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The Conversation

Randall J. Stephens

7

Articles

18

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Professor of American and British Studies, University of Oslo

Randall J. Stephens is a Professor of American and British Studies at the University of Oslo. He is the author of The Fire Spreads: Holiness and Pentecostalism in the American South (Harvard University Press, 2008); The Anointed: Evangelical Truth in a Secular Age, co-authored with Karl Giberson (Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2011); and The Devil's Music: How Christians Inspired, Condemned, and Embraced Rock 'n' Roll (Harvard University Press, 2018). He is currently working on several projects that deal with religion, environmentalism, culture, and politics in the Anglo-American world.

In 2011-12 Randall was a Fulbright Roving Scholar in American Studies in Norway. In addition to his articles in the Conversation, he has written for the New York Times, the Washington Post, the Chronicle of Higher Education, the Independent, the Atlantic, Salon, and the Christian Century. Follow him on Twitter: @Randall_Stps.

Experience

  • 2012–present
    Reader in History and American Studies, Northumbria University

Education

  • 2003 
    University of Florida, PhD in History

Publications

  • 2018
    "Culture, Entertainment, and Religion in America", The Oxford Encyclopedia of Religion in America (Oxford University Press)
  • 2018
    The Devil's Music: How Christians Inspired, Condemned, and Embraced Rock 'n' Roll, (Harvard University Press)
  • 2018
    "God Gave Rock and Roll to You", History Today
  • 2017
    “The Klan, White Christianity, and the Past and Present: A Response to Kelly Baker’s Essay", Religion and Culture Forum
  • 2017
    “Popular Culture and Pentecostalism: Comparing Britain and the United States", Secularization and Religious Innovation in the North Atlantic World (Oxford University Press)
  • 2017
    “Recent Developments in the Study of Religion in the US”, Journal of American Studies
  • 2017
    “The Bible and Fundamentalism", The Oxford Handbook on the Bible in America (Oxford University Press)
  • 2016
    “Of Gods, Presence, Abundant History, and the Challenges of Studying Everyday Religion", Fides et Historia
  • 2016
    “‘Where else did they copy their styles but from church groups?’ Rock ‘n’ Roll and Pentecostalism in the 1950s South", Church History: Studies in Christianity and Culture
  • 2016
    “‘It has to come from the hearts of the people’: Evangelicals, Fundamentalists, Race, and the 1964 Civil Rights Act", Journal of American Studies
  • 2016
    “‘Religious Liberty’ and the Origins of the Evangelical Persecution Complex", Religion Dispatches
  • 2015
    “From Abolitionists to Fundamentalists: The Transformation of the Wesleyan Methodists in the 19th and 20th Centuries” , American Nineteenth Century History
  • 2015
    “Bertram Wyatt-Brown as Scholar and Mentor", Georgia Historical Quarterly
  • 2015
    “Understanding the Prosperity Gospel” , Fides et Historia
  • 2013
    “High Holy Rollers", Wilson Quarterly
  • 2012
    Bibliographic editor, The Columbia Guide to Religion in American History, (Columbia University Press)
  • 2011
    “‘Ohio villains’ and ‘pretenders to new revelations’: Wesleyan Abolitionists in North Carolina and Virginia, 1847-1857”, Southern Character: Essays in Honor of Bertram Wyatt-Brown (University Press of Florida)
  • 2011
    The Anointed: Evangelical Truth in a Secular Age, co-authored with Karl Giberson, (The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press)
  • 2010
    “The Holiness/Pentecostal/Charismatic Extension of the Wesleyan Tradition” , in The Cambridge Companion to John Wesley (Cambridge University Press)
  • 2009
    Sam Jones’ Own Book, 1886. With a New Introduction by Randall J. Stephens. Southern Classics Series, (University of South Carolina Press)
  • 2009
    Editor, Recent Themes in American Religious History, (University of South Carolina Press)
  • 2008
    “‘There is Magic in Print’: The Holiness Pentecostal Press and the Origins of Southern Pentecostalism”, in Southern Crossroads: Perspectives on Southern Religion and Culture (University of Kentucky Press)
  • 2008
    “Pentecost for the Southland” , Historically Speaking
  • 2008
    “Interpreting American Pentecostal Origins: Retrospect and Prospect”, in Interpreting Denominational History: Perspectives on the Past, Prospects for the Future
  • 2008
    The Fire Spreads: Holiness and Pentecostalism in the American South , (Harvard University Press)

Grants and Contracts

  • 2012
    Fulbright Fellowship, Norway
    Role:
    Roving Scholar
    Funding Source:
    Fulbright Commission

Honours

Organization of American Historians Distinguished Lecturer, 2013-2019