Religion Matters ─ What Sociology Teaches Us About Religion in Our World

Religion Matters: What Sociology Teaches Us About Religion in Our World is organized around the biggest questions that arrise in the field of sociology of religion.

This is a new text for the sociology of religion course. Instead of surveying this field systematically, the text focuses on the major questions that generate the most discussion and debate in the sociology of religion field.

Michael O. Emerson is the Allyn and Gladys Cline Professor of Sociology and Co-Director of the Institute for Urban Research at Rice University. In addition to many articles on the topic of religion, he is the author of several books, including Divided by Faith: Evangelical Religion and the Problem of Race in America (Oxford University Press) and People of the Dream: Multiracial Congregations in the United States (Princeton University Press).

William A. Mirola is Professor of Sociology and former chair of the Department of History and Social Science at Marian College in Indianapolis, IN. His teaching and research interests focus on the sociology of religion, social class, and social movements and change. In 2009, he co-edited (with Sean McCloud), Religion and Class in America: Culture, History, and Politics. He is co-editor (with Susanne Monahan and Michael Emerson) of Sociology of Religion: A Reader. He has published articles in Sociology of Religion, Social Problems, and Social Science History, principally addressing the intersections of religion and social class as well as religious dynamics in the American labor movement, past and present.

Susanne C. Monahan is Associate Professor and former chair of the Department of Sociology and Anthropology at Montana State University. She received a Ph.D. and A.M. in Sociology from Stanford University, and a B.A. in Sociology/Anthropology and Economics from Swarthmore College. Her research focuses on complex organizations, including work on American congregations and clergy. She is co-editor, along with William Mirola and Michael Emerson, of Sociology of Religion: A Reader, and has published articles and reviews in the Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion, Review of Religious Research, Sociology of Religion, Theoretical Criminology, Justice Quarterly, Journal of the American Academy of Religion and Child Development.