Leadership Team: PUBLIC scholarship
2020
“Why I Joined Elizabeth Warren’s Interfaith Advisory Council,” Religion News Service (27 February 2020)
“World Religions: Shall We Not,” Keeping It 101: A Killjoy’s Introduction to Religion (26 February 2020)
“Fireside Chats with Rumi: Love, Suffering, and Illumination,” Sufi Heart (21 February 2020)
“Major Religions? Minor Religions? Must We?” Keeping It 101: A Killjoy’s Introduction to Religion (12 February 2020)
“The Public Writing Life: the Venue, the Pitch, and the Fee,” Chronicle of Higher Education (12 February 2020)
“Abusing Religion: Michelle Remembers and the Satanic Panic,” The Revealer (4 February 2020)
Fauja Singh Keeps Going, forthcoming from Penguin Random House (February 2020)
“Who Gets Left Out of ‘Religion?’” Keeping It 101: A Killjoy’s Introduction to Religion (29 January 2020)
“Begin Again,” Women in Higher Education (29 January 2020)
“Expanded Travel Ban Gives World's Democracies More Cover for Anti-Muslim Measures,” Religion News Service (28 January 2020)
“Mandeep Rai's Book on Business Collects the Spiritual Wisdom of 101 Countries,” Religion News Service (23 January 2020)
“Making Real Change with Shannon Watts,” Spirited (22 January 2020)
“Reimagining Hagar,” Ancient Jew Review (20 January 2020)
“Raising Resistance: One Woman’s Playbook for Overthrowing the Patriarchy,” Signs (19 January 2020)
“Embracing ‘We’ with Jagmeet Singh,” Spirited (15 January 2020)
“What the Heck Is Religion, and What the Heck Is this Podcast?” Keeping It 101: A Killjoy’s Introduction to Religion (15 January 2020)
“US, Iran Step Back from the Brink; Region Still on Edge,” WTTW (8 January 2020)
“Paying It Forward with Rabia Chaudry,” Spirited (8 January 2020)
“The Story of the Black King Among the Magi,” Hyperallergic (6 January 2020)
“Behind the Tensions between Muslims and Sikhs in Punjab,” Religion News Service (3 January 2020)
2019
“I Hope,” Women in Higher Education (31 December 2019)
“On Self-Care and Risks,” Women in Higher Education (31 December 2019)
“Religion and Politics,” WHYY (19 December 2019)
“Evangelism and Religious Supremacy,” Religion News Service (19 December 2019)
“How Colonialism Still Colors Our Ideas about Who Gets to Teach Religion,” Religion News Service (19 December 2019)
“Bridging Divides with Rabbi Brad Hirschfield,” Spirited (18 December 2019)
“Manifesting Empathy with Abdul El-Sayed,” Spirited (11 December 2019)
“Pious Fashion and Muslim Women,” Classical Ideas Podcast (6 December 2019)
“Fighting For Justice with Charlotte Clymer,” Spirited (4 December 2019)
“More than Success,” Women in Higher Education (2 December 2019)
“Keeping It Real with Rev. Dr. Amy Butler,” Spirited (27 November 2019)
“Faith Could Bring Us Together. But Too Often It Divides Us,” CNN (23 November 2019)
“Trusting Yourself to Lead with Cecilia Muñoz,” Spirited (20 November 2019)
“Before We Can Rein in Hate Crime, We Have to Admit the Size of the Problem,” Religion News Service (18 November 2019)
“Talking Honestly About Legacy and Grace with Serene Jones,” Spirited (15 November 2019)
“Why Did a Muslim Civil Rights Group Oppose Democrats’ Plans to Confront White Nationalism?” Religion Dispatches (15 November 2019)
“Remembering History’s Truth with Mark Charles,” Spirited (8 November 2019)
“550 Years after His Birth, A Reflection on the Life of Guru Nanak,” Religion News Service (8 November 2019)
“Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel,” Sufi Heart (6 November 2019)
“Punching Up, Not Kicking Down with Hari Kondabolu,” Spirited (1 November 2019)
“Feeling like an Impostor,” Women in Higher Education (30 October 2019)
“Defying Limits with Rep. IIhan Omar,” Spirited (25 October 2019)
“More than 1 Billion People Celebrate on Diwali. What Does It Mean to Them?” Religion News Service (18 October 2019)
