Review- Conversations: Asian American Evangelical Theologies in Formation

Here is a review of D. J. Chuang and Timothy Tseng, eds., Conversations: Asian American Evangelical Theologies in Formation in Religious Studies Review 33:4 (2007): 319-20 by Dr. Amos Yong of Regent University School of Divinity. The Religious Studies Review is published by the Council of Societies for the Study of Religion.

+ + +
CONVERSATIONS: ASIAN AMERICAN EVANGELICAL THEOLOGIES IN FORMATION. Edited by D. J. Chuang and Timothy Tseng. Washington, DC: L2 Foundation, 2006. Pp. xi + 130. Paper, $10.00, ISBN: none; the book is available from www.L2Foundation.org.

Published by an organization devoted to “Asian American leadership and legacy development” (website), this is the first book to appear on the topic of Asian American evangelical theology (AAET). The six essayists reflect the diversity of the AAE community. David Yoo, a historian at Claremont McKenna College, surveys (with two collaborators) the pre-WWII histories of Japanese and Korean American Christians, and urges that religion needs to be factored into immigration and race analyses of these communities, even as Tim Tseng, a historian of American Christianity and founder of the Institute for the Study of Asian American Christianity (http://www.isaacweb.org), exposes the “color blindness” of American church history and provides some hermeneutical options for moving beyond orientalist or assimilationist models of the Asian American Christian experience. A practical theologian at Trinity Evangelical Divinity School, Peter Cha, discusses the challenges involved in identity formation among second generation Korean Americans. An intriguing essay is missiologist James Zo’s insightful analysis of how structural and power issues complicate the assessment of racism, prejudice, and discrimination on both sides of the American and Asian American equation. For a volume on AAET, the two explicitly theological essays are by historical theologians: Paul Lim (who specializes in early modern England and teaches at Vanderbilt University) reveals the importance of biography in the construction of any AAET, and Jeffrey Jue (a post-Reformation historian at Westminster Theological Seminary) seeks a way beyond both modernist experientialism and postmodernist subjectivism by returning to the gospel. May others join in the conversation launched herein.

Amos Yong
Professor of Theology and Director of PhD Program in Renewal Studies
Regent University School of Divinity

* * *
Dr. Amos Yong is author of six well received books, including the forthcoming Hospitality and the Other: Pentecost, Christian Practices, and the Neighbor (Orbis Books, 2008). A clergyman with the Pentecostal Assemblies of God Church, his scholarly life is dedicated to deepening biblical theology and promoting ecumenical and interfaith understanding.

Faculty Openings at Regent University

Dr. Wie Tjiong wishes to announce the following four openings at Regent University (Virginia Beach, VA):

***
New Testament Studies
Download Job Description (MS Word)

Regent University’s School of Divinity invites applications and nominations for a tenure-track faculty appointment at the rank of assistant professor. The appointment involves responsibility for teaching and research in some facet of New Testament studies. Interest in and aptitude for teaching biblical languages and hermeneutics are also desirable. A PhD and an aptitude as a teacher to become proficient in multiple forms of delivery are required. University or seminary level teaching experience in a relevant field is desirable, and the successful candidate must demonstrate an understanding of and respect for the Renewal (Pentecostal/Charismatic) perspective in Christianity. Ministerial credentials are strongly preferred.

Prospective candidates should send a letter of interest, transcripts, curriculum vita, and a brief statement on their Christian experience and philosophy of education in relation to ministry. In addition, letters of reference from three recommenders should be sent directly from the recommenders to this postal address.

Biblical Studies Search Committee
c/o Meredith Vance
Office of the Dean
School of Divinity
Regent University
1000 Regent University Drive
Virginia Beach, VA 23464

Applications can be submitted online at https://www.regent.edu/admin/hr/new_faculty_application.cfm.

Curriculum vita or resume can be submitted electronically in PDF or Microsoft Word format to (mvance@regent.edu). Priority will be given to applications received by December 15, 2007.

Regent University is a culturally diverse community that actively encourages women and members of all racial/ethnic backgrounds and cultures to apply. More information regarding Regent University can be found at www.regent.edu.

Applicants will receive consideration without discrimination because of race, color, sex, age, national origin, or disability.

