L. J. Kutten Lecture Series

Each year the department sponsors L. J. Kutten lectureship, which brings to campus major scholars working in the area of religious studies, particularly outside traditional Western religious traditions.

Academic Year 2019-2020

Brian Collins
Department Chair and Associate Professor fo Classics and World Religion, Ohio University
The Other Rama: Matricide and Genocide in the Mythology of Parashurama
November 21, 2019

Mark Juergensmeyer
Distinguished Professor of Sociology and Global Studies, and Affiliate Professor of Religious Studies, University of California, Santa Barbara
Is ISIS Over?
February 05, 2019

Travis Zadeh
A Scholar of Islamic intellectual and cultural history.
How Muslims Discovered America
March​ 06, 2019

Academic Year 2018-2019
Academic Year 2017-2018

John Stratton Hawley
Claire Tow Professor of Religion, Barnard College, Columbia University
Blind Faith: The Hindi Poet Surdas and his Visual Legacy
October 02, 2017

Ali Asani
Professor of Indo-Muslim and Islamic Religion and Cultures, Harvard University
Hymns of Wisdom: The Islami Ginans of South Asia
October 23, 2017 | Evening Program

Nancy A. Martin
Chair and Associate Professor of Religious Studies and Director, Schweitzer Institute at Chapman University
"Mirabai speaks.....": The Emergent Voice of Medieval Saint
November 08, 2017

Academic Year 2016-2017

A series on Islam and the humanities and liberal arts. Speakers included Professor Tariq al-Jamil (Swarthmore College) and Professor Kambiz Ghanea Bassiri (Reed College)

Academic Year 2015-2016

Professor Michael Sells (University of Chicago),
“Wahhabi Doctrine and Global Conflict”

Professor Shahzad Bashir (Stanford University) on “Travels in Islamic Timespace”

Academic Year 2014-2015

Nimmi Gowrinathan
Understanding The Female Fighter: Extreme Marginalization
March 25, 2015

Ann Gold
Shravan Kumar Stepped Here: Myth, Morality and the Market in a Provincial Rajasthan Town
November 3, 2014

Academic Year 2013-2014

Anna Bigelow
Shared Sacred Space
April 20, 2014

Academic Year 2012-2013

Richard Eaton
Sufis and the Growth of Islam in India -- Two Patterns
November 29, 2012

Joseph Lelyveld
Great Soul: Mahatma Gandhi and His Struggle with India
November 19, 2012

Academic Year 2011-2012

Sheldon Pollock
Does the Past Have a Future: On the Fate of Classical Culture
March 20, 2012

Academic Year 2010-2011

Vali Nasr
The Coming Revolution in the Muslim World: Economics vs. Extremism
February 9, 2011

Academic Years 1999-2010

2010: Mark Juergensmeyer, Terror in the Mind of God: Religion, Violence, and Steps to Peace and Reconciliation in South Asia
2009: David White: Yoga Before the Yoga Sutras, Or What Does Sitting Cross-legged Have To Do With the History of Yoga
2008: Ian Whicher: The Challenge of Yoga: Enlightened Engagement in Patanjali’s Yoga-Sutra
2007: Tim Ward: Savage Beast: One Man’s Search for the Goddess
2006: Salman Rushdie: Step Across This Line
2006: Reza Aslan, The Future of Islam: Toward the Islamic Reformation
2005: Roger Ames, Confucianism and A-Theistic Righteousness
2004: Kathleen Norris: Spiritual Practice and Social Justice
2003: Daniel Godlhagen: The Vatican, and the Holocaust
2002: David Edwards, The Arab Jihad in Afghanistan: Pictures from an Occupation
2001: Christopher Chapple: The Great Elements of Continuity of Life: Ecology in Hinduism and Jainism
2000: Anne Klein: Tibetan Images of Enlightenment: Practice and Theory on the Plateau
1999: Tazim Kassam: The Perils and Promise of Identity: Transformations of a Muslim Minority