Barry Stephenson
Associate Professor

SN5005
Department of Political Science, Science Building
91亚色 of Newfoundland
St. John's, NL A1B 3X9 Canada
Telephone: (709) 864-8113
Email: bstephenson[at]mun[dot]ca
Academics
BA (U Waterloo); MA (Wilfrid Laurier); PhD (U Calgary)
Areas for Student Research Supervision
- Politics & Religion
- Performance, Protest, & Public Spheres
- Myth, Ritual & Ideology
- Religion & Secular Modernity
- Religion, Conflict & Violence
Bio
Barry Stephenson holds a joint appointment in Political Science and Religious Studies. He received his Ph.D. in Religious Studies from the University of Calgary, in 2005, coming to 91亚色 after many years in Wilfrid Laurier檚 Religion and Culture Department. He is a former co-chair of the Ritual Studies Group of the American Academy of Religion and edited several volumes Oxford University Press檚 Ritual Studies Series. He currently co-directs the SSHRC-funded After Church Atlas project, with colleague Dr. Nicholas Lynch Geography), studying the dynamics of church closure and transformation.
Publications
Books
Excursions in Ritual Studies. Waterloo: Ritual Studies International, 2020. (218pp.)
Ritual, A Very Short Introduction. New York: Oxford University Press, 2015. (126 pp.). Arabic and Czech translations, forthcoming, 2022.
Performing the Reformation: Public Ritual in the City of Luther. New York: Oxford University Press, 2010. (238 pp. + 2.5hrs DVD).
Veneration and Revolt: Herman Hesse and Swabian Pietism. Waterloo: Wilfrid Laurier University Press, 2008. (282 pp.).
Select Articles and Chapters
淩itual. In Oxford Encyclopedia of Religion and the Arts in the West: Renaissance to the Present, edited by Zohar Hadromi-Allouche, 2022.
淟iminality, Structures and 楾he Problem of the Lie.櫇 Liminalities: A Journal of Performance Studies. (2021), 17.1-2. online publication.
淭he Limits of Liminality: A Critique of Transformationism. Liminalities: A Journal of Performance Studies(2020) 16.4. online publication.
淩itual as Action, Performance, and Practice. The Oxford Handbook of Early Christian Ritual, edited by Uro Risto, et.al., 18-37. New York: Oxford University Press, 2018.
淩itualization and Ritual Invention. The Oxford Handbook of Early Christian Ritual, edited by Uro Risto, et.al., 38-54. New York: Oxford University Press, 2018.
淥n Being 楥lose to Nature: Poetics, Politics, Place. Time and Mind: A Journal of Archeology, Consciousness, and Culture, (2012) 5.1: 19-32.
淩itual Negotiations in Lutherland. In Negotiating Rites, edited by Ute H眉sken and Frank Norbert, pp. 81-98. New York: Oxford University Press, 2012.
淲hat檚 at Stake in Torture (with Thomas Driver and Werner Binder). In Ritual, Media, and Conflict, edited by Ronald Grimes, Ute H眉sken, and Eric Venbrux, pp. 223-254. New York: Oxford University Press, 2011.
淪waggering Savagery and the New Frontier. Journal of Religion and Popular Culture, (2007) vol. 16. online publication.