Robert A. Yelle Leopoldstrasse 135 [email protected] 80804 München +49 (0)151 20049750 Deutschland
Education
2002 Ph.D. in the History of Religions, University of Chicago “Explaining Mantras: Rhetoric, the Dream of a Natural Language, and the Efficacy of Ritual” Advisor: Frank Reynolds 1993 J.D., Boalt Hall School of Law, University of California at Berkeley Order of the Coif (class rank: 8 out of 300 (top 3%)) 1988 A.B. in Philosophy, Harvard University, cum laude in General Studies 1984 Phillips Academy, Andover, MA (Cum Laude Society)
Professional Experience
August 2014- Professor for the Theory and Method of Religious Studies, Chair of the Interfaculty Program in Religious Studies, Ludwig Maximilian University, Munich 2013-14 Associate Professor, Department of History, University of Memphis 2008-13 Assistant Professor, Department of History and the Helen Hardin Honors Program, University of Memphis 2010-13 Program Advisor, Minor in Religious Studies, University of Memphis 2006-08 Research Assistant Professor, Department of History, University of Memphis 2005-06 Postdoctoral Fellow, Illinois Program for Research in the Humanities and Visiting Assistant Professor, Program for the Study of Religion, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign 2003-05 Mellon Postdoctoral Fellow, Department of History, University of Toronto 2001-03 Lecturer, Department of Philosophy, Southern Illinois University, Carbondale 1993-94 Corporate Attorney, Milbank, Tweed, Hadley & McCloy, Los Angeles 1989-90 Legal Assistant, Thelen, Marrin, Johnson & Bridges, San Francisco
Academic Awards
2021 Harris Fellow, Department of Religion, Dartmouth College (September 2021) 2019 Finalist, AAR Award for Excellence in Constructive-Reflective Studies for Sovereignty and the Sacred (see Publications) 2017 Visiting Scholar, Department of Philosophy and Education, University of Turin 2013-14 Joint Tikvah/Senior Emile Noël Fellow, Tikvah Center for Law & Jewish Civilization and Jean Monnet Center for International and Regional Economic Law & Justice, New York University School of Law 2013-14 Faculty Research Grant, University of Memphis 2012 Professional Development Assignment (sabbatical leave award), Fall Semester 2012, University of Memphis College of Arts and Sciences 2006-07 Fellow, John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation 2003 Participant, Erasmus Institute Summer Faculty Workshop on “Religious Hermeneutics and Secular Interpretation,” College of the Holy Cross, Worcester, MA 2001-02 Committee on Southern Asian Studies Dissertation Fellow, University of Chicago 2000-01 Martin Marty Center Junior Fellow, University of Chicago Divinity School Yelle, p.2
1999-2000 Fulbright-Hays Doctoral Dissertation Research Abroad Fellow, Calcutta, India 1998 Social Science Research Council Predissertation Fellow, Dhaka, Bangladesh 1996-98 Foreign Language and Area Studies Fellow in Bengali 1992-93 Foreign Language and Area Studies Fellow in German 1992 Scholarship to the Hague Academy of International Law from the Ford Foundation Program in Public International Law at Boalt Hall School of Law 1990-93 Jurisprudence Awards (1st in class or section): Civil Procedure, Contracts, Comparative Law, International Law, International Trade Law, Law and Modern Social Thought, Professional Responsibility 1990-93 Prosser Prizes (2nd in class or section): Conceptions of Punishment, Jurisprudence
Grants and Grant Proposals (individual fellowships and time-release grants are covered under Academic Awards)
“EuroBlas.” Co-PI of HERA grant proposal for an unfunded project on blasphemy in Europe. Project one of 35 recommended for funding (top 5-6% of those submitted in first round); only 18 projects were funded. Other PIs were from the Netherlands, the UK, and Denmark. (1.2 million euros; not funded)
Collaborative Research Grant, American Academy of Religion, for “The Sacred/Secular Divide: The Legal Story II” conference, under Project Director Winnifred Sullivan, 2008-09. ($4,500)
Research Areas general history of religions; history and theory of secularism; religion and politics; South Asian religions; semiotics of religion
Publications
Monographs
Sovereignty and the Sacred: Secularism and the Political Economy of Religion . Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2019. Finalist, AAR Award for Excellence in Constructive-Reflective Studies. (reviewed in Sociology of Religion , Journal of Religion in Europe , and several other journals)
The Language of Disenchantment: Protestant Literalism and Colonial Discourse in British India . New York: Oxford University Press, 2013. (reviewed in 10 journals; excerpts available upon request)
Semiotics of Religion: Signs of the Sacred in History . London: Bloomsbury, 2013. (review symposium in Religion 44 (2014): 84-163; reviewed in four additional journals; excerpts available upon request)
Explaining Mantras: Ritual, Rhetoric, and the Dream of a Natural Language in Hindu Tantra . London and New York: Routledge, 2003. (reviewed in Journal of Religion )
Edited volumes
Narratives of Disenchantment and Secularization: Critiquing Max Weber’s Idea of Modernity , ed. Robert A. Yelle and Lorenz Trein. London: Bloomsbury, 2020 (in press).
