Specialization:
Global Studies as an emerging field
Global rise of religious violence
Nationalism and transnational in a global age
Sikhism and South Asian religion and politics
Global religion; conflict resolution
Bio:
Professor
Global Studies
Sociology
Religious Studies
Founder and Former Director
Orfalea Center for Global & International Studies
Mark Juergensmeyer is Distinguished Professor Emeritus of Global Studies, Sociology, and affiliate of Religious Studies at the University of California, Santa Barbara, where he was the founding director of the Global and International Studies Program and the Orfalea Center for Global and International Studies. He is an expert on religious violence, conflict resolution and South Asian religion and politics, and has published more than three hundred articles and thirty books, including When God Stops Fighting: How Religious Violence Ends (University of California Press, 2022), God at War: A Meditation on Religion and Warfare (Oxford, 2021), and the co-authored God in the Tumult of the Global Square: Religion in Global Civil Society (University of California Press, 2015; co-authored with Dinah Griego and John Soboslai). His widely-read Terror in the Mind of God: The Global Rise of Religious Violence (University of California Press, fourth edition in 2017), is based on interviews with religious activists around the world--including Jihadi activists, ISIS supporters, leaders of Hamas, and abortion clinic bombers in the United States; an earlier edition was listed by the Washington Post and the Los Angeles Times as one of the best nonfiction books of the year. The first edition of a companion volume, Global Rebellion: Religious Challenges to the Secular State (University of California Press 2008) was named by the New York Times as one of the notable books of the year. His book on Gandhian conflict resolution has been reprinted as Gandhi's Way (University of California Press, Updated Edition, 2005), and was selected as Community Book of the Year at the University of California, Davis. He has co-edited with Saskia Sassen and Manfred Steger The Oxford Handbook of Global Studies (Oxford University Press, 2017; Victor Faessel, Managing Editor), and has edited Thinking Globally: A Global Studies Reader (University of California Press, 2015), the Oxford Handbook of Global Religion (Oxford University Press, 2006) and Religion in Global Civil Society (Oxford University Press, 2005), and has co-edited The Encyclopedia of Global Religions (co-edited with WC Roof; Sage Publications, 2008) and The Encyclopedia of Global Studies (co-edited with Helmunt Anheier; Sage Publications, 2009).
Juergensmeyer has received research fellowships from the Wilson Center in Washington D.C., the Harry Frank Guggenheim Foundation, the U.S. Institute of Peace, and the American Council of Learned Societies. He is the recipient of the prestigious Grawemeyer Award for contributions to the study of religion, and was awarded the Silver Award of the Queen Sofia Center for the Study of Violence in Spain. He received Honorary Doctorates from Lehigh University, Dayalbagh Educational Institute in India, and Roskilde University in Denmark, a Distinguished Teaching Award from the University of California, Santa Barbara, and the Unitas Distinguished Alumnus Award from Union Theological Seminary, New York. He was elected president of the American Academy of Religion, and chaired the working group on Religion and International Affairs for the national Social Science Research Council that resulted in the volume, Rethinking Secularism (co-edited with Craig Calhoun and Jonathan VanAntwerpen; Oxford Univ Press, 2011). He serves as the general editor of the Oxford University Press handbooks of religion online, and his commentary on contemporary issues of global religion and politics appear in The Huffington Post, The Globalist, Religion Dispatches, The Immanent Frame, and YaleGlobal Online, and on BBC, CNN, and NPR news media.
Positions
Current Positions
Distinguished Professor Emeritus of Global Studies, Sociology, and affiliate of Religious Studies (since 2021)
Professor of Sociology (1993-2021), Global Studies (1998-2021), and Religious Studies (2002-2021)
Fellow, Orfalea Center for Global & International Studies (since 2005)
Previous Positions
Director, Orfalea Center for Global & International Studies (2005-2015)
Director, Global & International Studies Program (1995-2005) University of California, Santa Barbara
Chair, Pacific Rim Research Program, Univ of California system (1994-97)
Dean, School of Hawai'ian, Asian and Pacific Studies, and Professor of Religion and Political Science, University of Hawai'i (1989-93)
Coordinator and Affiliate Professor, Religious Studies Program, Univ of California, Berkeley (1974-89),
Professor and Director, Office of Programs in Comparative Religion, Graduate Theological Union, Berkeley (1974-89)
Education
University of California, Berkeley (Political Science; PhD, 1974 and MA, 1968)
Union Theological Seminary, New York City (Ethics; MDiv, 1965)
Columbia University (School of International Affairs, 1963-65)
Univ of Illinois, Urbana (Philosophy, BA distinction, 1962)
Honors, Fellowships, Grants
International Fellow, Columbia University, 1963-65
Visiting Professor, Punjab University (India) 1970-71
Indo-American Fellowship (Fulbright) India, 1978
American Institute of Indian Studies, Senior Research Grant, India, 1979, 1983, 1985 and 1986
Co-Director, NEH Berkeley-Harvard Program in Comparative Religion (1979-84)
and NEH Berkeley-Chicago-Harvard Program (1984-89)
Fellow, Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars (Smithsonian Institution), 1986
Distinguished Visiting Professor, Univ of California-Santa Cruz, 1988
Fellow, Harry Frank Guggenheim Foundation, 1988-90
Fellow, U. S. Institute of Peace, 1989-91
Fellow, American Council of Learned Societies, 1996
Halle Distinguished Visiting Professor of Global Learning, Emory University, 2002
Elected Member, Pacific Council, Los Angeles, 2002
Grawemeyer Award in Religion, 2003
Silver Medal, Queen Sofia Center for the Study of Conflict, Valencia, Spain, 2004
Honorary Doctorate, Lehigh University, 2004
Distinguished Teaching Award, University of California, Santa Barbara, 2006
Stafford Little Lectures, Princeton University, 2006
President and Vice President, American Academy of Religion, 2007-9
Doctor Honoris Causa (Honorary Doctorate), Roskilde University, Denmark, 2009.