“The Penn State Hair Letter Controversy Shows How Being Black and Proud Is Still Political,” NBC Think (9 October 2019)
“Jagmeet Singh's Civility Is Praiseworthy, but Even Nice Racism Is Still Racism,” Religion News Service (4 October 2019)
“Citation Matters,” Women in Higher Education (30 September 2019)
“White Evangelicals Love Trump and Aren't Confused about Why. No One Should Be,” NBC Think (27 September 2019)
“Risks and Rewards of Doing Work in Public,” Women in Higher Education (10 Sept 2019)
“We Are Not All the Same, and in Our Difference We Are Divine,” Religion News Service (30 August 2019)
“Why Trump—and Some of His Followers—Believe He Is the Chosen One,” Religion News Service (23 August 2019)
“Open Letter: Against the New Nationalism,” Commonweal (19 August 2019)
“Anti-Christian Attacks in Nigeria Threaten Precarious Balance of Faiths,” Religion News Service (8 August 2019)
“AOC Isn't Nancy Pelosi's Problem. Trump Is, and He Keeps Proving iIt,” NBC Think (15 July 2019)
“The Conference of the Birds, Part 2,” Sufi Heart (8 July 2019)
“Dangerous Logic at the Border: Religion and the Travel Ban” Religion & Politics (2 July 2019)
“On Pride and against Prejudice,” Sisters of Mercy (25 June 2019)
“Vatican’s ‘Dumbed Down Version of an Old Argument’ on Gender Can’t Stop Changes in Catholicism,” Religion Dispatches (25 June 2019)
“James Cone, the Father of Black Theology,” America (8 June 2019)
“The Conference of the Birds,” Sufi Heart (17 June 2019)
“Abusing Religion: Race, Islam, and Not Without My Daughter,” The Revealer (29 May 2019)
“Feminist Theologians Bring Wisdom to Fiction,” National Catholic Reporter (29 May 2019)
“Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s Message for Today,” Sufi Heart (21 May 2019)
“Pope Francis Dithering about Women, Skittish about Cops,” Religion Dispatches (15 May 2019)
“Coming to Terms With Mental Illness,” Women in Higher Education (30 April 2019)
“Asma Uddin: If We Deprive Islam of Its Status as a Religion, All Religion Is Threatened,” Religion News Service (30 April 2019)
“World’s Oldest Marathoner, at 108, Is a Model of More than Simply Stamina,” Religion News Service (22 April 2019)
“On Vaisakhi, Making the Spiritual and Long Ago Immediate and Personal,” Religion News Service (12 April 2019)
“D.C. Has Its First Black Archbishop, but What Took So Long? Look to the History of Black U.S. Catholicism,” Washington Post (4 April 2019)
“Women Are Fully Human Agents of Social, Political Change,” National Catholic Reporter (3 April 2019)
“Learning How to Not Give a Fox,” Women in Higher Education (2 April 2019)
“Discussing Pious Fashion and Muslim Dress beyond the Headscarf,” Religious Studies Project (1 April 2019)
“NBA Star Enes Kanter on Faith, Basketball and Political Activism,” Religion News Service (28 March 2019)
“It’s beyond Time to Stop Sexual Harassment in the Workplace,” Tallahassee Democrat (27 March 2019)
“Finding Compassion Amid Chaos,” Sufi Heart (25 March 2019)
“Challenges and Responsibilities for the Public Scholar of Religion,” Religious Studies Project (25 March 2019)
“The Conflation of Antisemitism and Israel Criticism Isn’t Unique, But It Is a Problem,” Religion Dispatches (19 March 2019)
“Jess Hilarious Profiled Four Sikhs on a Plane. Our Government Does So Every Day,” Religion News Service (18 March 2019)
“Mysticism in the Modern Age,” Sufi Heart (17 March 2019)
“To Battle the Hate that Invaded Two New Zealand Mosques, Start in the Schoolroom,” Religion News Service (15 March 2019)
“As UN Considers Status of Women, It’s Time for the Vatican to Take Its Rightful Place,” Religion Dispatches (13 March 2019)
“How 9/11 Spurred New Jersey’s Sikh Attorney General into Public Service,” Religion News Service (8 March 2019)
