Rosalind I. J. Hackett

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Rosalind I. J. Hackett has been teaching in the Department of Religious Studies at the University of Tennessee in Knoxville since 1986, and is an adjunct Professor in Anthropology and faculty associate at the Howard H. Baker, Jr. Center for Public Policy.  She was a Distinguished Professor in the Humanities from 2003-2008.. She taught in Nigerian universities from 1975-1983, while conducting fieldwork. Her graduate degrees are from the University of London (M.Phil. in History and Philosophy of Religion) and from the University of Aberdeen (Ph.D. Religious Studies). As an undergraduate, she was a French major at the University of Leeds, before ‘converting’ to the academic study of religion.

As a specialist on the religions of Africa, she has published widely on new religious movements in Africa (New Religious Movements in Nigeria, ed. 1987), religious pluralism (Religion in Calabar, 1989), art (Art and Religion in Africa 1996), gender, the media, and religion in relation to human rights (Religious Persecution as a U.S. Policy Issue, co-ed., 1999). She recently published an edited book, Proselytization Revisited: Rights Talk, Free Markets, and Culture Wars (London: Equinox, 2008), and has co-edited Religious Dimensions of Conflict and Peace in Neoliberal Africa(Univ. of Notre Dame Press, 2010).  She is also bringing to completion Nigeria: Religion in the Balance (US Institute of Peace). Her future research plans include a monograph and a co-edited work on religious media in Africa.

Rosalind lectures widely in the U.S. and around the world. She has recently held fellowships at Harvard University (2000-01) and the University of Notre Dame, where she was Rockefeller Visiting Fellow at the Joan B. Kroc Institute of International Peace Studies from 2003-04.

Rosalind enjoys teaching courses in African religions, anthropology of religion, religion and human rights, religion and the media, comparative religion, as well as method and theory in the study of religion. She directs her extra-curricular energies on campus to the African Student Association, the Amnesty International chapter, and helping promote international and intercultural perspectives.  In the last two years, since she visited Uganda, she has been active in trying to end the war and suffering in Northern Uganda.  She worked with students and members of the music community to launch Knoxville Jazz for Justice on September 1, 2006 with a major benefit concert.

She is currently President of the International Association for the History of Religions (from 2005-10), for which she travels extensively. She is frequently consulted by government, development, and media organizations on religious conflict in Nigeria, the war in Northern Uganda, and the rise of Pentecostalism in Africa and beyond.

Education

• Ph.D. in Religious Studies, University of Aberdeen, Scotland, 1986
• M.Phil. in Religious Studies, University of London, 1978
• Postgraduate Certificate in Education (credit), St. Luke's College/University of Exeter (Major:, French; minor: Religious Education.), 1974
• B.A. Honours in French and Religious Studies, University of Leeds, 1973

Fields of Interest

• African Religions
• Anthropology of Religion
• Religion, Conflict, and Violence
• Religion and Human Rights
• Religion and Media
• Religion and Art

Current Courses

• Dr. Hackett is teaching RS 373 African Religions in the fall, and RS 302 Anthropology of Religion in the spring.

Contact Information

Rosalind I. J. Hackett
Professor
501 McClung Tower
University of Tennessee
Knoxville, Tennessee 37996-0450

Phone: 865-974-6980
Email: rhackett@utk.edu