* * *
Old Testament Studies
Download Job Description (MS Word)

Regent University’s School of Divinity invites applications and nominations for a tenure-track faculty appointment at the rank of assistant or associate professor. The appointment involves responsibility for teaching and research in some facet of Old Testament studies. Interest in and aptitude for teaching biblical languages and hermeneutics are also desirable. A PhD and an aptitude as a teacher to become proficient in multiple forms of delivery are required. University or seminary level teaching experience in a relevant field is desirable. In addition to teaching and professional research, the position entails advising students and participating in committee work. The successful candidate must demonstrate an understanding of and respect for the Renewal (Pentecostal/Charismatic) perspective in Christianity. Ministerial credentials are strongly preferred.

Prospective candidates should send a letter of interest, transcripts, curriculum vita, and a brief statement on their Christian experience and philosophy of education in relation to ministry. In addition, letters of reference from three recommenders should be sent directly from the recommenders to this postal address.

Old Testament Search Committee
c/o Meredith Vance
Office of the Dean
School of Divinity
Regent University
1000 Regent University Drive
Virginia Beach, VA 23464

Applications can be submitted online at https://www.regent.edu/admin/hr/new_faculty_application.cfm.

Curriculum vita or resume can be submitted electronically in PDF or Microsoft Word format to (mvance@regent.edu). Priority will be given to applications received by December 15, 2007.

Regent University is a culturally diverse community that actively encourages women and members of all racial/ethnic backgrounds and cultures to apply. More information regarding Regent University can be found at www.regent.edu.

Applicants will receive consideration without discrimination because of race, color, sex, age, national origin, or disability.

* * *
World Christianity and Global Missions
Download Job Description (MS Word)

Regent University invites applications and nominations for a tenure track faculty appointment at the rank of assistant, associate, or full professor. The appointment involves responsibility for educating, equipping, and empowering men and women for ministry in global missions, and for contributing to the wider scholarly discussion about missiology and theology of mission. A terminal degree (Ph.D., D.Miss., and/or D.Min. or their equivalent) is required; university or seminar-level teaching experience in relevant areas of world Christianity, global missions, and practical ministry is desirable; scholarly contribution in some area of world Christianity and global missions is desirable; ministerial credentials with a denomination, sending agency, local church, or church network is strongly preferred.

Send letter of interest, transcripts, and curriculum vita to the following postal address. In addition, letters of reference from three recommenders should be sent directly from the recommenders to this postal address.

World Christianity and Global Missions Search Committee
c/o Meredith Vance
Office of the Dean
School of Divinity
Regent University
1000 Regent University Drive
Virginia Beach, VA 23464

Applications can be submitted online at https://www.regent.edu/admin/hr/new_faculty_application.cfm.

Curriculum vita or resume can be submitted electronically in PDF or Microsoft Word format to (mvance@regent.edu). Priority will be given to applications received by December 15, 2007.

Regent University is a culturally diverse community that actively encourages women and members of all racial/ethnic backgrounds and cultures to apply. More information regarding Regent University can be found at www.regent.edu.

Applicants will receive consideration without discrimination because of race, color, sex, age, national origin, or disability.

* * *
Practical Ministry
Download Job Description (MS Word)

Regent University invites applications and nominations for a tenure track faculty appointment at the rank of assistant or associate professor. The appointment involves responsibility for educating, equipping, and empowering men and women for ethnically and culturally sensitive ministry in one or more of the following areas: church ministry, chaplaincy, evangelism, para-church ministry, or marketplace ministry. PhD or DMin required; university or seminar level teaching experience in relevant areas of practical ministry is desirable; scholarly contribution in some area of practical ministry is desirable; ministerial credentials with a denomination, sending agency, local church, or church network are strongly preferred. Women and racial/ethnic minorities are encouraged to apply.

Send letter of interest, transcripts, and curriculum vita to the following postal address. In addition, letters of reference from three recommenders should be sent directly from the recommenders to this postal address.

Practical Ministry Search Committee
c/o Meredith Vance
Office of the Dean
School of Divinity
Regent University
1000 Regent University Drive
Virginia Beach, VA 23464

Applications can be submitted online at https://www.regent.edu/admin/hr/new_faculty_application.cfm.

Curriculum vita or resume can be submitted electronically in PDF or Microsoft Word format to (mvance@regent.edu). Priority will be given to applications received by December 15, 2007.

