Theology, ethnography, and politics.
I’m Jackson Wolford, a researcher in religion, ethnography, and the ancient art of trying to fit 16 synthesizers into a 215 square foot D.C. apartment. I currently work as a think tank researcher in Washington, D.C., mostly as a contributing to several book projects, including manuscripts on:
- The history of American Christian political engagement
- The political theory of theologian Reinhold Niebuhr
I received a master’s of Theological Studies from Candler School of Theology at Emory University. Prior to that, I graduated from the University of Virginia with focuses on Socio-Cultural Anthropology and Playwriting.
My personal research focuses mostly on the intersection of:
- the messy, grounded business of the ethnography of religious experience;
- the messier, often entirely un-grounded business of politics;
- their intersection in contemporary questions of religious pluralism.
This continues the themes of my master’s thesis, Dramatic Tensions and New Resolutions: Seeking a Plausible Ethnographic Theology, which (God willing) no one will ever read.