guys i promised some news and here it is... I'm writing another book. Look for VIOLENCE: A CHRISTIAN HISTORY in bookstores in late 2027/ early 2028

On MLK Day, just re-upping this detail from a little-known speech King gave in 1966. It also includes this passage, where King says this line: "I think the earth is the Lord's, and since we didn't make these things by ourselves, we must share them with each other."

This is pure, unabashed bigotry. If a politician said this about any other faith, they would rightfully be run out of their party. But this kind of despicable anti-Muslim rhetoric is so normalized that a sitting Senator uses it without consequence. A stain on our Congress.

It's been just over a year since many academics and sociology folks came over to Bluesky. Thought Id share for some more community building and the later arrivals. Feel free to add other sections and areas to the list and or request to be added to any packs!

The religious left: Still a thing.

While our first 5 episodes stuck pretty closely to the series, the 6th is the one where @derekgottliebphd.com and I get into the bigger questions Chernobyl can answer, including about how the fascism in the US right now is rooted in both new and old lies. podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/6...

Dartmouth College, where I teach, is offering faculty grants to *incentivize* adding genAI to courses. Doubly-depressing, because in addition to the pro-AI stance there’s an astonishing failure to recognize that AI is already on courses, that cheating is incredibly common.

Who wants to move to NYC for a tenure track job teaching Caribbean and/or Latino/a literature? cuny.jobs/new-york-ny/...

What is “Religious Studies”? An interesting example comes up in the initiative discussed in this article, which seeks to limit federal funds to programs based on average income after graduation www.chronicle.com/article/coll... +

Our dear friend Anne died on Christmas of ovarian cancer, leaving her wife Valerie and their son Bobby. This family matters so much to me. They got to know us after Bobby was diagnosed with Down syndrome before he was born, and our families remain close. Help if you can. Just a repost helps.

It would appear I am now a columnist at Inside Higher Ed. My first piece focuses on McCarthyism, censorship, and our current moment in higher education. This is an essay I started nearly 6 months ago so I'm glad to finally share it with y'all. www.insidehighered.com/opinion/colu...

🤘🤘🤓🤓

Also lol: religion reporting, 2026.

🚨 New publication: “The Wages of Ethnic Power: Socioeconomic Status, Group Threat, and Anti-Immigrant Attitudes in Western Europe” 🚨 Just published in the International Journal of Comparative Sociology with Charles Seguin and Brandon Gorman. journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10....

Denmark needs to put a traffic cone and/or lawn chair on Greenland.

1/4 An announcement, of sorts... I wasn't sure when or how to share this news publicly. As you know, Macquarie University went through a round of academic staff cuts at the end of 2025, particularly targeting my discipline of sociology.

Remembering today that having your heart broken is a necessary step on the path to becoming fully human. Whichever heartbreak is your first, it’s probably critical that a state break your heart so that you can develop a political imagination. If this is your first, I’m sorry and also welcome.

NEW from me: At least two clergy were among those shoved, shot at with pepper rounds and exposed to pepper spray while protesting the actions of in Minnesota after an ICE agent shot and killed a woman who had been observing them. religionnews.com/2026/01/07/m...

I'm glad to share this new book chapter, written with one of my undergrads. Drawing on interviews during/after Covid lockdowns, we show that moms varied in how they approached remote learning, and that intensive approaches led to more burnout, leading to more interest in a return to in-person school

@brewin.bsky.social Great Toyah Wilcox shout! 👏👏

Have a look at this

1. Did you know that Girl Scouts has, for a long time, accepted trans girls and nonbinary scouts? Trans kids are under attack. Every year, I make a thread of trans and nonbinary girl scouts you can get your cookies from. Lets get our cookies from them this year in solidarity!

somebody at UChicago is feeding preprints to LLMs without authors' consent, in a research study they have the gall to suggest to authors they've opted-in that they volunteer to evaluate the LLMs' suggestions regarding their own work. lol, lmao even. here is the invite and my reply

My department is hiring! Open rank faculty position in Helsinki Anthropology jobs.helsinki.fi/job/Helsinki...

While vaccines for diseases that no longer carry a universal recommendation will still be covered by federal health insurance programs, RFK Jr’s schedule change will increase confusion and distrust in vaccines, lower vaccination rates, and increase disease and death.

Man, that Mark Kelly guy...what a kook, eh?

You've probably been following the story about fraud in MN. I wrote about the people who provide services who are being driven into bankruptcy, thanks to the Walz' administration decision to hire Optum AI to screen all payments. It's a disaster.

I'm still sick so I'm not gonna do a full recap, but I do want to say, proudly and clearly: there were multiple national stories and full news cycles sparked by @rns.org reporting in 2025. We didn't always get credit for them, but the origin was clear — and we've got way, way more coming in 2026.

If you're a journalist who needs an expert to talk about events in southern Yemen, I've been following this issue on an almost-daily basis for close to a decade now.

You love to see it.

Assistant Professor (Classics and Religious Studies) Job Opening in Boston, Massachusetts - Insight Into Academia careers.insightintoacademia.com/job/assistan...

Christianity and Religious Pluralism in Algeria www.pressenza.com/2025/12/chri...

In case you missed it: I’ve got a new (warning: somewhat intense) story on @npr.org about all the ways faith leaders have pushed back against the Trump administration’s mass deportation campaign this year — including clergy directly confronting ICE agents and police. www.npr.org/2025/12/24/n...

Happy release day to my friend Hunter Hampton! After hearing him talk through the ideas behind this project for years, it’s so cool to see it out in the world. Lots of great material, with chapters on Notre Dame, BYU, Wheaton, Baylor, Wiley, and Liberty.

@acjimbo.bsky.social "One in the eye for their critics..." 👏👏👏

Something I talk about in my book Religion for Realists. It's okay to recognize right-wing Christians *are correct* that egalitarian gender arrangements likely contribute to religious decline. You can disagree with their response strategy (shoring up patriarchal norms), but they're rightly afraid.

Finally! 🤩 Our position piece: Against the Uncritical Adoption of 'AI' Technologies in Academia: doi.org/10.5281/zeno... We unpick the tech industry’s marketing, hype, & harm; and we argue for safeguarding higher education, critical thinking, expertise, academic freedom, & scientific integrity. 1/n

Like politics, anyone can (usually) weigh in on religion. But FWIW: Harvard, where Pinker teaches, also has a divinity school. It has lots of scholars who study religion for a living. Pinker isn't one of them — in fact, they've publicly criticized him: www.commonwealmagazine.org/enlightenmen...