Graduate Students
FAQ's for Incoming Graduate Students
The graduate program has three tracks. Short descriptions of the academic interests of graduate students in each area of emphasis are provided below:
Religion in the Americas
Kerri Blumenthal.
Ph.D. student (from 2010). Kerri Blumenthal received a B.A. in Anthropology and Religious Studies from the University of Kansas (2003) where she focused on the interconnectedness between island populations and the environment in the British West Indies and Polynesia. She received an M.A. in Religion from Claremont Graduate University (2010); in her thesis she evaluated social capital theory at the collective level through an investigation of church involvement in the 2008 California Proposition 8 campaigns. She is interested in identity construction, with particular focus on the African diaspora.blumentk@ufl.edu
Mallory K. Bolduc.
Ph.D. student (from 2007). Mallory graduated with honors from Texas Christian University with a B.A. in political science and religion. Her undergraduate thesis, which she presented at the Southwest Commission on Religious Studies, examined the Christian lobby for Israel in the United States and analyzed the effectiveness of this lobby under the George W. Bush administration. She also spent several months in Seville, Spain, where she studied interreligious dialogue and/or conflict under Muslim and Catholic rule. Her research interests deal primarily with the role of the Catholic hierarchy in Latin American regime transitions, especially on truth and reconciliation commissions in the Southern Cone. She is pursuing a minor in the Political Science department in order to focus on the "military moment" of Chile's transition to democracy and its lasting impact on democratic consolidation. mkbolduc@ufl.edu
Rose Caraway. Ph.D. (2011). Ms. Caraway received a B.A. in Latin American Studies with honors in 2003 from the University of Texas at Austin. In 2006, she received her M.A. in Latin American Studies from Tulane University in New Orleans. Her academic interests include religion in Latin America and the Caribbean; African and African Diaspora religions; world Christianity; and religious revivals in communist, post-communist, and post-Soviet areas. Her dissertation analyzed religion and social change in Cuba since the fall of the Soviet Bloc, when Cubans turned to religion during the economic crisis known as the "Special Period." She is currently the C.W. and Modene Neely Visiting Assistant Professor of Christianity at Northern Arizona University. Rose.Caraway@nau.edu
Jennifer Dick. M.A. student (From 2008). Jennifer received a B.A. in Anthropology, with a minor in Religion, from the University of Florida in 2007, graduating cum laude. Her undergraduate focus was in archaeology and African American religions. Her current research interests include plantation archaeology with a focus on how oppression and gender shape the meaning and practices of religion. gdick84@ufl.edu
Shreena N. Gandhi. Ph.D. (2009). Shreena received her BA in Religion from Swarthmore College, where her major was religion and her thesis research centered on Buddhist religious narratives in Sri Lanka. In 2003 she received her Masters of Theological Studies from Harvard Divinity School. While at Harvard Divinity, she worked as a research assistant at the Center for Studies of World Religions, where her research focused on the religions of Iran. At Florida, Shreena focused on U.S. Religious history and Hindu traditions in the Americas track. She graduated in 2009 after she completed her dissertation, Translating, Practicing and Commodifying Yoga in the U.S. She is now an Assistant Professor in the Department of Religion at Kalamazoo College. Shreena.Gandhi@kzoo.edu
Cez Erika Generoso. Ph.D student (From 2010). Cez Erika Generosoreceived a B.A. in Religion and Anthropology from the University of Florida, graduating summa cum laude in 2009. Her undergraduate thesis investigated Bharata Natyam in Alachua County and operated on the premise that cultural performance and lived religion are means through which communities define and situate themselves in particular contexts. She is primarily interested in topics regarding religion and immigration, with particular focus on the Filipino religious experience.cezerika@ufl.edu
