David Morgan, Professor and Chair

Contact Info:

Office Location:	Department of Religious Studies, Durham, NC 27708
Office Phone:	+1 919 660 3555
Email Address:
Web Page:	http://www.duke.edu/%7Edm127/Site/Intro.html

Teaching (Spring 2024):

• Religion 392.01, Independent study Synopsis

  Gray 319, F 01:40 PM-04:10 PM

• Religion 859s.01, Catholic visual piety Synopsis

  Gray 319, F 01:40 PM-04:10 PM

  (also cross-listed as ARTHIST 859S.01, VMS 859S.01)

Education:

Ph.D.	The University of Chicago	1990
M.A.	University of Arizona	1984
B.A.	Concordia College	1980

Specialties:

American Religious History
Culture

Research Interests: material culture of religion, religion and media

Current projects: The Forge of Vision: Image and Imagination in Modern Christianity, delivered as the 2012 Cadbury Lectures, University of Birmingham, England, March 7 to 15, 2012.

David Morgan is Professor of Religious Studies with a secondary appointment in the Department of Art, Art History, and Visual Studies at Duke. He also chairs the Department of Religious Studies at Duke. Morgan received his Ph.D. at the University of Chicago in 1990. He has published several books and dozens of essays on the history of religious visual culture, on art history and critical theory, and on religion and media. His most recent book is The Embodied Eye: Religious Visual Culture and the Social Life of Feeling (California, 2012). Other books are: The Lure of Images: A History of Religion and Visual Media in America (Routledge, 2007) and two that he edited and contributed to: Religion and Material Culture: The Matter of Belief (Routledge, 2010) and Key Words in Religion, Media, and Culture (Routledge, 2008). Earlier works include: Visual Piety (University of California Press, 1998), Protestants and Pictures (Oxford, 1999), and The Sacred Gaze (California, 2005). Morgan is co-founder and co-editor of the international scholarly journal, Material Religion, and co-editor of a book series at Routledge entitled “Religion, Media, and Culture.”

Current Ph.D. Students  

• Brenna Jorgenson
• Torang Asadi
• Jamie Brummitt
• Stephanie Gehring
• Eric Chalfant
• Adrienne Krone
• Sonia Hazard
• Andrew Coates

Recent Publications   (More Publications)

1. Morgan, D. The sacred gaze: Religious visual culture in theory and practice. September, 2023: 1-318.  [abs]
2. Morgan, D. "Agency, Images, and Visual Culture: the impact of Hans Belting." Material Religion 19:3 (January, 2023): 310-311. [doi]
3. Morgan, D. "RELIGION." Contested Concepts in the Study of Religion: a Critical Exploration. January, 2022, 105-110.
4. Morgan, D. "The Visual Culture of Revelation: Visions and the Images that Reveal Them." Irish Theological Quarterly 86:3 (August, 2021): 223-240. [doi]  [abs]
5. Morgan, D. "Religious Materiality in the Early Modern World. Suzanna Ivanič, Mary Laven, and Andrew Morrall, eds. Visual and Material Culture, 1300–1700 18. Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press, 2019. 262 pp. + color pls. €109." Renaissance Quarterly 74:2 (June, 2021): 648-650. [doi]