Regent University is a culturally diverse community that actively encourages women and members of all racial/ethnic backgrounds and cultures to apply. More information regarding Regent University can be found at www.regent.edu.

Applicants will receive consideration without discrimination because of race, color, sex, age, national origin, or disability.
———-

Dr. Wie L. Tjiong
Professor, Practical Theology, School of Divinity
Regent University
1000 Regent University Dr.
Virginia Beach, Virginia 23464-9800
Work: (757)226-4538
Fax: (757)226-4636
wietjio@regent.edu

Resource: New Hmong Studies Annotated Bibliography

Hmong-Related Works, 1996-2006: An Annotated Bibliography newly published by Scarecrow Press

The Hmong are a mountain-dwelling ethnic group residing in southwest China. In the 18th and 19th centuries, the Hmong began migrating southeast to Vietnam, Laos, and Thailand. Then in the second half of the 20th century, due mainly to their participation in the Second Indochina War (1954-1975), the Hmong began migrating to the West. Today, the Hmong are one of the fastest growing ethnic origin populations in the United States, growing from about 94,000 in the 1990 census to about 210,000 in the U.S. census bureau’s 2006 American Community Survey.

With this rapid expansion in the population, a substantially increased interest in Hmong-related written works, multimedia materials, and websites among students, scholars, service professionals, and the general public has arisen. To help meet that interest, author Mark E. Pfeifer has compiled Hmong-Related Works 1996-2006: An Annotated Bibliography, which includes full reference information (including internet links to articles where available) and descriptive summaries for 610 Hmong-related works. The work is organized into the following subject areas: Hmong in Asia, Hmong culture, The Hmong Language, Traditional Hmong Religion and Christianity, Hmong Music and Storytelling, Hmong Embroidery and Clothing, Hmong American Cultural Arts, The War in Laos and Refugee Resettlement Issues, Hmong Families, Parenting, and Gender Roles, Settlement Patterns, Housing and Socioeconomic Incorporation, Hmong Cultural Adaptation, Race Relations, The Law, and Political Incorporation, Literacy and Educational Adaptation, Physical and Mental Health, Personal Narratives of Hmong Americans, Juvenile Literature and Curriculum Materials for Teachers, Videos and DVDs, Internet Resources.

*ABOUT THE AUTHOR*

Mark Pfeifer is an Academic Librarian at Texas A&M University in Corpus Christi. From 2000-2006, he worked at the Hmong Cultural Center in St. Paul, where he developed the Hmong Resource Center Library, an extensive collection of Hmong-related academic works. Pfeifer is also editor of the Hmong Studies Journal and the Hmong Studies Internet Resource Center (www.hmongstudies.org)

Further information on this volume may be obtained at:
the Scarecrow Press website at: http://www.scarecrowpress.com/

Mark E. Pfeifer, PhD
Hmong Cultural Center
Editor, Hmong Studies Journal and Hmong Studies Internet Resource Center
E-mail: editor@hmongstudies.org
Hmong Studies Journal Website: www.hmongstudies.org/Multicultural Education
Website: www.learnabouthmong.com
Hmong Resources Portal Website: www.hmongnet.org/

cfp: American Studies Association 2008 Annual Meeting

The Religion and American Culture Caucus of the American Studies Association offers the following Calls for Papers for the 2008 Annual Meeting in Alburquerque, New Mexico, October 16-19, 2008. According to ASA guidelines, the Caucus may officially sponsor only one session per year but may assist in the organization of other sessions. Sponsorship does not guarantee a place on the final program. For more information on the Caucus, please see our site at http://www.theasa.net/caucus_religion/

All proposals should follow the ASA’s submission guidelines for session descriptions, paper abstracts, and CVs, which are described on the ASA website. (http://www.theasa.net/annual_meeting/page/submitting_a_proposal/)

Submissions will be reviewed by a panel of Caucus members; notification of sponsorship will be made before January 25.  Please send proposals to Matt Hedstrom by January 11, 2008.

Calls for Papers

1.  The Religious Left in Modern America

This panel seeks a reassessment of the religious Left in American culture and politics from the heyday of the Social Gospel in the late nineteenth century to the present.  The current efforts of the Democratic Party to speak more effectively in a religious idiom, and the widely reported fracturing of the Religious Right, bring a renewed urgency to studying the role of religion in the development and continued makeup of the Left in American politics and public life.

