People

The New Directions in the Study of Prayer project is led by a multi-disciplinary SSRC advisory committee. Launched in September 2011, NDSP invited proposals from scholars in all disciplines for studies that will enhance knowledge of the social, cultural, psychological, and cognitive dimensions of prayer, and of its origins, variations, and correlations in human life. In September 2012, NDSP announced the selection of twenty-eight grantees, including both researchers and journalists. Over the coming years, grantees will participate in a series of interdisciplinary workshops and digital initiatives organized in conjunction with the project.

Advisory Committee

Courtney Bender

Professor, Department of Religion, Columbia University

Paul Bloom

Brooks and Suzanne Ragen Professor, Department of Psychology, Yale University

Anna Gade

Vilas Distinguished Achievement Professor, Nelson Institute for Environmental Studies, University of Wisconsin-Madison

Charles Hirschkind

Associate Professor, Department of Anthropology, University of California, Berkeley

Kevin Ladd

Associate Professor, Department of Psychology, Indiana University, South Bend

Hazel Markus

Davis-Brack Professor in the Behavioral Sciences, Department of Psychology, Stanford University

Birgit Meyer

Professor, Department of Religious Studies and Theology, Universiteit Utrecht

Peter van der Veer

Director, Max Planck Institute for the Study of Religious and Ethnic Diversity at Göttingen

Diane Winston

Knight Chair in Media and Religion, Annenberg School for Communication and Journalism, University of Southern California
 

Researchers

Mark Aveyard

Assistant Professor, Department of Psychology, American University of Sharjah

Anderson Blanton

Postdoctoral Fellow, Center for the Study of the American South, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill

Fenella Cannell

Reader, Department of Anthropology, London School of Economics and Political Science

Thomas Csordas

Professor, Department of Anthropology, University of California, San Diego

Shira Gabriel

Associate Professor, Department of Psychology, SUNY Buffalo

Parvis Ghassem-Fachandi

Assistant Professor, Department of Anthropology, Rutgers University

Jeremy Ginges

Associate Professor, Department of Psychology, The New School

Leor Halevi

Associate Professor, Department of History, Vanderbilt University

Nicholas Harkness

Assistant Professor, Department of Anthropology, Harvard University

Jonathan Lane

Postdoctoral Fellow, Harvard Graduate School of Education

Sonja Luehrmann

Assistant Professor, Department of Sociology and Anthropology, Simon Fraser University

Tanya Luhrmann

Professor, Department of Psychology, Stanford University

Ruth Marshall

Assistant Professor, Department for the Study of Religion and of Political Science, University of Toronto

Elizabeth McAlister

Associate Professor, Department of Religion, Wesleyan University

John Modern

Associate Professor, Department of Religious Studies, Franklin & Marshall College

Sanal Mohan

Associate Professor, Department of Social Sciences, Mahatma Gandhi University

Ebenezer Obadare

Associate Professor, Department of Sociology, University of Kansas

Robert Orsi

Professor, Department of Religious Studies, Northwestern University

Fareen Parvez

Assistant Professor, Department of Sociology, University of Massachusetts Amherst

Rebekah Richert

Associate Professor, Department of Psychology, University of California, Riverside

Don Seeman

Associate Professor, Department of Religion, Emory University

Mark Taylor

Professor, Department of Religion, Columbia University

Stephen F. Teiser

Professor, Department of Religion, Princeton University

Henry Wellman

Professor, Department of Psychology, University of Michigan
 

Journalists

Norris Chumley

Producer and Host, Institute for Religion, Culture and Public Life

Elizabeth Drescher

Senior Correspondent, Religion Dispatches

Peter Manseau

Freelance Journalist

Savitri Medhatul

Freelance Journalist

Emma-Kate Symons

Freelance Journalist

Christine Wicker

Freelance Journalist
 

NDSP Editors

Taline Cox

Editorial Associate

Candace E. West

Managing Editor

Wei Zhu

 Editorial Associate

Zachary Zinn

Technical Consultant