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Mediation and Immediacy: The Semiotic Turn in the Study of Religion , ed. Jenny Ponzo, Robert A. Yelle, and Massimo Leone. Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 2020 (in press).
Interpreting and Explaining Transcendence: Interdisciplinary Approaches to the Beyond , ed. Robert A. Yelle and Jenny Ponzo. Berlin: Walter de Gruyter (under contract).
Language and Religion , ed. Robert A. Yelle, Courtney Handman, and Christopher I. Lehrich. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter, 2019.
After Secular Law , ed. Winnifred F. Sullivan, Robert A. Yelle, and Mateo Taussig-Rubbo. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2011. (reviewed in Journal of the American Academy of Religion )
Articles and book chapters
“Hobbes the Egyptian: The Return of the Pharaoh, or the Ancient Roots of Secular Politics.” In Sacred Kingship in World History: Between Immanence and Transcendence , ed. Alan Strathern and Azfar Moin. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press (revising for submission).
“Chastening and Disciplining Comparison: Bruce Lincoln and Oliver Freiberger on the Comparative Method in the Study of Religion.” Review symposium on Bruce Lincoln, Apples and Oranges and Oliver Freiberger, Considering Comparison , in Method & Theory in the Study of Religion (in press).
“Imagining Sacrifice in Ancient India: A Genealogy of Heesterman’s ‘Broken World,’” in South Asian Rituals in Archaeological Context: Power, Presence and Space , ed. Henry Albery, Jens-Uwe Hartmann, and Himanshu Prabha Ray. London: Routledge (in press).
“Exceptional Grace: Religion as the Sovereign Suspension of Law.” In Law as Religion, Religion as Law , ed. Benny Porat and David Flatto. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press (in press).
“‘An Age of Miracles’: Disenchantment as a Secularized Theological Narrative.” In Narratives of Disenchantment and Secularization: Critiquing Max Weber’s Idea of Modernity , ed. Robert A. Yelle and Lorenz Trein. London: Bloomsbury, 2020 (in press).
“Religion and History.” In Blackwell Companion to the Study of Religion , ed. Robert A. Segal, 2 nd ed. Oxford: Blackwell (in press).
“‘By Fire and Sword’: Early English Critiques of Islam and Judaism as ‘Impostures’ or Political and ‘Unfree’ Religions,” Patterns of Prejudice 53 (2020). DOI: 10.1080/0031322X.2019.1702761 . Special issue on “Genealogies of ‘Jews’ and ‘Muslims’: Social Imaginaries in the Race-Religion Nexus,” ed. Yolande Jansen and Nasar Meer.
“From Sovereignty to Solidarity: Some Transformations in the Politics of Sacrifice from the Reformation to Robertson Smith,” History of Religions 58 (2019): 319-46.
“Protestant (An)aesthetics,” in Bloomsbury Handbook for the Cultural and Cognitive Aesthetics of Religion , ed. Anne Koch and Katharina Wilkens, 241-51. London: Bloomsbury, 2019.
“Frozen Forms: An Inquiry into Magic Words and the Power of Names,” Lexia (October 2019): 35-47.
“Intertextuality, Iconicity, and Joint Speech: Three Dialogical Modes of Linguistic Performance in South Asian Traditions.” In Language and Religion , ed. Robert A. Yelle, Courtney Handman, and Christopher I. Lehrich, 57-67. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter, 2019. Yelle, p.4
“Religionsfreiheit und die Säkularisierung religiösen Rechts aus der Perspektive eines Historikers.“ In Hat Religiöses Recht eine Existenzberechtigung in säkularer Gesellschaft? , ed. Burkhard Berkmann, Kirche & Recht Beihefte, Band 1 (2019): 113-25.
“Réflexions sur la théorie sémiotique de Sacrosanctum Concilium.” In Désirs de réforme : Relectures de la Constitution conciliaire sur la liturgie , ed. Ângelo Cardita. Montréal: Les Presses de l’Université de Montréal, 2018.
“Semiotics and Aesthetics: Historical and Structural Connections.” In Aesthetics of Religion: A Connective Concept , ed. Alexander K. Grieser and Jay Johnston, 465-71. Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 2017.
“The Peircean Icon and the Study of Religion: A Brief Overview.” Material Religion 12 (2016): 241-43.
“Imagining the Hebrew Republic: Christian Genealogies of Religious Freedom.” In Politics of Religious Freedom , ed. Winnifred Fallers Sullivan, Elizabeth Shakman Hurd, Saba Mahmood, and Peter Danchin, 17-28. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2015.
“Semiotics.” In Oxford Handbook of Religious Studies , ed. Michael Stausberg and Steven Engler, 208-19. New York: Oxford University Press, 2016.
“Secular Blasphemies: Symbolic Offense in Modern Democracy.” In Profane: Sacrilegious Expression in a Multicultural Age , ed. Chistopher S. Grenda, Chris Beneke, and David Nash, 141-66. Berkeley: University of California Press, 2014.
“Coda and Counterpoint.” Author’s response to review symposium on Semiotics of Religion: Signs of the Sacred in History . In Religion 44 (2014): 148-63.
