AAR Task Force on AAR Guidelines for Valuing and Evaluating Public Scholarship in Religion

Background

The AAR Futures Task Force Report (2021) identified the need to expand what constitutes scholarship in the guild, describing it as foundational and critical to the institutional work of AAR. The recommendation reflects a number of intersecting realities:

1. Technological advances and changing avenues of communication require creative engagement of scholars to maximize learning with a growing variety of publics.
2. Members of the American Academy of Religion contribute meaningfully to scholarship in many ways beyond traditional monographs and publication in peer-reviewed journals. This work is not sufficiently valued in placement, tenure, and promotion for traditional jobs.
3. Traditional tenure-track employment in institutions of higher education is shrinking across the humanities, deeply impacting professional prospects for scholars of religion.
4. Colleagues working outside of traditional tenure-track positions, or outside the academy, are disadvantaged by a hierarchy in publication opportunities as well as status within the guild.

A significant dimension of this work involves “public scholarship,” including writing for non-academic journals, publishing op-eds, producing podcasts, contributing to a blog, collaborating with community activists and governmental bodies, developing an exhibit, teaching in the community, and scores of other substantive projects. AAR members provide vital contributions to the public understanding of religion.

Charge

The AAR’s Board of Directors in January 2024 charged the task force to create “Guidelines for Valuing and Evaluating Public Scholarship in Religion” that reflect and encourage best practices among institutions of higher education, and in the guild itself. Such a document will provide support for colleagues seeking to “count” their public scholarship in placement, promotion, and tenure. It should also guide the activities of AAR to ensure adequate visibility and status for colleagues engaged in this work. 

The task force should draw on the task force members’ expertise, best practices established by institutions on the leading edge of this change, existing guidelines in related guilds, public expressions of scholarship from diverse communities and religious traditions, and additional research as necessary in order to produce a draft of the above named “Guidelines…” by January, 2025, i.e. in time for the full Board to review.