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Eliza Kent

Professor of Religious Studies   

Phone:  (518) 580-5405
Email:  ekent@skidmore.edu 
Office:  Ladd 209

Education:

• Ph.D. The University of Chicago, History of Religions.  1999, with distinction.
• M.A. The University of Chicago, Religious Studies. 1992.
• B.A. Williams College, Religion and Women鈥檚 Studies.  1989, magna cum laude.

Research and Teaching Interests:

• South Asian Religions (Hinduism, Buddhism, Jainism, Islam and Christianity): religious pluralism in India and its side effects, such as conversion, syncretism, crypto-conversion, reform and revival.
• Religion and Ecology/Environmentalism
• Religion, Gender, and Sexuality
• Method and Theory in the Study of Religion

Courses taught:

• Understanding Religions (RE103)
• Asian Religions in America (RE216)
• Hindu Mythology (RE217)
• Health and Healing in Asian Religions (RE218)
• Religion and Society in Modern India (RE219)
• Religion and Ecology (RE225)
• Theorizing the Sacred (RE241) (TM)
• Goddesses and Other Powerful Women (RE318) (TM)
• Yoga: Theory, History and Practice (RE320)

Publications:

Books:

• Sacred Groves and Local Gods: Religion and Environmentalism in South India (New York: Oxford University Press, 2013).
• Converting Women: Gender and Christianity in Colonial South India (New York: Oxford University Press, 2004).  Received a CHOICE Award for Outstanding Academic Title of 2004 from the American Library Association.   Received Award for Best Book in Hindu-Christian Studies for 2003-2005 from the Society for Hindu-Christian Studies.
• Lines in Water: Religious Boundaries in South Asia, co-edited with Tazim Kassam (Syracuse University Press, 2013).

Journal Articles:

• 鈥淐alifornia Hinduisms: The Shiva Lingam of Golden Gate Park, 1989-1994,鈥� Nova Religio: The Journal of Alternative and Emergent Religions 30, 1 (August 2026).  Forthcoming.
• 鈥淩ace, Caste and Conversion in Colonial and Postcolonial India [Editor鈥檚 introduction to Special Issue],鈥� Nid膩n: International Journal for Indian Studies 9, 1 (2024): 4-8, DOI:
• 鈥淐hristian Conversion and the Racialisation of Religion in Colonial India,鈥� Nid膩n: International Journal for Indian Studies 9, 1 (2024): 50-67.  DOI:
• 鈥淏us Stop Sami: Transient Temples in Urban South India,鈥� South Asia Multidisciplinary Academic Journal (SAMAJ) 18 (2018)
• Co-authored with Isabella Orlowska, 鈥淎ccidental Environmentalists: The Religiosity of Church Forests in Highlands Ethiopia,鈥� Worldviews: Global Religions, Culture And Ecology, 2018.
• Co-Authored with Cardel煤s, Catherine L., Scull, Peter, Wassie, Alemaheyu Woods, Carrie L., Klepeis, Peter, Kent, Eliza F., & Orlowska, Isabella. 鈥淪hadow conservation and the persistence of sacred church forests in northern Ethiopia.鈥� Biotropica, 2017, 1鈥�8.
• Co-Authored with Klepeis, Peter, Orlowska, Isabella,  Kent, Eliza F., Cardel煤s, Catherine L., Scull, Peter, Wassie, Alemaheyu, & Woods, Carrie, 鈥淓thiopian Church Forests: A Hybrid Model of Protection,鈥� Human Ecology, 44 (2016): 715鈥�730.
• 鈥淐onvenience, Consumption and Creatureliness: Thoughts on Sacred Groves, Hindu and Christian,鈥� Journal for Hindu-Christian Studies 27 (2014).
• "What Are You Going to Do with a Degree in That? Arguing for the Humanities in an Era of Efficiency,鈥� Arts & Humanities in Higher Education 11, 3 (July-August 2012): 273-284.
• 鈥淪ecret Christians of Sivakasi: Gender, Syncretism, and Crypto-Religion in Early Twentieth-Century South India,鈥� Journal of the American Academy of Religion 79, 3 (September 2011): 676-705.
• 鈥淔orests of Belonging: The Contested Meanings of Trees and Forests in Indian Hinduism鈥� [editor鈥檚 introduction], Journal for the Study of Religion, Nature and Culture 4, 2 (June 2010): 129-138.
• 鈥淎 Road Runs through It: Changing Meanings in a Sacred Grove in Tiruvannamalai, Tamil Nadu,鈥� Journal for the Study of Religion, Nature and Culture 4, 2 (June 2010): 213-231.
• 鈥淪acred Groves and Local Gods: Religion and Environmentalism in South India,鈥� Worldviews: Global Religions, Culture, and Ecology 13, 1 (April 2009): 1-39. 
• 鈥溾�橶hat鈥檚 Written on the Forehead Will Never Fail鈥�: Karma, Fate and Headwriting in Indian Folktales,鈥� Asian Ethnology 68, 1 (2009): 1-26.
• 鈥淔ierce Gods and Dense Forest: Sacred Groves in Coromandel,鈥� with M.P. Ramanujam, Indian Folklife [Chennai, India] 26 (July 2007): 14-19. 
• 鈥淟andscapes of Changes: Recent Ethnography on the Religious Meanings of Trees and Forests in India鈥� [editor鈥檚 intro.], Indian Folklife [Chennai, India] 26 (July 2007): 3-4. 
• "Representing Caste in the Classroom: Perils, Pitfalls and Potential Insight,鈥� Method and Theory in the Study of Religion 17, 3 (2005): 231-241.
• 鈥淟aw of the Land: Indigenous Marriage Practices, Caste and Indian Christians in Nineteenth-Century India,鈥� Vidyajyoti: Journal of Theological Reflection (Delhi) (June, 2005): 431-443. 
• 鈥淭amil Bible Women in the Zenana Missions of Colonial Tamil Nadu,鈥� History of Religions 39, 2 (November, 1999): 117-149.

