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About Isaiah
Isaiah Ellis (he/him) is the incoming assistant professor of urban religions in the Department of Religious Studies at Southern Methodist University, where he is also joining the university’s Urban Research Cluster. This year, he is also a Robert M. Kingdon Fellow at the Institute for Research in the Humanities at the University of Wisconsin – Madison. First joining the AAR as a student member in 2014, Ellis is a 2024 Individual Research Grant recipient.
What is your area of expertise or field of study?
I research and teach about the spatial politics of religion in American public life in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, as well as the conceptual purchase of place, region, and built environments in the study of religion. The pile of books on top of my desk often includes texts from urban studies, southern history, material and visual cultures of religion, and histories of religion, capitalism, and empire. This approach informs my first book project, Apostles of Asphalt: Race, Empire, and the Religious Politics of Infrastructure in the American South, which I’m revising now for Columbia University Press’s Religion, Culture, and Public Life series. You can read more about the project here.
Why did you get involved with AAR and how is your work aligned?
I attended my first AAR Annual Meeting early on in grad school. I co-presented in the now inactive Religion in the American West Unit with my undergrad mentor, Angela Tarango, for whom I had done some work as a summer research assistant. Back then, I was no good at navigating the AAR’s vast archipelago of intellectual and networking spaces, but the Program Units I have gotten involved with since then—especially the Religion and Cities Unit and the Space, Place, and Religion Unit—have offered rich environments of conversation and collegiality that have greatly impacted how I approach my research and teaching.
What is your favorite AAR member benefit, and how has it helped your career? This might include access to our grants, award programs, and/or various research tools; opportunities to promote your scholarship through our official channels; networking and mentoring; career training through Beyond the Professoriate; and discounts on travel, transportation, and office supplies.
The spaces I have found at AAR have enabled me to pursue conversations with folks in different institutional and disciplinary contexts, many of whom I would rarely, if ever, have the chance to work alongside during the regular course of the year. In these spaces, I have been able to workshop ideas that became central to my current book project as well as more off-beat projects that I wasn’t sure were worth continuing. For me, AAR’s value comes most directly from the challenges and insights that a new set of conversation partners can bring.
What is one piece of advice you’d give to a first-time Annual Meeting attendee?
I thought a bit about this question during my postdoc because I was asked to give a workshop for graduate students entitled “The AAR/SBL: A User’s Guide.” The participants, and the colleagues from whom I solicited advice, suggested the need for a strategy for “finding your people” in what can feel like an incomprehensibly large and lonesome conference environment.
In my mind, it all starts a month or so ahead of the conference—reach out to scholars whose work you’ve read, or who just sound like they’re up to interesting stuff, or even folks you might consider to be “too important” or “too senior” to take notice. All those who respond will be glad to hear from you, and happy to tell you whether they’re going to the Annual Meeting and if they will be able to connect with you there. If you’re not sure who your intellectual kin might be or where to find them, go to PAPERS, see who is on the steering committee of Program Units that sound interesting, and pick one or two folks to reach out to via email. Meet people where they are—at their unit’s business meeting or at their panel, or ask for a coffee in the convention center or a quick chat in a location central to the flow of people. Follow up after the conference. If you’re presenting, reach out to your fellow panelists beforehand, ask who would be up for a coffee or a bite to eat afterward. Be in touch before the conference and afterward to share resources and conspire further! Building community at the AAR can be difficult but taking it into your own hands is one great way to make good on the large investment of time and money you are making to be there.
What book is on your nightstand that you’re reading or intend to read in the future?
I just finished reading Anne Enright’s novel The Wren, The Wren, which in classic Enright fashion is a deeply psychological exploration of the Irish family and our dubious emotional inheritances. As I begin revising my book’s introduction, I’m about to re-read Jenna Supp-Montgomerie’s book When the Medium Was the Mission, which is both a history of American Protestant missionary organizations’ hopes and anxieties surrounding the Atlantic telegraph and a media-studies theorization of religion and infrastructure.
What do you enjoy doing outside of work?
I like to cook, read, travel, and explore city spaces with my spouse. I’m also working on a couple of musical projects I’m hoping to finish up sometime in the next year.