“Spiritual Economies beyond the Sacred/Secular Paradigm: Or, What Did Religious Freedom Mean in Ancient India?” In Varieties of Religious Establishments , ed. Lori Beaman and Winnifred Sullivan, 15-32. Farnham, Surrey, UK: Ashgate, 2013.
Review Article on Brad Gregory, The Unintended Reformation: How a Religious Revolution Secularized Society , review symposium in Church History 81 (2012): 918-24.
“Comparative Religion as Cultural Combat: Occidentalism and Relativism in Rajiv Malhotra’s Being Different .” Review Article on Rajiv Malhotra, Being Different: An Indian Challenge to Western Universalism , review symposium in International Journal of Hindu Studies 16 (2012): 335-48.
“Semiotics.” In Handbook of Research Methods in Religious Studies , ed. Michael Stausberg and Steven Engler, 355- 65. London and New York: Routledge, 2011.
“Moses’ Veil: Secularization as Christian Myth.” In After Secular Law , ed. Winnifred F. Sullivan, Robert A. Yelle, and Mateo Taussig-Rubbo, 23-42. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2011.
“The End(s) of Sacrifice: Mel Gibson’s Apocalypto as a Christian Defense of Colonialism.” Journal of Religion and Popular Culture 23 (2011): 82-89.
“The Trouble with Transcendence: Carl Schmitt’s ‘Exception’ as a Challenge for Religious Studies.” Method & Theory in the Study of Religion 22 (2010): 189-206.
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“Hindu Law as Performance: Ritual and Poetic Elements in Dharmasastra .” In Hinduism and Law: An Introduction , ed. Timothy Lubin, Donald R. Davis, Jr., and Jayanth K. Krishnan, 183-92. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2010.
“Punishing Puns: Etymology as Linguistic Ideology in Hindu and British Traditions.” In Religion and Identity in South Asia and Beyond: Essays in Honor of Patrick Olivelle , ed. Steven E. Lindquist, 129-46. New York, London, Delhi: Anthem Press, 2010.
“The Hindu Moses: Christian Polemics against Jewish Ritual and the Secularization of Hindu Law under Colonialism,” History of Religions 49 (2009): 141-71.
“To Perform or Not to Perform?: A Theory of Ritual Performance versus Cognitive Theories of Religious Transmission.” Method & Theory in the Study of Religion 18 (2006): 372-91.
“The Rhetoric of Gesture in Cross-Cultural Perspective.” In Paul Bouissac, ed., “Gesture, Ritual and Memory,” special issue of Gesture 6 (2006): 223-40.
“Law’s Trouble with Images: Fetishism and Seduction from Athens and Jerusalem to Madison Avenue.” In Images in Law , ed. Anne Wagner and William Pencak, 267-79. Aldershot, UK: Ashgate, 2006.
Editor, “The Spaces and Places of Law,” special issue of International Journal for the Semiotics of Law 19, no. 3 (2006).
“Bentham’s Fictions: Canon and Idolatry in the Genealogy of Law.” Yale Journal of Law & the Humanities 17 (2005): 151-79.
“Images of Law and its Others: Canon and Idolatry in the Discourses of British India.” Culture and Religion 6 (2005): 181-99.
“Poetic Justice: Rhetoric in Hindu Ordeals and Legal Formulas.” Religion 32 (2002): 259-72.
“Rhetorics of Law and Ritual: A Semiotic Comparison of the Law of Talion and Sympathetic Magic.” Journal of the American Academy of Religion 69 (2001): 627-47.
“The Rebirth of Myth?: Nietzsche’s Eternal Recurrence and its Romantic Antecedents.” Numen 47 (2000): 175-202.
“Discord and Concord in Buddhist Perspective,” with Frank Reynolds and Jason A. Carbine. In Research in Human Social Conflict , ed. Joseph B. Gittler. Vol. 2, Ideas of Concord and Discord in Selected World Religions , 21-58. Stamford, CT: JAI Press, 2000.
“Mantrasamskara: Tantric Rites for Making Mantras Effective.” Journal of the Sanskrit Department of Rabindra Bharati University 9 (2000): 10-25.
Encyclopedia and reference articles
“European Constructions of Hinduism.” With Lorenz Trein and Joydeep Bagchee. Oxford Bibliographies Online , published August 2016. DOI: 10.1093/OBO/9780195399318-0174.
“Criticism and Critique (in, among and of Religions).” In Brill Vocabulary for the Study of Religion , ed. Robert Segal and Kocku von Stuckrad, 372-78. Leiden: Brill, 2015.
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“Law and Religion.” In International Encyclopedia of Legal History , ed. Stanley N. Katz. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009.
“Mantra.” In Encyclopedia of Religion, Communication, and Media , ed. Daniel Stout, 232-34. London and New York: Routledge, 2006.
“Ritual and Religious Language.” In Encyclopedia of Language and Linguistics , second revised edition, ed. Keith Brown, 633-40. Oxford: Elsevier, 2005.
Consultant, articles on Law and Religion, Encyclopedia of Religion , second edition. New York: Macmillan Reference USA, 2005.