Gayle Ann Spiers Lasater. Ph.D. candidate (from 2003).Ms. Lasater received a BA in Anthropology with a minor in International Relations at the University of West Florida, following this with an MA in Latin American and Caribbean Studies and an emphasis in Sociology from Florida International University. Her academic interests include religion and politics in the Americas, western monotheism in the Atlantic New World, the interaction of Christian missions in the Americas, and religion and the environment. Ms. Lasater was a researcher with Ford Foundation's immigrant religion project, "Latino Immigrants in Florida: Lived Religion, Space, and Power,"working with principle investigator and religion department professor Manuel Vasquez. Ms. Lasater is writing her dissertation entitled Building the Kingdom: Mormon Missionaries and the Americas. glasater@ufl.edu
Sean O’Neil. Ph.D. candidate (from 2005). Sean received a BA in English and History from the University of King's College in Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada and holds a Masters in International Affairs--Latin American Studies from Ohio University. He taught high school levels of World and American history in Bogota, Colombia and from 2003 to 2005 Sean was an instructor of Spanish language and Latin American history at North Greenville University in Tigerville, South Carolina. At the University of Florida, he has taught introductory courses in Social Ethics and Christianity, and also teaches an undergraduate seminar in Religion, Pluralism and Identity in Latin America. His academic interests include social ethics; US Latino and Latin American religion; religion and globalization; religion and disability; and religion, film, and popular culture. He is currently conducting dissertation research on the influence of US Latino and Latin American Christianity on the reconfiguration of the Anglican Communion.soneil@ufl.edu
Jason Purvis. Ph.D. candidate (from 2010). Jason received his BA in the Academic Study of Religion with a minor in Asian Studies from the College of Charleston. Jason’s Bachelor’s essay consisted of a three month research trip in and around Tokyo, Japan. This project examined the ritual known as mizuko kuyo, a ritual that memorializes the spirits of aborted and/or miscarried fetuses—its various manifestations and the significant role of material culture in its production. Jason received his MA in the Academic Study of Religion from the University of Colorado at Boulder. His MA Thesis was an examination of the ways in which mizuko kuyo is being transplanted and re-contextualized in the United States, primarily among American convert Buddhist communities. Jason’s current interests include religion in the Americas, globalization and religion, religion and immigration, and ritual programs in transition from one cultural context to another. Jason is now working on how religious discourse and ritual informs the lives of those who are caught up in the process of migration between Central/South America and the United States. jepurv@ufl.edu
Leah Sarat. Ph.D. candidate (from 2006).Ms. Sarat received a BA in Comparative Cultures and Fine Art from Alfred University, and an MA in Religion and Culture from Wilfrid Laurier University. During an undergraduate semester in Nepal, she researched community formation among migrants to the KathmanduValley. After graduation, Ms. Sarat worked for two years as a resident volunteer at a women’s shelter in Ciudad Júarez, Mexico. During this time she assisted with the Border Awareness Program, introducing U.S. college students to the political and social realities of the border area. Her research interests include ritual, indigenous religions of the Americas, and the religious dimensions of U.S.-Mexico border crossing. Ms. Sarat has presented her work at the Canadian Society for the Study of Religion and is a contributor to The U.S.-Mexico Border: A Cultural and Political Encyclopedia.lsarat@ufl.edu
Hilit Surowitz. Ph.D. candidate (from 2004). Ms. Surowitz received an undergraduate degree from the University of Florida with a dual major in Religion and Political Science, and afterward, a Fulbright Fellowship to study the religious and social integration of Israel's Ethiopian Jewish community. She subsequently earned a master's degree from the department of religion at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem and taught primary and secondary school in both Israel and South Florida. Her research interests include Caribbean religion, the Jewish communities of the Caribbean, and diaspora studies. She is particularly interested in the trans-Atlantic social and religious networks established and maintained by European, North African, and Caribbean Jewish communities and their role in defining community identity. hilit@ufl.edu
These Religion and Nature students have declared Religions of the Americas their secondary area: Gavin Van Horn, Samuel Snyder, Eleanor Finnegan, Bridgette O'Brien.
