Global Religion Research Initiative
toggle menu
View the research summaries below to learn more about some of the projects funded by the Global Religion Research Initiative.
Click on a discipline below to jump to that section.
After the Last ‘Firman’: Victimhood, Survival and Societal Transformation among the Yezidis
Güneş Tezcür
Associate Professor of Political Science at University of Central Florida
Zeynep Kaya
Research Fellow at the Middle East Center at London School of Economics
Bayar Mustafa
Associate Professor of International Studies at American University of Kurdistan
View Research Summary →
Alternatives in Mobilization: Ethnicity and Religion
Can Religious Reinterpretations Bridge the Secular-Religious Divide? Experimental Evidence from Tunisia
Sharan Grewal
Assistant Professor of Government at the College of William & Mary
Matthew Cebul
Research Officer for the Program on Nonviolent Actiino at the United States Institute of Peace
View Research Summary →
Consequences of Secular and Religious Civic Education Among Youth: A Pilot and Research Design in Zambia
Elizabeth Sperber
Assistant Professor of Political Science at University of Denver
Gwyneth McClendon
Associate Professor of Politics at New York University
O’Brien Kaaba
Lecturer in Law at the University of Zambia
View Research Summary →
Control of Religious Freedom in Authoritarian States: Explaining China’s Selective Treatment of Christian Churches
Divined Intervention: Religious Institutions and Collective Action
Explaining Belonging: The Strength and Salience of Religious Identification in Turkey
K. Amber Curtis
Associate Professor of Political Science at Clemson University
Laura Olson
Professor of Political Science at Clemson University
View Research Summary →
Faith, Friendship, and Interfaith Relations
Nathaneal Gratias Sumaktoyo
Postdoctoral Fellow with the Politics of Inequality Project at University of Konstanz, Germany
View Research Summary →
The Global Politics of Interreligious Dialogue: Religious Change, Solidarity and Citizenship in the Middle East
Michael Daniel Driessen
Associate Professor of Political Science and International Affairs at John Cabot University, Rome
View Research Summary →
How Do Terrorist Attacks Affect the Religiosity of Survivors? Evidence from Africa
Islam, Justice, and Democracy
Islamic-Secular Divides in the Wake of the Arab Spring: A Social Network Approach
Measuring Religious Violence: Conceptual and Empirical Issues Utilizing Natural Language Processing for Religious Violence Event-Data
Mobilizing the Devout: Mosques, Churches, and Political Participation in Indonesia
Parable of Talents: How North Korea-related, Faith-Based Workers respond to Enhanced Sanctions and a Global Pandemic
William Hayes
Associate Professor of Sociology at Gonzaga University
Joseph Yi
Associate Professor of Political Science at Hanyang University
View Research Summary →
Perceived Threat and Demographic Misperceptions
Religious Identification in Global Perspective
Religion, Ideology and Corruption in Muslim Majority Democracies: Experimental Evidence from Tunisia
M. Tahir Kilavuz
Assistant Professor of Political Science and International Relations at Marmara University
Nathanael Gratias Sumaktoyo
Postdoctoral Fellow with the Politics of Inequality Project at University of Konstanz, Germany
View Research Summary →
Religious Violence and Discriminationo in Global Perspective
Sacred Politics: Religious Leaders and Conflict in Israel
Shaping Citizenship: Christian Institutions and Urban Youth in Africa
Amy Patterson
Professor of Politics at University of the South, Sewanee
Richard Asante
Senior Research Fellow in the Institute of African Studies at University of Ghana
Megan Hershey
Associate Professor of Politcal Science at Whitworth University
Phoebe Kajubi
Researcher at The Institute for Disease Investigations, Uganda
Tracy Kuperus
Professor in International Development at Calvin College
Colman Titus Msoka
Lecturer in the Institute of Development Studies at University of Dar es Salaam, Tanzania
View Research Summary →
Strong Spirits: How Street Gangs Leverage Occult Power
Andrew Cesare Miller
PhD Candidate of Political Science at Massachusetts Institute of Technology
View Research Summary →
What Stymies Action on Climate Change? Religious Institutions, Marginalization, and Efficacy in Kenya
Amy Erica Smith
Assistant Professor of Political Science at Iowa State University
Lauren Hoing
Assistant Professor of Political Science at Boston College
Jaimie Bleck
Associate Professor of Political Science at the University of Notre Dame
View Research Summary →
Are Declines in Religiousness Confined to the West? An Analysis of Worldwide Change in Average Levels of Religiosity and Variation across Generations, 1981-2020
Christians and Muslims in Urban Cairo: Daily Sectarianism and Intersectionality in the Post-Arab Uprisings Era
Closed Religion in Urban China
Conceptualizing Blackness in/through Tunisia
Shreya Parikh
Dual-PhD Candidate of Sociology at UNC Chapel Hill and CERI - Sciences Po Paris
