Background and Expertise
My name is Manuel Vásquez. I am an independent scholar and author. I received my BS in biology from Georgetown University and my M.A. and Ph.D. (with distinction) in Religion from Temple University. I also was an Andrew W. Mellon post-doctoral fellow at Wesleyan University’s Center for the Americas. After more than twenty years of service, I retired as a tenured full professor and chair of the Department of Religion at the University of Florida. During my career, I chaired or was a member of dissertation committees for more than 25 Ph.D. students from a variety of departments, ranging from anthropology and history to religious studies and political science. Moreover, as department chair, I successfully oversaw several tenure and promotion cases, both from assistant professor to associate professor and to full professorship. See more on my mentoring
In terms of my own writing, I have authored, co-authored, and/or co-edited seven books, including The Brazilian Popular Church and the Crisis of Modernity (Cambridge University Press), which received the 1998 American Academy of Religion Award for Excellence in the Study of Religion in the Analytical-Descriptive Studies category, and More than Belief: A Materialist Theory of Religion (Oxford University Press, 2011), which has been the subject of fora in several prominent journals in the humanities and social sciences. Furthermore, I published scores of journal articles, book chapters, reviews, and encyclopedia entries. In addition, I (co)wrote and was principal investigator in multiple grants totaling more than $2M from funders such as The Pew Charitable Trusts, The Ford Foundation, and The Rockefeller Foundation.
I would be happy to share my full CV.