“Law, Religion, and Punishment.” In Encyclopedia of Religion , second edition, 5371-5375. New York: Macmillan Reference USA, 2005.
(With Winnifred Fallers Sullivan.) “Law and Religion: An Overview.” In Encyclopedia of Religion , second edition, 5325-5332. New York: Macmillan Reference USA, 2005.
“Utilitarianism and J. S. Mill.” In Encyclopedia of Religious Freedom , ed. Catharine Cookson, 497-99. London and New York: Routledge, 2003.
“Mantra,” “Mandala,” and “Tantricism.” In Banglapedia: National Encyclopedia of Bangladesh , ed. Sirajul Islam. Dhaka: Asiatic Society of Bangladesh, 2003.
Book reviews
Review of Richard Parmentier, Signs and Society: Further Studies in Semiotic Anthropology , in Anthropos (in press).
Review of Jakob De Roover, Europe, India, and the Limits of Secularism , in Journal of Religion in Europe 11 (2018): 102-104.
“Secularism Reconsidered: Three Approaches.” Review of Ari Joskowicz and Ethan Katz, ed., Secularism in Question: Jews and Judaism in Modern Times , in Politics, Religion, and Ideology 17 (2016): 429-32.
“Protestant Presuppositions in the Study of Hinduism.” Review of Vishwa Adluri and Joydeep Bagchee, The Nay Science: A History of German Indology , in International Journal of Dharma Studies 4 (2016): 14-16.
Review of Robert Orsi, History and Presence , in Religious Studies Review 42 (2016): 268.
Review of André Padoux, Tantric Mantras: Studies on Mantrasastra , in Religious Studies Review 38 (2012): 257.
Review of Donald Davis, Jr., The Spirit of Hindu Law , in History of Religions 51 (2011), 183-85.
Review of Jesper Sørensen, A Cognitive Theory of Magic , in Journal of the American Academy of Religion 76 (2008): 527-31.
Review of Susan Snow Wadley, Raja Nal and the Goddess: The North Indian Epic Dhola in Performance , in International Journal of Hindu Studies 11 (2007): 347-48.
Review of Robert Eric Frykenberg, ed., Christians and Missionaries in India: Cross-Cultural Communication Since 1500 , in Journal of Interdisciplinary History 35 (2005): 681-83.
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Review of Mark C. Taylor, ed., Critical Terms for Religious Studies , in Journal of Religion 80 (2000): 360-61.
Review of Rebecca Redwood French, The Golden Yoke: The Legal Cosmology of Buddhist Tibet , in Journal of Religion 77 (1997): 343-44.
Online publications
“Corporate Veil or Wall of separation?” The Immanent Frame (accessed 5/26/2015 at http://blogs.ssrc.org/tif/2015/01/22/corporate-veil-or-wall-of-separation/ ).
“Christian Genealogies of Religious Freedom.” The Immanent Frame (accessed 4/06/2012 at http://blogs.ssrc.org/tif/2012/04/06/christian-genealogies-of-religious-freedom/ ).
“The Semiotics of Religion.” Semiotix Bulletin XN-1 (New Series) (2010) (accessed 1/13/2012 at http://www.semioticon.com/semiotix/issues/semiotix-xn-1-2010 ).
Conferences Organized
Co-organizer with Vincent Lloyd, “Deprovincializing Political Theology: Postcolonial and Comparative Approaches,” LMU Munich, October 2019.
Co-organizer with Yvonne Sherwood, “Sovereignty and Religion: Interrogating the Foundations of Polity,” Siemens Stiftung, Schloss Nymphenburg, Munich, July 2018.
Co-organizer with Lorenz Trein, “Narratives of Disenchantment and Secularization: Origins, Contexts, Transformations,” LMU Munich, October 2017.
Co-organizer with Yvonne Sherwood, “Sovereignty and Religion: Interrogating the Foundations of Polity,” workshop at LMU Munich, September 2017.
Co-organizer with Massimo Leone and Jenny Ponzo, “Mediation and Immediacy: The Semiotic Turn in the Study of Religion,” University of Turin, Italy, June 2016.
Co-organizer with Jenny Ponzo, “Transcendence: An Interdisciplinary Dialogue,” Center for Advanced Studies, LMU Munich, June 2015.
Co-organizer with Winnifred Sullivan, “The Sacred/Secular Divide: The Legal Story II,” Baldy Center, SUNY Buffalo Law School, 2009.
Co-organizer with Winnifred Sullivan, “The Sacred/Secular Divide: The Legal Story I,” Baldy Center, SUNY Buffalo Law School, 2008.
Conference Presentations
“The Biggest Idol in the History of the World.” Images in Religious Persuasion: A Cross-Cultural Perspective. CERES, University of Bochum, October 2019.
Respondent, panel discussions of Sovereignty and the Sacred . European Association for the Study of Religion, Tartu, Estonia, June 2019. Deutsche Vereinigung für Religionswissenschaft, Hannover, September 2019. American Academy of Religion, San Diego 2019.
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“A Farewell to Kings?: Representing the Body Politic after the Death of Monarchy in Western Europe,” Sacred Kingship in World History: Between Immanence and Transcendence, Oxford University, May 2019.