View Research Summary →
Divorce in Contemporary Indonesia
Rachel Rinaldo
Assistant Professor of Sociology at University of Colorado Boulder
Eva Fahrun Nisa
Lecturer at Victoria University of Wellington
Nina Nurmila
Senior Lecturer at the State Islamic University in Bandung, Indonesia
View Research Summary →
Do Modern Social Conditions Really Make People Less Religious? An Analysis of Worldwide Data, 1981-2014
Essays on the emergence of Islamic finance and non-western normmaking
Paper 2: Emergence of Islamic Finance
Evangelical Political Mobilization in Latin America
Edwin Ackerman
Assistant Professor of Sociology at Syracuse University
Graham Hill
Postdoctoral Researcher of Sociology at University of Bern
View Research Summary →
Faith and the Fragility of Justice: Religious Responses to Gender-Based Violence in South Africa
How Pastors, Sheikhs and Chiefs in Rural Malawi Lead in a Pandemic
Hyphenated Identities: Taiwanese Denominational Organizations and Transnational Taiwanese Identity Formation
Measuring Fundamentalism among Israeli Jews
Parable of Talents: How North Korea-related, Faith-Based Workers respond to Enhanced Sanctions and a Global Pandemic
William Hayes
Associate Professor of Sociology at Gonzaga University
Joseph Yi
Associate Professor of Political Science at Hanyang University
View Research Summary →
Queering Orthodoxy: The Battle Over Judaism’s (Straight) Soul in Israel
The Role of Religion in the Adaptation Process of Africans in China
Tactics and Transcendence: The Struggle to Create Common Understandings about Religion and its Relationship to Women’s Human Rights within the United Nations
Using Internet Derived Data to Measure Religion: Understanding how Google can provide insight into cross-national religious differences
Amy Adamczyk
Professor of Sociology at John Jay College of Criminal Justice at The Graduate Center, CUNY
Steve Hitlin
Professor of Sociology at University of Iowa
View Research Summary →
“We love martyrdom, but we also love life”: Coptic Cultural Trauma Between Martyrdom and Rights
Women in Place: The Politics of Gender Segregation in Iran
Nazanin Shahrokni
Assistant Professor of Gender and Globalization at The London School of Ecnomics, UK
View Research Summary →
Women Living Hinduism and Islam Project (WLHIP)
Anjana Narayan
Associate Professor of Sociology at California State Polytechnic University Pomona
Bandana Purkayastha
Professor of Sociology and Asian American Studies at University of Connecticut
Durre Sameen Ahmed
Chairperson and Senior Research Fellow, Center for the Study of Gender and Culture, Pakistan
Neela Bhattacharya Saxena
Professor of English at Nassau Community College
Asha Mukherjee
Professor of Philosophy and Religion at Visva-Bharati University (India)
Farhan Navid Yousaf
Assistant Professor of Sociology at International Islamic University (Islamabad, Pakistan)
View Research Summary →
Women’s Movements During Democratic Transitions: The Case of Tunisia
Afro-Queer Journeys: Transnational Revival Zion Religion in Jamaica and Panama
Between Shanghai and Mecca: Diaspora and Diplomacy of Chinese Muslims in the Twentieth Century
Cross-Cultural Investigations in the Science-Religion Relationship
Kimberly Rios
Associate Professor of Psychology at Ohio University
Mark Aveyard
Assistant Professor of Psychology at American University of Sharjah
View Research Summary →
Forgiveness among Muslims and Christians in Indonesia and the United States
Kaye Cook
Professor of Psychology at Gordon College
Ni Made Taganing Kurniati
Lecturer of Psychology at Universitas Gunadarma
Christiany Suwartono
Lecturer of Psychology at Atma Jaya Catholic University of Indonesia
View Research Summary →
Guardians of Faith: Global Contestations Over the Care of Muslim Orphans
Making/Erasing Africana Religions: Brazil at the Crossroads of Heritage and Intolerance
Danielle N. Boaz
Associate Professor of Africana Studies at University of North Carolina at Charlotte
Umi Vaughan
Associate Professor of Africana Studies at California State University, Monterey Bay
View Research Summary →
Religion, Violence, and the Secular State in Mexico
Resisting and Rationalizing State Violence
Andrew Johnson
Professor of Criminal Justice at Metropolitan State University
Jayeel Cornelio
Associate Professor of Development Studies at Ateneo de Manila University
James Densley
Associate Professor of Criminal Justice at Metropolitan State University
View Research Summary →
Socializing Human Relations in Religious High Schools in the U.S. and India
Lauren S. Crane
Associate Professor of Psychology and East Asian Studies at Wittenberg University
Shabana Bano
Assistant Professor of Psychology at Banaras Hindu University
R.C. Mishra
Professor Emeritus of Psychology at Banaras Hindu University
Sushma Pandey
Professor of Psychology at DDU Gorakhpur University
Nona Moskowitz
Associate Professor of Psychology at Wittenberg University
View Research Summary →
Transnationalism and the Evangelical Campaign against Trafficking in Southeast Asia