“Navigating (or Not) the Tightrope,” Women in Higher Education (1 March 2019)
“Rome Has Spoken and Rome Is Finished: The Vatican’s Sexual Abuse Summit ‘Failed Miserably,’” Religion Dispatches (27 February 2019)
“The Private Faith of Black Public Figures, from Ethel Waters to Muhammad Ali,” Religion & Politics (26 February 2019)
“Abusing Religion: Polygyny, Mormonisms, and Under the Banner of Heaven,” The Revealer (20 February 2019)
“Religious Studies and the #MeToo Movement: Tips for Sharing Scholarship with the Public,” Religious Freedom Center (19 February 2019)
“Meet Sadaf Jaffer, America’s First Female Muslim Mayor,” Religion News Service (14 February 2019)
“Absent an Imam, Domineque Ray’s Execution by Alabama Disenfranchises Muslims,” Religion News Service (13 February 2019)
“Religion and Public Scholarship in the Age of Anger,” University of Colorado, Boulder (12 February 2019)
“Prosperity, Politics, and Pentecostal Power in Nigeria,” Center for the Study of Religion and Conflict (12 February 2019)
“Blackface: Past and Present,” WHYY (12 February 2019)
“Kharaqani, the Saint Who Breathed with God,” Sufi Heart (8 February 2019)
“Vatican Sexual Abuse Meeting Is Destined to Fail—To Stop the Problem or the Decline,” Religion Dispatches (5 February 2019)
“The Productivity Trap,” Women in Higher Education (1 February 2019)
“Why Sikhs Don’t Throw Muslims under the Bus,” Religion News Service (28 January 2019)
“Rekindling Our Tenderness,” Sufi Heart (15 January 2019)
“Heavenly Bodies Was the Most Popular Exhibit in the History of the Met: Here’s Why That’s a Problem,” Religion Dispatches (11 January 2019)
“Honoring The Memory of Lamin Sanneh, Yale Divinity School Expert on World Christianity,” Religion News Service (8 January 2019)
“What I Learned Teaching Islamic Studies in Texas,” Religion News Service (4 January 2019)
“Stay Mad,” Women in Higher Education (4 January 2019)
“Learned Societies Need Anti-Harassment Policies,” Women in Higher Education (3 January 2019)
“Dear Nancy Pelosi: A Hijab Is Not a Hat,” Religion News Service (3 January 2019)
2018
“Practice of Compassion,” Sufi Heart (27 December 2018)
“India’s Conviction of a Mass Killer Falls Short of Justice,” Religion News Service (20 December 2018)
“Simran Jeet Singh: American Sikhs Will Begin to Conquer the Skeletons in Their Closet,” Religion News Service (20 December 2018)
“Religious Studies, Sexuality, and Religious Freedom: Tips for Sharing Scholarship with the Public,” Religious Freedom Center (12 December 2018)
“New Film Profiles Boxer Pardeep Singh Nagra and His Fight for Religious Freedom,” Religion News Service (4 December 2018)
“Learning to Slack,” Women in Higher Education (3 December 2018)
“A Practice of Love,” Sufi Heart (30 November 2018)
“Eugene Peterson and the Imperative of Biblical Literacy,” Religion & Politics (27 November 2018)
“Welcome Muslim Congresswomen by Dropping Ban on Headwear,” Religion News Service (20 November 2018)
“FBI’s New Hate Crime Report Captures an America Changed by Hate,” Religion News Service (13 November 2018)
“Three Things We Can Learn from Contemporary Muslim Women’s Fashion,” The Conversation (5 November 2018)
“Believe Women,” Women in Higher Education (1 November 2018)
“Dear America: Please Stop Expecting Us to Whitewash Our Names,” Religion News Service (24 October 2018)
“Welcoming the Tranquil Soul Back to the Divine,” Sufi Heart (23 October 2018)
“Religious Studies in Social Media: Promising Venues for Public Scholarship,” Religious Freedom Center (18 October 2018)
“To Overcome Patriarchy, Men First Have to See It in Themselves,” Religion News Service (3 October 2018)
“The Flame of Justice,” Sufi Heart (2 October 2018)
“Why We Must Hold Law Enforcement Officials Accountable for Racism,” Religion News Service (26 September 2018)