“The Use and Abuse of the Category of the Secular as Applied to Precolonial India” (keynote lecture). Environment, Religion and Culture, Jadavpur University, February 2019.
“Säkularisierung des Hindurechts,” workshop, “Hat religiöses Recht eine Existenzberechtigung?” Katholische Akademie, Munich, September 2018.
“Blood Lines: Biopolitics, Patriarchy, Myth.” Sovereignty and Religion: Interrogating the Foundations of Polity, Siemens Stiftung, Munich, July 2018.
“The Reasonableness of God and the Foundations of Modern Polity: The Influence of Protestant Theology on English Liberalism during and after the Seventeenth Century.” Liberal Theology Today, LMU Munich, July 2018.
“Frozen Forms: Magical Languages and the Power of Divine Names.” Ancient and Artificial Languages in Today’s Culture, University of Turin, June 2018.
“Imagining Sacrifice in Ancient India: A Genealogy of Heesterman’s ‘Broken World.’” Rituals of Power in South Asia, LMU Munich, March 2018.
Panelist, review symposium on Tisa Wenger, Religious Freedom: The Contested History of an American Ideal . American Academy of Religion, Boston, November 2017.
“How the Legacy of Christian Theology Has Influenced Modern Constructions of Religion.” European Association for the Study of Religion, Leuven, September 2016.
“’Entzauberung’ und ‘Routinisierung’: Theologische Quellen von den Hauptbegriffen Max Webers.” Deutsche Vereinigung für Religionswissenschaft, Marburg, September 2017.
“Intertextuality, Iconicity, and Joint Speech: Three Dialogical Modes of Linguistic Performance in South Asian Traditions.” The Dialogical Indian, Lancaster University, July 2017.
“‘By Fire and Sword’: Early English Depictions of Islam and Judaism as Political Religions, and their Connection with Debates regarding Secularism and Freedom of Religion.” Critique of Religion: Framing Jews and Muslims in Public Debate and Political Theory Today, Amsterdam, June 2017.
“Exceptional Grace: The Pardon Power as a Window on the Politico-Theological Problem.” Law as Religion, Religion as Law, Hebrew University Law School, June 2016.
“Blasphemy and Sedition: Compassing the Death of the King in the State of Exception.” Blasphemies: Media, History, Affect, Paris, May 2016.
Panelist, Review Symposium on Adluri and Bagchee, The Nay Science: A History of German Indology . Dharma Association of North America, Atlanta, November 2016.
“Disenchantment as a Politico-Theological Problem: Weber’s Charisma Theory and Protestant Discourses on the Cessation of Miracles.” European Association for the Study of Religion, Helsinki, June 2016.
“The Protestant (An)aesthetic and the Attack on Mediation.” Mediation and Immediacy: The Semiotic Turn in the Study of Religion, Turin, Italy, June 2016. Yelle, p.9
“Imagining Sacrifice: Secular Politics and the Invention of a Religious Phenomenon.” International Association for the History of Religions, Erfurt, August 2015.
Panelist, “Integrating the Material, Bodily, and Sensual into the Study of Religion.” International Association for the History of Religions, Erfurt, August 2015.
“Social Transcendence: Connecting Anomie and Sovereignty.” Interpreting Transcendence: An Interdisciplinary Dialogue. Center for Advanced Studies, LMU, Munich, June 2015.
Chair, Presidential Panel on “The Category of Religion in the Technology of Statecraft: Theorizing Religions as Vestigial States.” North American Association for the Study of Religion, San Diego, November 2014.
Panelist, Review Panel on Elizabeth Pritchard’s Religion in Public: Locke’s Political Theology (Stanford University Press, 2013). North American Association for the Study of Religion, San Diego, November 2014.
“Disenchantment and the Liberal Constitution.” Modern Government, Sovereignty, and the Category of Religion: An Interdisciplinary Conference on Critical Religion Theory, Impact of Religion program, Uppsala University, Uppsala, Sweden, May 2014.
Panelist, “Is There a Religious Mode of Production?: Economic Aspects of Sacrifice and Related Behaviors.” North American Association for the Study of Religion, Baltimore, November 2013.
Panelist, “Magic Words, Magic Powers, Magic Healings: Insights on ‘Irrational’ and ‘Rational’ Aspects of South Asian Religion.” South Asia Colloquium, New York University, New York, November 2013.
Panelist, Language, Media, and Religion Mini-Conference and Roundtable, Reed College, October 2013.
Respondent, panel on “Religion-Making, Secularism, and Reform in 19 th -Century Bombay.” Association for Asian Studies, San Diego, March 2013.
Platform speaker, Rethinking Religion in India IV Conference: Law, Religion, and Secularism. Mangalore, India, November 2012.
Participant, Luce Foundation Workshop on “Politics of Religious Freedom in South and Southeast Asia: Contested Norms and Local Practices.” Chiang Mai, Thailand, December 2011.
Respondent, panel on “Law, Legislation, and Religious Formations in South Asian Nation-States.” American Academy of Religion, San Francisco, November 2011.