Religions of Asia
Yu Jing Chen. Ph.D. student (from 2010). Yu Jing Chen is a Mahayana Buddhist nun in the Chan tradition. She earned a master’s degree in religious studies from the National Cheng-Chi University in Taiwan. Her M.A. research focused on the doctrine and practice of non-duality in Buddhism. She is broadly concerned with the transmission of Buddhism in Asia, the development of Chinese Buddhist scriptures, and Buddhist art. Her current interest is the issues of the mutual interactions between Buddhism and other religions in China.yujingche@ufl.edu
Melanie Davis. Ph.D. student (from 2010). Melanie Davis received a B.A. in Religious Studies and Anthropology from Rollins College, graduating cum laude in 2010. Her primary research interests include religion in Japan, comparative religion with particular focus on East Asia and the United States, and anthropological perspectives on religion. msdavis@ufl.edu
Phillip Scott Ellis Green. Ph.D. candidate (from 2009).Mr. Green received an undergraduate degree in comparative religion from the University of Washington in 2002, and after living abroad in Japan for three years returned to earn a master's degree from the University of Florida in religion in 2007 with an emphasis in early Indian Buddhism. His M.A. research focused on avadana literature, especially how images of women were portrayed and understood in a Buddhist collection of avadanas known as the Avadanashataka. After 2007, Phillip’s interest in religion in early Southeast Asian—along with connections between early South Asia and Southeast Asia—steadily increased. Phillip’s dissertation research examines the emergence of esotericism (especially forms of tantric Buddhism) among the early Khmers between the tenth to thirteenth centuries. Examining architectural, art historical, and epigraphical sources in Old Khmer and Sanskrit comprise the foundation of Phillip’s research. Phillip’s research is currently funded by a UF Alumni Fellowship and a Ph.D. Dissertation Research Fellowship through the Center for Khmer Studies. Phillip has also organized UF's first Sanskrit club in order to provide students of Sanskrit additional resources and peer support. psgreen@ufl.edu
Kendall Marchman. Ph.D. student (from 2008). Mr. Marchman received a Bachelor of Arts degree in Music from Mercer University and a Master of Theological Studies from Vanderbilt University. His main focus is Asian Buddhism, specifically its transmission and early development in China. His secondary interests include Hinduism, Vajrayana, Popular Religion, and Comic Books.krmarchman@ufl.edu
Ved Patel. Ph.D. student (from 2010). Ved Patel received his BA from the University of California, Irvine. His current research interests center on Hindu Diaspora in the U.S. and Europe, particularly the translation of communal rituals and religious complexes in a setting of minority status.patelvr@ufl.edu
Caleb Simmons. Ph.D. student (from 2008). Caleb Simmons graduated from the Missouri State University (formerly Southwest Missouri State University) with a B.A. in Religious Studies. He received his master's degree from the Florida State University in Asian religious traditions with an emphasis in Hinduism (Thesis: She Who Slays the Buffalo Demon: Divinity, Identity, and Authority in Iconography of Mahishasuramardini). He has taught Religions of South Asia, Introduction to World Religions, and Asian Humanities at various institutions. Mr. Simmons has authored several encyclopedia articles covering a wide range of topics in South Asian History.simmons@ufl.edu
Christine Walters. Ph.D. student (from 2010). Christine Walters received an MA from the University of Hawai‘i, where her research focused on Buddhism in the United States with an emphasis on constructions of religious and ethnic identity at the community level. She spent the 2009-2010 academic year as an adjunct instructor at the University of South Florida. Her current research interests include religious identity, ritual and material culture, and popular culture in India, especially religious activities depicted in Hindi film.c.walters@ufl.edu
Jimi Wilson. M.A. student (from 2006). Mr. Wilson earned a BA in Philosophy and Religion and a BS in Mass Communications (with a concentration in journalism) at the University of North Carolina-Pembroke. His emphasis is in Hindu religious ethnography. As an undergraduate his research focused on practices among diasporic Hindus from the Sindh region (modern Pakistan). In addition to his ongoing interest in Sindhi Hinduism, he has recently been researching ways in which alternative music forms in the west—particularly punk rock—have incorporated Hindu religious concepts and have sometimes been used to promote various forms of Hinduism. jimi45@ufl.edu
Religion and Nature
Fahaa Baden-Roberts.
