Holy Waters: An Interdisciplinary Examination of Religion and Alcohol

With an increase in academic programs related to viniculture and brewing science, the time is ripe for contributions from the humanities and social sciences. We believe the theories and methods of religious studies have important contributions to offer studies of alcohol. Thus, we seek to bring together scholars from across disciplines to examine the historical, social, ritual, economic, political and cultural relationship between religion and alcohol across time periods and around the world. The goal of the workshop is to create an edited volume with broad appeal that will advance research on religion and alcohol.

Participants will be selected from submissions. Care will be given to ensure broad interdisciplinary representation as well as a balance of junior and senior scholars and we will seek to assure representation of underrepresented groups. The workshop will be held on March 4-6, 2022 at Western Michigan University. Funding will be available to help offset travel costs.
Manuscript drafts will be pre-circulated to all participants. Participants will be asked to revise their manuscripts based on workshop feedback and to submit a revised manuscript to the editors by July 1, 2022 with the goal of submitting the book manuscript to the publisher by spring 2023.

Submissions: To submit a proposal for consideration, please email an abstract of approximately 250 words and a brief C.V. (2 pages) to ryan.r.lemasters@wmich.edu. The title of your abstract should be your last name and be sent as a PDF. The subject line of the email should appear as follows “Holy Waters.” The deadline to submit is October 1, 2021. Those selected for inclusion will be notified by the organizing committee by October 11, 2021.

Read full Call for Proposals announcement (PDF).