Respondent, panel on After Secular Law , edited by Winnifred F. Sullivan, Robert A. Yelle, and Mateo Taussig- Rubbo. North American Association for the Study of Religion, San Francisco, November 2011.
Roundtable Respondent and Panel Chair, Rethinking Religion in India III Conference: European Representations and Indian Responses. University of Pardubice, Czech Republic, October 2011.
“Redeeming the Land.” Conference on Religious Freedom and Indigenous Land Rights, Wake Forest University, Winston-Salem, NC, April 2011.
“What Did Religious Freedom Mean in Ancient India?: Beyond the Sacred/Secular Paradigm.” Workshop on “Varieties of Religious Establishments.” St. Thomas University, Fredericton, New Brunswick, November 2010.
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Panelist, “Antisemitism and Its Afterlives: Christian Studies of Judaism and the Construction of Modernity.” American Academy of Religion, Atlanta, November 2010.
“Sacred Arbitrariness: The Antinomian Holy and its Exclusion under Natural Law.” International Association for the History of Religions, Toronto, August 2010.
“Christian, but How Modern?: A Critique of Webb Keane’s Christian Moderns .” International Association for the History of Religions, Toronto, August 2010.
“Spiritual Economies: The Myth of the Religious Neutrality of the Secular and the Question of Indian Secularism.” Panel on “Is There a Religious-Secular Divide in the Indian Traditions?” Association for Asian Studies, Philadelphia, March 2010.
“Biblical Studies in the Postcolony: The Implications for Religious Studies.” Panel on “The Bible in the Study of Religion.” Co-sponsored by the North American Association for the Study of Religion, Society of Biblical Literature, New Orleans, November 2009.
“Liberalism Has No Charisma: Judaism and the Critique of Modernity According to Max Weber, Philip Rieff, and Carl Schmitt.” Panel on “Disenchantment and Reenchantment in Political Theology: Diagnosing the Crisis of Liberalism.” North American Association for the Study of Religion, Montreal, November 2009.
“The Scandal of Transcendence and the Spiritual Economy of Modernity.” Roundtable on Theoretical-Critical Issues in the Study of Religion. Co-sponsored by the North American Association for the Study of Religion and the Critical Theory and Discourses on Religion Group of the American Academy of Religion, Montreal, November 2009.
Co-organizer (with Winnifred Sullivan and Mateo Taussig-Rubbo), presenter, and moderator, conference on “Re-describing the Sacred/Secular Divide: The Legal Story II.” Baldy Center for Law and Social Policy, University at Buffalo, NY, April 29-May 3, 2009.
Panelist, “Lost in Translation? Comparing Local and Global Interpretations of Religious Freedom.” Baker Center for Public Policy, University of Tennessee, Knoxville, February, 2009.
Co-organizer (with Winnifred Sullivan) and conference participant, conference on “Re-describing the Sacred/Secular Divide: The Legal Story.” Baldy Center for Law and Social Policy, University at Buffalo, NY, March, 2008.
Panelist, “The Relevance of Hindu Law for Religious Studies.” Hinduism Group, American Academy of Religion, San Diego, November 2007.
Chair, panel on “Critical Cultural Studies of Western Law and Political Theology.” Law, Religion, and Culture Group, American Academy of Religion, San Diego, November 2007.
“Hindu Law as Performance: Ritual and Poetic Elements in Dharmashastra .” Law and Hinduism: A Pre- Conference Workshop of the 36 th Annual Conference on South Asia, University of Wisconsin, Madison, October 2007.
“Public Laws, Private Religions: The Secularization of Hindu Dharma in Colonial India.” Conference on the Politics of Religion-Making, Hofstra University, Hempstead, NY, October 2007.
“The Hindu Moses: Christian Representations of Judaism and the Secularization of Hindu Law under Colonialism.” Law and Society Association Annual Meeting, Berlin, Germany, July 2007. Yelle, p.11
“‘The Christian Character of the North-West Provinces’: Roman Transliteration and the Linguistic Reformation of Colonial India.” American Academy of Religion, Washington, DC, November 2006.
“Christian Polemics against Jewish Ritual Law as a Precursor of Religious Freedom in Modern Law.” Law and Society Association, Baltimore, July 2006.
Respondent, Panel on “Testing Secularism.” Law, Religion, and Culture Group, American Academy of Religion, Philadelphia, November 2005.
“A Separate Place, A Separate Peace?: Law and Literature in Historical Perspective.” International Roundtable for the Semiotics of Law, McGill University, Montreal, April 2005.
“Idols of the Tongue: Literalism versus Poetry in the Laws of Reformation England and Colonial India.” Association for the Study of Law, Culture and the Humanities, Austin, TX, March 2005.
“The Trouble with Images.” Association for the Study of Law, Culture and the Humanities, Austin, TX, March 2005.
“Rhetorical, Communicological, and Other Semiotic Approaches to Religion and Ritual.” North American Association for the Study of Religion, San Antonio, November 2004.
“The Idolatry of Language: Max Müller’s Literalism and Monotheism.” American Academy of Religion, San Antonio, November 2004.