M.A. student (from 2002).Fahaa received a B.A in Religion (summa cum laude) with a minor in Psychology from the University of Florida in 2000. Her undergraduate thesis focused upon the dynamics of Sufi Mysticism and Carl Gustav Jung's Analytical Psychology. Central to her graduate work is to consider how philosophies of substance and philosophies of events have affected modern thought. Her M.A. thesis will discuss Meister Eckhart's thought in relation to Alfred North Whitehead's process philosophy. She plans to advance this project further in Ph.D work. Fahaa is a student member of the Instituite of Physics in England, American Institute of Physics, Eckhart Society, and Michael Polanyi Society. She is also a devoted wildlife rehabilitator and supporter of many conservation groups. fahaa@earthlink.net
Clint Bland. Ph.D. student (from 2008). Mr. Bland received a B.A. from Texas A&M University in 2006 where he majored in English literature and minored in history and film studies. In 2008, he completed an M.A. in religious studies at the University of Kansas where his thesis focused on critiquing the rehabilitation of theories of totemism and their application to contemporary anti-whaling movements and indigenous rights. His current interests include the impacts of environmental degradation on marginalized indigenous religious communities in the southern United States, Native American forms of Christianity, religious freedoms and U.S. constitutional law, and the intersection of religion, nature, and film.ctbland@ufl.edu
Amy Brown. Ph.D. student (2008). Amy graduated from University of Arkansas with a B.S. in Microbiology and a minor in Religious Studies. She received an M.S. from University of Vermont in Natural Resources with a concentration in Environmental Thought and Culture. Her Master's Thesis examined the religious and environmental dimensions of green (or environmentally-friendly) funerals. Her current research interests are in religion and science, particularly evolutionary theory, women and religion, and gender and nature. Her dissertation research will focus on feminist critiques of evolution and evolution as a religious narrative.amylbrown@ufl.edu
Eleanor Finnegan. Ph.D. candidate (from 2005).Eleanor Finnegan is a full-time lecturer at Coastal Carolina University. She received an undergraduate degree in Religious Studies from Colgate University and a Master of Theological Studies from Vanderbilt University with a focus on Islamic studies. The recipient of several Foreign Language and Area Studies (FLAS) fellowships for Modern Standard Arabic, her research interests include American Islam and Muslims and the relations between Muslims' religious and environmental ideas and practices. Her publications include: "What Traditions are Represented in Religion and Ecology? A Prespective from an American Scholar of Islam," "Case Study: Images of 'Land' among Islamic Farmers in the U.S.," and "Representin' Women: Signification of Women's Bodies in Muslim Hip-Hop," as well as contributions to several encyclopedias and journals. Her dissertation is focused on farming among American Muslim communities. Her website is: http://www.clas.ufl.edu/users/finneged . finneged@ufl.edu
Robin Globus Veldman. Ph.D. candidate (from 2008). Robin Globus Veldman received an undergraduate degree in Environmental Studies from Dartmouth College (2002), and a master's in Religion and Nature from UF’s Department of Religion (2008). A recipient of the Tedder Family Doctoral Fellowship in the Humanities, her research interests include the various ways in which religion and environmental attitudes and behavior intertwine; millennialism; and environmental ethics, especially as they are embodied in practice. Her dissertation employs qualitative methods to examine attitudes about climate change, the environment and environmentalism among theologically conservative Christians in southeastern Georgia. Strongly interested in cross-disciplinary communication and the role of the humanities in collaborative environmental research, she is also a fellow at the Integrative Graduate Education and Research Traineeship (IGERT) program, an NSF-funded initiative that seeks to bring together interdisciplinary scholars. Professionally, she works as Assistant Editor the Journal for the Study of Religion, Nature and Culture, and serves as student member on the board of the International Society for the Study of Religion, Nature and Culture. Her publications include “Narrating the Environmental Apocalypse: How Imagining the End Facilitates Moral Reasoning Among Environmental Activists” (Ethics & the Environment, 2012) and “Environmental Millennialism,” co-authored with Dr. Bron Taylor (Oxford Handbook of Millennialism, 2010). rglobus@ufl.edu
Brant Horacek. Ph.D. student (from 2010). Brant Horacek is from Omaha, Nebraska. He has a B.A. in Religious Studies from Missouri State University and an M.T.S. from the Candler School of Theology at Emory University. His broad research interests are in religion and science, food and animal ethics, and sociology of religion. Some more specific interests include: 1) understanding ethics in everyday life, especially religious groups who understand food in ways that challenge current societal foodways 2) religious groups who combine religious and scientific language and logic in an attempt to solve contemporary social issues. branth6@ufl.edu
Keri Johnson.
