Kristen Tobey, Ph.D
Associate Professor
Contact
Areas of Expertise
American religious history and culture, religion and the social sciences, religious identity construction and maintenance, religious exitResearch Interests
Dr. Tobey, a sociologist of religion, conducts qualitative research into the dynamics and mechanisms of religious belonging and nonbelonging in the pluralistic context of the United States. The subjects of Dr. Tobey's research, which focuses on how religious identities are formed, maintained, communicated, and sometimes discarded, have included radical Catholic anti-nuclear activists, ambivalent Mormons, and exiters from high-demand religious communities.Education & Awards
M.A. and Ph.D., Anthropology and Sociology of Religion, University of Chicago Divinity SchoolCourses Taught
Minority Religions in the United States; Religion, Freedom, and the Law; Religious Enthusiasm in Modern America; Constructing Religious Identity; The Faithful: Being Catholic in AmericaPublications
Books
- Dr. Tobey's publications include the monograph Plowshares: Protest, Performance, and Religious Identity in the Nuclear Age (Pennsylvania State University Press, 2016) and articles in, most recently, Religious Studies Review 44:2 ("From Middlemarch to the DaVinci Code: Portrayals of Religious Studies in Popular Culture") and The Journal of the American Academy of Religion 90:2 ("Mormonish: Negotiating Religious Ambivalence Online").