“Toward a Natural History of Rhetoric: Textual Economies and the Rise of the Literal in the Age of Globalization.” 8th Congress of the International Association for Semiotic Studies, Lyon, France, July 2004.
“Gesturing at Nature: The Rhetoric of Gestures, Ritual and Memory in Cross-Cultural Perspective.” Gestures, Rituals and Memory: A Multidisciplinary Symposium on Patterned Human Movement Across Time. Victoria College, University of Toronto, May 2004.
“Monological Gods, Dialogical Selves: Canon and Monotheism as Strategies for Interreligious Debate in Nineteenth-century India.” American Academy of Religion, Atlanta, November 2003.
“Bentham’s Fictions: Canon and Idolatry in the Genealogy of Law.” American Academy of Religion, Atlanta, November 2003.
“Chanting the Cosmogony: Hindu Tantric Rituals for Making Mantras Effective.” American Oriental Society, Nashville, April 2003.
“Images of Law and its Others: Law, Religion, and Idolatry in British India.” Association for the Study of Law, Culture and the Humanities, New York, March 2003.
Respondent, Panel on “Multiplying and Dividing: Pluralism and Transformation in Law and Religion.” Law, Religion, and Culture Group, American Academy of Religion, Toronto, November 2002.
“What Makes a Mantra Effective?: Diagrams of Creation.” 30 th Annual Conference on South Asia, Madison, October 2001.
“Poetic Justice: Magic and Rhetoric in Hindu Ordeals.” International Association for the History of Religions, Durban, South Africa, August 2000.
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“Relativity Reconsidered: Whorf and the Structural Analysis of Mantras.” Society for Indian Philosophy and Religion, Calcutta, India, August 2000.
“Rhetorics of Law and Ritual: A Semiotic Comparison of the Law of Talion and Sympathetic Magic.” American Academy of Religion, Orlando, November 1998.
“The Global Ethic Document and International Law.” Society for Buddhist-Christian Studies Conference, DePaul University, Chicago, July 1996.
Invited Presentations
Respondent, book panel on Sovereignty and the Sacred . Workshop on “Sovereignty: Sacred and Secular.” University of Vienna, February 2020.
“The Use and Abuse of the Category of the Secular as Applied to Precolonial India.” Center for the Study of Developing Societies, New Delhi, January 2019.
“Sovereignty and the Sacred.” Book presentations at Max-Weber-Kolleg, University of Erfurt; University of Navarra; India International Center, Delhi; Presidency University, Kolkata, 2019.
“Secularization as the Disenchantment of Sovereignty.” Lecture series, Configurations of the Secular, Institute for Islamic Studies, Freie Universität Berlin, June 2017.
“Blasphemy and Sedition: Compassing the Death of the King in the State of Exception.” University of Turin, April 2017.
“Disenchantment: European Origins and South Asian Consequences.” Center for the Study of Developing Societies, New Delhi, January 2017.
“Hindu Mantras and Christian Prayers.” India International Center, New Delhi, January 2017.
“Disenchantment and Sovereignty: A New Genealogy of the Secular.” Workshop on “Secularization, Disenchantment, and Re-enchantment,” History of Religions Department, Stockholm University, May 2016.
“Secularism, Sovereignty, and the Jewish Question: Perspectives from the History of Protestant Theology.” Law and Political Thought Workshop on “Questioning Secularism,” Tel Aviv University School of Law, March 2016.
“Fences and Neighbors: South Asian Studies and Religious Studies.” Center for Modern Indian Studies, Georg-August-Universität, Göttingen, July 2015.
“Modernity and Disenchantment.” Annual LMU Philosophy Department Lecture, Siemens Stiftung, Munich, January 2015.
“Disenchantment and Secular Politics.” Faculty of Philosophy, Philosophy of Science, and Religious Studies, Ludwig Maximilians University, Munich, January 2013.
“The Hindu Moses: The Secularization of Hindu Law under Colonialism.” South Asia Institute, University of Heidelberg, Germany, April 2008.
Yelle, p.13
“Toward a Genealogy of Ritual Performance: The Protestant Critique of Vain Repetitions in Prayer and its Causes and Consequences.” Department of Anthropology, University of Chicago, April 2007.
“Two Competing Linguistic Ideologies: Hindu Mantras and the Protestant Critique of Vain Repetitions in Prayer.” Department of Communication, University of Memphis, March 2007.
“Iconoclasm and Modernity: Western Tradition against Itself.” Phi Alpha Theta Series on Counterculture, Department of History, University of Memphis, February 2007.
“Toward a Genealogy of Human Rights: Christian Polemics against Jewish Ritual Law as a Precursor of Religious Freedom in Modern Law.” Speaker Series on Law, Religion, and Secularism. American Bar Foundation, Chicago, April 2006.
“An Indian Linguistic Reformation: The Disenchantment of South Asian Languages under Colonialism.” Department for the Study of Religion, University of Toronto, November 2005.
“What is Hinduism? And Who Says So?” Department of Historical Studies, University of Toronto at Mississauga, November 2005.
“Toward a Theory of Performance: The Rhetoric of Ritual and the Reasons for its Decline.” Faculty Colloquium, Program for the Study of Religion, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, October 2005.
