk is entitled "Four Technicians of the Apocalypse: The Futurist Blend of Religion, Technology, and the End of the World."

Claudia Setzer

  • Claudia Setzer will be teaching a course with poet Judith Baumel on "American Women Writers and the Bible: Challenge to Orthodoxy" at the Conservative Synagogue Adath Israel of Riverdale, May 18, 25, June 1.

Natalia Imperatori-Lee

  • April 15: Dr. Imperatori-Lee will be speaking at the 25th Anniversary of FutureChurch on "Our Catholic Church: What Do We Tell Our Daughters?" Link: http://myemail.constantcontact.com/Just-a-few-seats-left---Join-FutureChurch-and-Natalia-Imperatori-Lee--Ph-D--for-an-exciting-event-in-New-York-City-----Our-Catho.html?soid=1101674625527&aid=K2P-OTlq2IY

  • April 19: Dr Imperatori-Lee will be on a panel at Fordham University. The event is entitled "Is the Pope Catholic?" and features Mr. Ross Douthat, Mr. Peter Steinfels, Ms. Alice Kearney Alwin along with Dr. Imperatori-Lee. Link: http://forever.fordham.edu/s/1362/rd/index.aspx?sid=1362&gid=1&pgid=315

Kevin Ahern:

This semester, Kevin Ahern gave several academic lectures on Catholic social ethics including:

  • “Let Justice Roll Down Like Water: Pope Francis and Water Ethics” on March 3rd, annual Focus the Nation Lecture at St. Leo’s University as part of the annual (Florida)

  • “The Ecological Common Good and the Globalization of Indifference” on March 17th at Vanderbilt University (Nashville, TN)

  • ·“Migration and Mercy in an Indifferent World” on March 30th, annual Newman Lecture at Gettysburg College

Peace Week: The Religious Studies Department Cosposred Peace Week with Manhattan College Peace Studies, which Dr. Ahern directs. Events included:

  • March 7th: Building a World Without Borders: Engineers and Peace

  • March 8th: The US Militarization of Korea: A Catholic Response with Fr. Mun Jeong Hyeon, Korean priest and peace activist, winner of the Gwangju Prize for Human Rights and Martha Hennessy, Catholic Worker, activist, and granddaughter of Dorothy Day

  • March 9th: The Psychology of Borders, with Dr. Nuwan Jayawickreme

  • March 10th: The Responsibility to Protect and the Future of Borders, The Cost of War Lecture with Dr. Simon Adams:

Book Review: Kevin Ahern’s new book, Structures of Grace: Catholic Originations Serving the Global Common Good was reviewed at America Magazine: http://americamagazine.org/media/books/structures-grace

Philip Francis:

For the 2015-2016 academic years, Prof. Francis is Fellow in the Humanities at the University of Pennsylvania Penn Humanities Forum.

This semester he organized a Penn Conference called: Geographies of Intimacy. He also gave a paper at the University of Pennsylvania Religious Studies Colloquium, and he gave a response paper at the Penn Humanities Forum.

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