Media Appearances
Television:
CNN Evening News, CNN International News, CNN The Point; ABC News, ABC Politically Incorrect; NBC News; CBS Evening News; Fox News; MSNBC News Special; MSNBC Dan Abrams Report; CNBC Dennis Miller Show; NHK (Japan) News Special; local interviews in New York, Washington, Atlanta, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Chicago, Santa Barbara, Oslo, Jakarta, Delhi, Tokyo, Valencia, Madrid, Berlin, Rome, Milan, and elsewhere.
Radio:
NPR All Things Considered; BBC; Australian, German, Italian, Spanish, Japanese, and Brazilian radio, and approximately 150 local and syndicated news and talk shows.
Languages Studied
Hindi, Panjabi, Urdu, German, Latin
Publications:
When God Stops Fighting: How Religious Violence Ends (University of California Press, 2022)
God at War: A Meditation on Religion and Warfare (Oxford University Press, 2021)
The Oxford Handbook of Global Studies, co-editor (Oxford University Press, 2017), co-edited with Saskia Sassen and Manfred Steger; Victor Faessel, Managing Editor.
Thinking Globally: A Global Studies Reader, editor (Univ of California Press, 2013)
Global Rebellion: Religious Challenges to the Secular State (Univ of California Press, 2008)
Terror in the Mind of God: The Global Rise of Religious Violence (University of California Press), fourth edition, 2017; third edition, 2003; second edition (paperback) 2001; first edition, 2000; India edition, 2001 (Oxford Univ Press); Spanish edition, 2001, Italian edition, 2003 (G. Laterza, Publisher); French edition, 2003; Japanese edition, 2003; German edition, 2004; Indonesian edition, 2005.
The New Cold War? Religious Nationalism Confronts the Secular State (University of California Press, 1993); paperback edition, 1994; Japanese edition, 1995; India edition, (Oxford 1995); Indonesian edition, 1998.
Rethinking Secularism, co-editor (Oxford University Press, 2008), co-edited with Craig Calhoun and Jonathan VanAntwerpen.
Gandhi's Way: A Handbook of Conflict Resolution (Univ of California Press, Updated Edition, 2005). Revised edition of Fighting With Gandhi (Harper and Row, 1984); paperback edition published as Fighting Fair, 1986.
Global Religions: An Introduction, editor (Oxford University Press, New York, 2003).
Religion in Global Civil Society, editor (Oxford University Press, 2005).
A Handbook of Global Religions, editor (Oxford University Press, 2006).
The Encyclopedia of Global Studies, four volumes, co-editor (Sage Publications, 2012); co-edited with Helmut Anheier, Victor Faessel, Managing Editor.
The Encyclopedia of Global Religion, two volumes, co-editor (Sage Publications, 2012), co-edited with Wade Clark Roof.
Religion and Violence in the World's Religious Traditions, co-editor (Oxford University Press, forthcoming in 2017), co-edited with Margo Kitts and Michael Jerryson
The Oxford Handbook of Religion and Violence, co-editor (Oxford University Press, 2013), co-edited with Margo Kitts and Michael Jerryson
Princeton Readings in Religion and Violence, co-editor (Princeton University Press, 2011), co-edited with Margo Kitts
Violence and the Sacred in the Modern World, editor, (London: Frank Cass, 1992).
Radhasoami Reality: The Logic of a Modern Faith (Princeton University Press, 1991); paperback edition, 1995.
A Bibliographic Guide to the Comparative Study of Ethics, co-editor (Cambridge University Press, 1991).
Teaching the Introductory Course in Religious Studies, editor (Atlanta: Scholars Press, 1991).
Imagining India: Essays on Indian History by Ainslie Embree, editor (Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1989).
Songs of the Saints of India, co-translator (New York: Oxford University Press 1988), co-translated with John Stratton Hawley
Religion as Social Vision: The Movement Against Untouchability in 20th Century Punjab (Berkeley: Univ of California Press, 1982); Revised edition, Religious Rebels in the Punjab (New Delhi: Ajanta, 1988; reprinted by Navajivan Press, 2010).
Sikh Studies: Comparative Perspectives on a Changing Tradition, co-editor (Berkeley: Religious Studies Series and New Delhi: Motilal Banarsidass, 1979) co-edited with N.G. Barrier.
Other publications:
Approximately 200 journal articles, booklets, encyclopedia entries, and chapters in books; 300 papers and addresses delivered at academic conferences.
Book series editor:
Oxford Handbooks in Religion Online (Oxford University Press), General Editor
Comparative Studies in Religion and Society (University of California Press); The Life of Religion (University of California Press).
Journal Board Member:
Culture and Society; Global Networks; Religion; Journal of the American Academy of Religion; Contagion: Journal of Violence, Memesis, and Culture; International Journal of Studies in Religion; The Journal of Religion and Society; Punjab Journal of Politics; Journal of Punjab Studies; Social Change; Journal of Civi Society; Journal of Religion and Violence; Religion and Public Affairs.