Essays and Encyclopedia Articles:

• 鈥淕ender and the Creation and Destruction of Social Boundaries between 鈥楬indus鈥� and 鈥楥hristians,鈥欌�� in Routledge Handbook of Hindu-Christian Relations, ed. by Chad Bauman and Michelle Voss Roberts (Routledge Press, 2021).
• 鈥淰ernacular Christianities: Tamil Protestantism and Tamil Catholicism,鈥� in Vernacular Catholicism, Vernacular Saints: Selva J. Raj on 鈥淏eing Catholic the Tamil Way,鈥� ed. by Reid Locklein (Albany, NY: State University of New York Press, 2017)
• "Hinduism and Environmentalism in Modern India,鈥� in Hinduism in the Modern World, ed. by Brian A. Hatcher, 290-308 (New York: Taylor & Francis/Routledge, 2016)
• 鈥淐ivilization and Conjugality: Indian Christian Marriage in Law and Literature,鈥� in Conjugality and Beyond: Sexual Economies, Citizenship and the Marital Form in India, ed. by Lucinda Ramberg and Srimati Basu (New Delhi: Women Unlimited Press/Kali for Women, 2015).
• 鈥淔eminist Approaches to the Study of Conversion,鈥� in the Oxford Handbook of Religious Conversion, ed. by Lewis R. Rambo and Charles E. Farhadian (New York: Oxford University Press, 2014).
• 鈥淚ntroduction: Drawing Lines in Water: The Construction of Religious Boundaries in South Asia,鈥� [editor鈥檚 introduction], Lines in Water: Religious Boundaries in South Asia, 1-36 (Syracuse University Press, 2013). 
• 鈥淪yncretism and Sin: An Independent Christian Church in Nineteenth-Century South India,鈥� in Lines in Water: Religious Boundaries in South Asia, 101-124 (Syracuse University Press, 2013).
• 鈥淢ass Movements in South India, 1877-1936,鈥� in Converting Cultures: Religion, Ideology and Transformations of Modernity, ed. by Kevin Reinhart and Dennis Washburn, 367-394 (Leiden, The Netherlands: Brill Press, 2007).
• 鈥淩aja Clarinda 鈥� Widow, Concubine, Patroness: Women鈥檚 Leadership in the Indian Church,鈥� in The Beginning of the Protestant Churches in India, The Danish-Halle Mission in South India (1706-1845), vol. 2, 659-683 (Halle, Germany: The Francke Foundation, 2006). 
• 鈥淏ooks, Boots and Bodices: Material Culture and Protestant Missions in Colonial South India,鈥� in Mixed Messages: Materiality, Textuality, Missions, ed. by Gareth Griffiths and Jamie S. Scott, 67-87 (New York: Palgrave-McMillan, 2005).
• 鈥淗induism and Indian Ecstatic Religions,鈥� in Shamanism: An Encyclopedia of World Beliefs, Practices and Culture, ed. by Mariko Walker and Eva Fridman, 750-755 (Santa Barbara, Calif: ABC-CLIO, 2004).
• 鈥淩edemptive Hegemony and the Ritualization of Reading,鈥� in Riting Between the Lines: Popular Christianity in India, ed. by Corinne Dempsey and Selva Raj, 191-209 (Albany: State University of New York Press, 2002).

Fellowships, Grants, and Honors:

• New York Six Upstate Global Collective Working Group grant, sponsored by Mellon Foundation, for 鈥淩eligious Freedom and Human Rights in Pluralist Societies,鈥� with colleagues from Colgate, 911爆料, Union and Hobart William Smith Colleges.  June 2014 鈥� August 2017.
• Picker Interdisciplinary Science Institute Faculty grant for 鈥淒oes religious management mitigate the socio-ecological drivers of forest change in sacred groves of northern Ethiopia?鈥� with Catherine Cardel煤s (Biology), Peter Klepeis and Peter Scull (Geography), along with Margaret Lowman (NC Museum of Natural Sciences & NC State University) and Alemayehu Wassie Eshete (Bahir Dar University, Ethiopia).   July 2013-June 2014.
• National Endowment for the Humanities Fellowship for 鈥淪acred Groves and Local Gods: Religion and Environmentalism in South India,鈥� June 2007-December 2007
• American Institute for Indian Studies, Senior Short Term Research Grant for 鈥淪acred Groves and Local Gods: Religion and Environmentalism in South India,鈥� 2005-2006
• Committee on South Asian Studies Dissertation Fellowship, University of Chicago, 1997-99
• Center for Gender Studies Research Grant, University of Chicago, 1998
• Woodrow Wilson Dissertation Grant in Women鈥檚 Studies, 1997-98
• Fulbright IIE Dissertation Research Fellowship, 1996-97
• American Institute for Indian Studies Junior Research Grant, 1996-97
• Foreign Language Area Studies Academic Year Fellowships in Tamil, 1992-95
• American Institute for Indian Studies Summer Fellowship, Madurai, India, 1993