M.A. student (from 2010). Keri Johnson received a B.A. in Environmental Studies, with a minor in Plant and Soil Science from the University of Vermont, graduating with honors in 2007. Her undergraduate honors thesis was creation and execution of a Students Teaching Students course, entitled Yogic Environmental Philosophy. Her primary research includes the interconnections between Yogic and Environmental Ethics, as well as the influence South Asian Philosophies has directly or indirectly had on the global worldview today.keriljohnson@ufl.edu
Jacob L. Jones. Ph.D. student (from 2008). Jacob received his B.A. in Philosophy with a Religious Studies option from Montana State University in 2005. Then in 2008 he received his M.A. from University of Missouri. Throughout his M.A. studies Jacob focused on issues of power and new religious movements in the Americas. His current scholarly interests are in the environmental and religious history of the western United States, with specific emphasis on the Northern Rockies. Jacob is also interested in religion, nature, and virtual worlds, i.e. how virtual worlds can be interpreted as cultural products that highlight human understanding of religion and nature.jljgv9@ufl.edu
Todd LeVasseur. Ph.D. candidate (from 2006). Todd LeVasseur is a 5th year Ph.D. candidate in the Religion and Nature track. His dissertation work is a comparative study of religious communities that practice and support sustainable agriculture: Koinonia Partners, a Protestant lay monastic community in Americus, GA; and Congregation Shearith Israel, an egalitarian Conservative synagogue in Atlanta, GA and member of Hazon, a progressive national Jewish environmental group. His scholarly research reflects his interests in the interplay of religion, environmental and agrarian ethics, environmental science, and sustainable agriculture and how religions, especially in the U.S., are responding via lived environmental practices to the emerging climate crisis. Todd has been involved in interdisciplinary research on gender and watershed development in rural India and on environmental restoration with the Foundations of Conduct working group. Todd's scholarship on a variety of religion and nature issues can be seen in various self and co-authored book reviews and review essays, encyclopedia entries, and forthcoming articles in edited volumes. In the summer of 2010 Todd was a summer fellow with the Pluralism Project at Harvard University where he developed a case study about religious responses to the country's largest offshore wind farm. He is currently finishing his dissertation and is an adjunct professor at the College of Charleston in South Carolina. Lastly, Todd is passionate about teaching all aspects of religion to undergraduates. toddlev@ufl.edu
Lucas De Biaji Moreira. M.A. student (from 2010). Mr. Moreira received a B.A. in Anthropology, with a minor in Latin American and Caribbean Studies, from the College of Charleston in 2009. His research foci include indigenous traditions, myth and ritual, and social and religious change. He is also interested in researching the role of cities in the development of religious traditions, especially in regards to the evolution and diffusion of marginalized religious forms. This interest includes the formation of the state, evolutionary psychology, authority and power, constructive creations of space and place, ontology and globalization. ldmoreira@ufl.edu
Bridgette O'Brien. Ph.D. candidate (from 2005). Ms. O'Brien earned an undergraduate degree in comparative world religions at the University of Puget Sound and a master's degree from the religion department at Columbia University where her studies focused on the religious traditions of Asia. Ms. O'Brien has taught high school for the past eight years. She worked with Harvard's Pluralism Project to educate students about the religious diversity in the Northwest and explored with her students how different religions addressed local environmental concerns in the Puget Sound area. Her professional interests include continued involvement with secondary school education where she aims to incorporate ideas about ecological literacy and outdoor/environmental education with people's religious understanding of the world through innovative curriculum units that contribute to broader education reforms. bridge72@ufl.edu
Jaya Reddy. Ph.D. student (from 2010). Jaya Reddy received an M.A. from University of Wisconsin-Madison where she focused on the ways in which plants are used in Indian Religion, Medicine, and Astrology. Using plants as a focal point, her research examines how these systems of knowledge (religion, medicine, and astrology) interact with each other. She continues to build on these areas of research considering also the dialectic between religion and landscape.jreddy@ufl.edu
Melissa Richards. M.A. student (from 2010). Melissa Richards received her BA from UF in Mathematics in 2005.gator061@ufl.edu
David Wiles. M.A. student (from 2003). Mr. Wiles received an M.A. in philosophy, focusing on environmental ethics, from Colorado State University. His main academic interests are bioregionalism, permaculture, and the idea that it is possible, productive, and personally rewarding for environmentalists to continue to "strive" despite the despair they might feel in their struggles to protect the environment. He is currently teaching at Alachua county community colleges, when not playing underwater hockey. dwiles@ufl.edu
Joseph Witt. Ph.D. candidate (from 2004). Mr. Witt received a Bachelor of Arts degree in philosophy and religion from Hendrix College in 2003. In 2006, he received his Master of Arts degree in religious studies from the University of Florida. His research considered the involvement of Celtic Christian and neo-pagan groups in environmental activism in the United Kingdom and Ireland, particularly surrounding the 2005 G8 Summit in Gleneagles, Scotland. Mr. Witt’s current research involves the study of religion and nature in the southern United States, primarily focusing on the influence of religions in environmental activism, including issues of mountaintop removal, deforestation and chip-mills, National Forest and parkland uses, and environmental justice. He is a contributor to the journal Worldviews and, with Bron Taylor, Introduction to New and Alternative Religions in America. Mr. Witt is also the Assistant Editor for the Journal for the Study of Religion, Nature and Culture. joseph23@ufl.edu
