Dear SAR Community,
As we move into February and inch closer to the 2025 SAR Biennial Conference (June 21–23 at U.C. Santa Barbara), we have several important announcements and deadlines to share. Read ahead, please. This year’s theme, Religiosities, Ecologies, and Environmentalisms in the Age of the Anthropocene promises thought-provoking discussions and engaging scholarship. I look forward to seeing many of you there!
Best,
Shahana Munazir
PhD Candidate in Anthropology, UW-Madison
Society for the Anthropology of Religion
Section of the American Anthropological Association
16th February 2025
News and Announcements
SAR Biennial Conference June 2025
Late-Breaking Paper Submissions:
If you have recently completed research or wish to present on current global or U.S. events in the Anthropology of Religion, submit your Late-Breaking Paper or Panel Proposal by March 15, 2025. Submit here.
Dormitory Accommodations:
To help with lodging costs, affordable on-campus dormitory rooms are available at UCSB. Priority registration deadline: April 15, 2025. Register here
Workshops for Graduate Students and Early Career Scholars
We are hosting three workshops designed specifically for graduate students and early-career scholars. Each workshop has a capacity of up to 24 participants (on a first-come, first-served basis), and attendees are welcome to join more than one. Please use this link to sign up for any of these events after you have registered for the conference with AAA.
- Graduate & Early-Career Scholar Workshops: Three specialized workshops will be offered at the conference, including sessions on grants and the job market, academic publishing, and engaging with popular media. Navigating Grants and the Job Market — Prof. Angie Heo (Univ. of Chicago) and Prof. Joe Blankholm (UC Santa Barbara)
- Academic Publishing — Prof. Daromir Rudnyckyj (University of Victoria, B.C.) and Hillary Kaell (McGill Univ., editor of Contemporary Anthropology of Religion Book Series with Palgrave Macmillan Press)
- Engaging with Popular Media and Publishing in Newspapers/Magazines — Prof. Hannah H. Gould (Univ. of Melbourne)
Early Bird Registration deadline: Feb. 20, 2025
All attendees at the 2025 SAR Biennial Conference must register. This registration fee covers two lunches and one dinner/reception with alcohol. It also covers our conference room and equipment rentals, and Keynote speaker and Plenary Session costs. The Conference dinner, Keynote, and Plenary all take place on June 23, so please be sure to stay through the night of Jun 23, 2025.
Click here to register for the SAR Biennial Conference
Scholars without papers to present are welcome to attend the SAR Biannual Conference, so long as they register.
Registration Fees:
For SAR Members Early Bird Registration:
Non-Student/Professional – $160
Student – $60
International-based Professional (traveling from abroad); Contingent Employment – $30
For Non-SAR Members and Non-Early Bird SAR Members
Non-Student/Professional – $185
Student – $70
International-based Professional (traveling from abroad); Contingent Employment – $45
To join SAR or renew your membership, please go to the American Anthropological Association’s registration site and select SAR as one of your sections. (Note that membership in AAA is required to join SAR.)
Travel Grants:
The Society for the Anthropology of Religion (SAR) will make up to five (5) awards of US $450 each to underrepresented and financially needy scholars and Ph.D. students who: 1) are members of AAA and SAR; 2) will be attending and presenting a paper for the 2025 SAR Biennial Conference in Santa Barbara.
To apply, please fill out the form at this link by Saturday, March 15, 2025.
We need:
- An accepted abstract for the SAR Biannual Conference
- A personal statement outlining your current position/status, your doctoral degree date (or expected) and granting institution, your current employment, and explaining why you fit the terms of the travel grant (300 words maximum)
- A 2-page c.v.
Conference T-Shirts:
Conference T-shirts are thick 100% cotton, in two colors: Green and Yellow, Sizes S, M, L, and XL. They carry the logo of a humpback whale breaching out of the ocean, with a Channel Island on the horizon. All proceeds go to support SAR activities, including travel grants for financially needy attendees. $22 per shirt, pick up at Conference site. Purchase when you register for the SAR Biennial Conference:
Click here to purchase SAR Biennial Conference T-Shirt
New Books and Articles
Death in a Foreign Land: Turkish Muslim Exiles and the Making of Theodicy
January 2025
Shively Kim
Journal of the American Academy of Religion
The Mormon Archive’s First Ten Thousand Years: Infrastructure, Materiality, Ontology, and Resurrection in Religious Transhumanism
January 2025
Jon Bialecki
Comparative Studies in History and Society, Cambridge University Press
Khidmat as Understanding: Muslim Women, Marriage, and Ethics of Care in Muslim Households
December 2024
Shahana Munazir
South Asia Multidisciplinary Academic Journal
Muslim Women in India: Challenging Boundaries, Negotiating Spaces
December 2024
Usha Sanyal and Nazima Parveen
South Asia Multidisciplinary Academic Journal
Religious Sounds Beyond the Global North: Senses, Media and Power
November 2024
Carola E. Lorea and Rosalind I.J. Hackett
Amsterdam University Press
To Each Their Own’: Destined Difference, (In)commensurability, and the Discursive Mediation of Christian Spiritual Warfare in Northwestern Madagascar
October 2024
Seth Palmer
Journal of Religion in Africa
Mirrors of the Past: Time and Historical Consciousness in Contemporary Western Astrology
October 2024
Omri Elisha
Comparative Studies in Society and History, Cambridge University Press
Goddess Beyond Boundaries: Worshipping the Eternal Mother at a North American Hindu Temple
September 2024
Tracy Pintchman
Oxford University Press
Call for Proposals and Opportunities
1) Annual Conference, American Academy of Religion
Proposal Submission Deadline: March 3rd, 2025
- AAR is offering two (2) Annual Meetings in 2025: The Online June Sessions, June 24-26 with a pre-conference day on June 23; and the In-person Annual Meeting, November 22-25 in Boston, MA with a pre-conference day on November 21.
- The Call for Proposals is now open from January 27 until March 3, 2025. Submit here
2) Annual Conference, American Anthropological Association: Theme “Ghosts”
Nov 19-23 2025 at New Orleans
Executive Call for Submissions: Deadline Feb 26th, 2025
3) Conference entitled In the Shadow of Malcolm X: Islam and the Black Radical Tradition, will take place at the Museum of Black Civilizations in Dakar Senegal, from May 19-21, 2025. The conference, which will mark the centennial of Malcolm X’s birth, will also explore the rich and storied intersections of Islam and the Black Radical Tradition.