“What Lawyers Can Learn from the Study of Rhetoric.” University of Toronto Law School, April 2005.
“Poetry on Trial: Law versus Literature, or Two Chapters in the History of Legal Literalism.” Toronto Legal History Seminar, University of Toronto Law School, February 2005.
“Poetry on Trial: Toward a Genealogy of Legal Literalism.” Rhetoric Department, University of California, Berkeley, January 2005.
“Rhetoric on Trial: The Case for and against Rhetoric in the Law.” Osgoode Hall Law School, York University, Toronto, February 2004.
“The Meaning of Mantras.” Semiotix Café, Toronto, December 2003.
“Explaining Mantras.” Faculty Colloquium, Department for the Study of Religion, University of Toronto, November 2003.
“Bentham’s Fictions: Canon and Idolatry in the Genealogy of Law.” Toronto Legal History Seminar, University of Toronto Law School, October 2003.
Respondent to Martha Minow, Engaging Cultural Differences . Brauer Seminar, University of Chicago Divinity School, May 2003.
“Legal Fictions: Canon, Idolatry, and Rhetoric in the Genealogy of Law.” Department of Law, Jurisprudence, and Social Thought, Amherst College, November 2002.
“An Emic Pragmatics of Mantra, Part Two: Diagrams of Creation.” History of Religions Workshop, University of Chicago Divinity School, May 2001.
“What Makes a Mantra Effective?” Asiatic Society, Calcutta, India, May 2000.
Yelle, p.14
“Verbal Icons: A Comparative Semiotic Analysis of Mantra.” Center for Advanced Research in the Humanities, Dhaka University, Dhaka, Bangladesh, August 1998.
Panelist, Conference on the Future of the History of Religions, University of Chicago Divinity School, November 1996.
Supervision of Doctoral Students and Habilitationen
Primary supervisor Sabine Exner, Homo-Ehe und Regenbogenfamilien: Eine vergleichende Diskursanalyse in Bezug auf Religion (in progress). Franziska Holzfurtner, Darstellung der Umwelt bei der bayerischen Romantik (in progress). Mehdi Mirabian, Religious Obstacles to the Establishment of the Modern State in Iran (in progress). Silviu-Vasile Rosu, The Baptism of a Pagan Language: A Textual and Contextual Analysis of William Carey’s (1761- 1834) Sanskrit Translation of the New Testament (in progress). Wenzel Braunfels, Die Rolle des Protestantismus für die deutsche Geisteswissenschaft im langen 19. Jahrhundert (in progress). Yu-Sheng Tsou, The Ritual of Chinese Esoteric Buddhism as the Observation of the Unobservable (in progress). Co- supervisor with Martin Lehnert.
Second reader Melanie Barbato, Anekanta through the Ages: The Jaina Teaching of the Infinite Facets of Reality between Philosophy and Rhetorics Emily Eiben, Representing Buddhism in British Media and Popular Culture, 1875-1895
Third reader Christian Göhlert, Ubugami - Geburtsgottheiten im japanischen Volksglauben Ines Seiter, Holocausterinnerung im musealen Kontext Baldassare Scolari, State Martyr: Representation and Performativity of Political Violence
Habilitationen (service on Mentorat for the Habil. in Religious Studies) Matthias Egeler, Island in the West: Genealogy of a Myth (awarded 2016). Martin Rötting, Navigation: Spirituelle Identität in einer interreligiösen Welt (awarded 2018). Marie-Thérèse Mäder, Religious Lifestyles in Documentary Media: Mormons in Spaces of Communication (awarded 2019). Lorenz Trein, Säkulare Zeit in der Religionsgeschichte: Über Geschichtskritik und Religionswissenschaft (in process).
Academic Service (Non-Departmental) currently peer reviewer for national scientific research funding agencies in Germany, Switzerland, Belgium, the Netherlands, and Israel 2018 Member, external peer review committee for the Faculty of Theology and Religious Studies at the University of Groningen 2012-22 Editor, Religion, Culture, and History book series, American Academy of Religion/ Oxford University Press; member, AAR Publications Committee 2016- Editorial Board, Method & Theory in the Study of Religion 2017- Co-editor, Semiotics of Religion book series, Walter de Gruyter publishers 2012-17 Steering Committee, Secularism and Secularity Group, American Academy of Religion 2011-13 Editorial Board, Studies in Religion/Sciences Religieuses 2010-13 Steering Committee, Religion, Colonialism, and Postcolonialism Group, American Academy of Religion 2007-11 Executive Secretary and Treasurer, North American Association for the Study of Religion 2005-07 Executive Council, North American Association for the Study of Religion Yelle, p.15
2005-08 Chair, Law, Religion, and Culture Group, American Academy of Religion 2002-05 Steering Committee, Law, Religion, and Culture Group, American Academy of Religion
Association Memberships
American Academy of Religion; European Association for the Study of Religion; Deutsche Vereinigung für Religionswissenschaft; North American Association for the Study of Religion
Languages
English: native speaker German: reading (fluent), conversation, lecturing French: reading, limited conversation Sanskrit: reading with dictionary Classical Hebrew: very limited knowledge