Topics may include (but are certainly not limited to):  the Social Gospel; religion and the counterculture of the 1960s and 1970s; religious voices in the African-American, Latino/a, gay and lesbian, and women’s liberation movements; religion and the labor movement; pacifism and anti-imperialism; the Democratic Party; church, state, and pluralism; political philosophy; the New Deal; the Great Society.

2.  Religion and Violence in Popular Culture

Both the violence of religion and the religion of violence are all too evident in our contemporary politics and culture. This panel aims to assess the complex interplay between religion and violence in American life through a study of its myriad manifestations in popular culture, both historically and in the present.

3.  Other complete sessions

We are eager to consider for sponsorship other complete panel sessions exploring historical, theoretical, and/or methodological issues in religion and American culture, including matters of secularism as a category of experience and analysis.  Panel proposals should address the 2008 meeting theme, “Back Down to the Crossroads: Integrative American Studies in Theory and Practice.” The notion of the crossroads speaks to current theoretical work in religious studies and offers the opportunity for commentary on a wide-variety of religious and cultural phenomena in the American West and Southwest, nationally, and transnationally.

Though we can only consider complete panel proposals for sponsorship, we are pleased to offer assistance to those working to assemble panels for 2008.  Please feel free to be in touch!

—
Matthew S. Hedstrom, PhD
Postdoctoral Research Associate
Center for the Study of Religion
Princeton University
609-258-6957

cfp: Association for the Sociology of Religion 2008 Annual Meeting

From Fenggang Yang:

Call for Papers
ASSOCIATION FOR THE SOCIOLOGY OF RELIGION
2008 Annual Meeting
Boston • 31 July to 2 August

RELIGION CROSSING BOUNDARIES

Religion solidifies groups, but it also transcends them.  It situates people in communities of meaning and memory, but also leads them beyond their everyday lives.  Indeed, it transforms those lives both inwardly (such as through prayer and conversion) and outwardly (through ecumenism, social activism, and the like).  Not only must scholars think about religious differences; they must also understand people who encounter each other across religious divides.  They must learn what it means for people to cross religious boundaries as well as what it means to stay inside them.  And they must, themselves, often cross disciplinary boundaries to accomplish any of these tasks.  This year‚s ASR Annual Meeting encourages scholars to reflect on such issues, both as they affect religions and as they affect their own scholarly work.

Papers and discussions are invited on a broad range of issues in the sociological study of religion relating to the meeting theme, including but not limited to the following:

– Religious boundaries of all types, including (but not limited to) theological, organizational, political, racial/ethnic, sexual, cultural, and geographic
– Shifting boundaries between Œreligion‚ and Œspirituality‚
– Shifting boundaries between religion/spirituality and non-religion
– Internal religious life, its boundaries, shapes, and transcendences
– Boundaries within and between religious organizations
– Religions‚ changing relationships with external agencies, authorities, structures
– Religious bricolage, personal, organizational, and societal
– Religious groups‚ efforts to reshape, reinforce, or erase boundaries of all kinds
– Religions‚ relationships with the social boundaries surrounding race, class, gender, and sexuality
– Religious alternatives and alternatives to religion at various points in history
– Scholarly boundaries in the study of religion and their shifts over time

And, as always, we seek an inclusive mix of substantive, theoretical, and methodological approaches.  Therefore, proposals for sessions and papers that fall outside the formal theme are also welcomed.

DEADLINES:

– Session Proposals are due by 31 January 2008
– Paper Abstracts are due by 29 February 2008

SUBMISSION GUIDELINES: (1) Submit your proposal by email as a Word attachment. Include the names, affiliations, and email addresses of all authors on the same sheet as your abstract/proposal. (2) Limit paper abstracts to a maximum of 150 words. (3) Membership in ASR is required for program consideration (one author, for multi-authored papers).  See the ASR website (www.sociologyofreligion.com) for information.

PROGRAM CHAIR: Jim Spickard, Professor of Sociology, University of Redlands. Jim is on on sabbatical and away from Redlands this year, so please use his ASR e-mail address:
ASR2008@coolsociology.net