RESEARCH
With an emphasis on student research, our faculty and student organizations offer support for conference preparation and travel to the regional and national levels.
Ongoing Research
Faculty in the department use a variety of methods and draw on various disciplinary frameworks and theories to study historical and contemporary manifestations of religions.
Religion, Health, and Humanity
Faculty engage in peer-reviewed and public research that bridges religion, health and humanity individually and in collaboration with community partners, including WellStar Health Systems and Compassion House for Living and Dying.
Humanistic Perspectives on Moral Injury
Dr. Kathryn McClymond, Dr. Andrew I. Cohen
Dr. Kathryn McClymond is co-editing a volume, Humanistic Perspectives on Moral Injury, with Dr. Andrew I. Cohen, which explores how the humanities can contribute to our understanding of and offer solutions to the trauma resulting from moral injury. Her work examines how veterans draw on traditional ritual practices as they respond to moral injury.
This line of research grows out of her broad interest in comparative ritual studies. She is also starting a new project examining quilts used in ritual activity and as artistic expressions of life cycle rituals. Dr. McClymond chairs the American Academy of Religion Futures Task Force and is an Executive Committee member of the American Society for the Study of Religion.
Hidden Histories: Faith and Black Lesbian Leadership
Dr. Monique Moultrie received a Columbia University Center on African-American Religion, Sexual Politics and Social Justice Rapid Response Grant to diversify her research project on Black lesbian religious leaders.
With this additional funding she plans to interview seven Black lesbian religious leaders from the Jewish, Buddhist, Muslim and African Traditional Religious Traditions. These interviews will complement the oral history interviews she conducted for her forthcoming manuscript Hidden Histories: Faith and Black Lesbian Leadership (Duke University Press).
Indigenous Religious Traditions in Five Minutes
Dr. Molly Bassett, Dr. Natalie Avalos
Dr. Molly Bassett and Dr. Natalie Avalos (Ethnic Studies, the University of Colorado at Boulder) are co-editing "Indigenous Religious Traditions in 5 Minutes," which will join other volumes in the “Religion in 5 Minutes” series founded and co-edited by Russell McCutcheon and Aaron Hughes. More than 25 scholars from around the world will answer questions, including:
- What moral responsibilities do scholars and students have in studying indigenous religions?
- What role does healing play in Native American and indigenous religious traditions?
- How does race shape the way we see and understand Native American religious life?
- Do all Native Americans practice the same ceremonies as one another?
- What are ancestor spirits and what role do they play in Hawaiian religious life?
Religious Life Stories Project
The Department of Religious Studies is cooperating with the University Library Special Collections & Archives to collect and preserve the religious life stories of metro Atlanta residents. This project seeks to expand the available data on the religious and spiritual lives of individuals and acknowledge the diversity and complexity in American religious lives. The 90-minute interviews invite the narrators to speak about their religious lives chronologically, starting with their childhoods and continuing to the present. The interviews are loosely structured to allow the narrators to discuss and emphasize those elements of their lives they feel are important to the understanding of their religiosity. The narrators describe their religiosity within the context of their unique life experiences, giving us stories that reflect not only their religious communities but the personal, social and historical settings of their lives.
Want to have your story recorded? Email us at [email protected], and a member of our research team will set up your interview, either on campus or at your home. The interviews (generally 90 minutes) are informal conversations. You will receive a digital recording of your conversation. The original interview recording and transcription will be stored in the University Library Special Collections, where it will be available to researchers.
For further information, contact Dr. Kathryn McClymond or Dr. David Bell.
Our Faculty Publications
Our faculty has published several well-known books in the field of religious studies over the last decade.
Religion and Public Life Fellow
The fellowship is for a professional who works in the media, politics, the corporate world, the arts or a non-profit organization and will explore how religion plays a role in their profession.
WellStar Graduate Fellowship
The fellowship supports a master's-level student preparing for work in the healthcare professions with a grounding in religion, ethics and cultural literacy.
Contact Us
The Department of Religious Studies
Office Hours (Available Remotely):
Monday - Friday
8:30 a.m. - 5:15 p.m.
Office Hours (In Person):
By appointment
Department Chair
Director of Undergraduate Studies
Director of Graduate Studies
Department Specialist
Department Specialist
Office/Delivery Address
Department of Religious Studies
Georgia State University
25 Park Place, Suite 1700
Atlanta, GA 30303
Mailing Address:
Department of Religious Studies
Georgia State University
P.O. Box 3994
Atlanta, GA 30302-3994