“Sacredness of Love,” Sufi Heart (13 September 2018)
“Catholics Are Facing a Very Real Emergency,” Religion Dispatches (29 August 2018)
“Real Change against Abuse Starts with Church's Clergy/Lay Structure,” National Catholic Reporter (21 August 2018)
“The Path of Radical Love,” Sufi Heart (19 August 2018)
“The Grand Jury Report about Catholic Priest Abuse in Pennsylvania Shows the Church Is a Criminal Syndicate,” NBC Think (15 August 2018)
“Who Are the Sikhs and What Are Their Beliefs?,” The Conversation (9 August 2018)
“Democrats Will Lose In 2018 If They Don’t Shut Up About Civility And Shout About Our Democracy Dying,” NBC Think (15 July 2018)
“A Catholic Trifecta of Disgrace: Next Step in Abuse Saga Is Due,” National Catholic Reporter (20 July 2018)
“Religion and Its Publics,” The Square (July 2018)
“The Border President,” Boston Review (28 June 2018)
“Finding Radical Love in Ancient Islamic Poetry,” The State of Things, WUNC (14 June 2018)
“Earth to Planet Catholic: Francis Papacy Is No Picnic,” Religion Dispatches (6 June 2018)
“Sowing the Seed: An Interview with Dr. Nyasha Junior,” Sowing the Seed (June 2018)
“This Woman is Giving a Voice to Muslims in the #MeToo Movement,” Teen Vogue (26 June 2018)
“This Ramadan 'Believers Bail Out' Wants Muslims to Address Prison Abolition,” Teen Vogue (11 June 2018)
“Trump Pardons the Hammonds, Arsonists Who Inspired Bundy Standoff,” Religion Dispatches (11 July 2018)
“Kavanaugh’s ‘Jesuitical’ Response to ‘Abomination’ of ‘Roe v. Wade’ in 2006,” Religion Dispatches (10 July 2018)
“Thoughts from The Lorraine Motel on the 50th Anniversary of Dr. King's Death,” Duke Today (5 April 2018)
“The Gender Politics of White Supremacy,” Women in Higher Education (4 April 2018)
“Billy Graham and the Gospel of American Nationalistic Christianity,” Religion Dispatches (22 February 2018)
“Does Religious Freedom Favor Some Religions Over Others?” U.S. Catholic (31 January 2018)
“Sikh Professor and Activist Talks Racism, Running, and His Faith,” Congregation, Huffington Post (6 January 2018)
2017
“When The Church’s LGBTIQ Loss Is the World’s Gain,” Religion Dispatches (21 December 2017)
“The Formation of ‘Religio-Racial’ Identity,” AAS21 (Princeton, 14 December 2017)
“The Cheap Prosperity Gospel of Trump and Osteen,” New York Times (30 August 2017)
“Sarsour Struggle For Justice: It Is Our Duty To Think Harder Or Sit Down,” The Maydan.com (7 August 2017)
“5 Years after Sikh Attack, Extremism Still Isn't Taken Seriously Enough,” CNN (5 August 2017)
“4 Lessons from My First Time Doing Civil Disobedience,” Auburn (28 July 2017)
“To Celebrate Father’s Day I’m Supporting the National Bail Out,” Auburn (17 June 2017)
“The Artifacts of White Supremacy,” Religion and Culture Forum (14 June 2017)
“Theorizing Religion in the Age of Trump,” Equinox Pub (16 May 2017)
“Trump’s Immigration Order Means Bureaucrats Have to Decide Who’s a ‘Real’ Christian,” Washington Post (8 February 2017)
“A Sample Letter to Send to Your Muslim Neighbors,” Huffington Post (27 January 2017)
“Religion on Display at the National Museum of African American History and Culture,” Sacred Matters (3 January 2017)
2016
“Academics Are Under Attack. Conservatives Are Trying To Undermine Free Speech,” The Guardian (2 December 2016)
“Breaking Silence on Abortion And Faith,” Auburn (18 November 2016)
“White Collar Supremacy,” New York Times (25 November 2016)
2015 & earlier
“Planning for Healing as Others Plan for Destruction,” Religion and Ethics Weekly, PBS (25 November 2015)
“Black Church Taught Me How to Be Black,” Buzzfeed (23 June 2015)
“Why Some Black Women Don't Call Themselves Feminists,” Washington Post (24 February 2015)
“Post-Racial America? The Tangle of Race, Religion, and Citizenship,” Religion & Politics (24 October 2012)