Program Units: Units

Units are established to encourage the exploration of an area of study or methodology, to cultivate the relation between the study of religion and a cognate discipline, or to pursue a long-range and broad research project. Units are expected to experiment with the format of sessions at the Annual Meeting. Units are approved for five-year terms. Renewals are contingent on making the case that the unit’s work needs to continue. Some units may complete their work in five years; others may continue indefinitely. Units meet for one to five sessions, as determined by the Program Committee for each term.

The following links will take you to general descriptions of the Units, including their most recent call for papers, on the AAR's PAPERS website.

• African Diaspora Religions
• African Religions
• Afro-American Religious History
• Animals and Religion
• Anthropology of Religion
• Arts, Literature, and Religion
• Asian North American Religion, Culture, and Society
• Augustine and Augustinianisms
• Baha’i Studies
• Bible in Racial, Ethnic, and Indigenous Communities
• Bioethics and Religion
• Black Theology
• Body and Religion
• Bonhoeffer: Theology and Social Analysis
• Buddhism
• Buddhism in the West
• Buddhist Critical–Constructive Reflection
• Buddhist Philosophy
• Childhood Studies and Religion
• Chinese Religions
• Christian Spirituality
• Christian Systematic Theology
• Class, Religion, and Theology
• Cognitive Science of Religion
• Comparative Approaches to Religion and Violence
• Comparative Religious Ethics
• Comparative Studies in Religion
• Comparative Theology
• Confucian Traditions
• Contemplative Studies
• Contemporary Islam
• Contemporary Pagan Studies
• Critical Approaches to Hip-Hop and Religion
• Critical Theory and Discourses on Religion
• Cultural History of the Study of Religion
• Daoist Studies
• Death, Dying, and Beyond
• Eastern Orthodox Studies
• Ecclesial Practices
• Ecclesiological Investigations
• Ethics
• Evangelical Studies
• Feminist Theory and Religious Reflection
• Gay Men and Religion
• Hinduism
• History of Christianity
• Human Enhancement and Transhumanism
• Indian and Chinese Religions Compared
• Indigenous Religious Traditions
• International Development and Religion
• Interreligious and Interfaith Studies
• Islam, Gender, Women
• Islamic Mysticism
• Jain Studies
• Japanese Religions
• Kierkegaard, Religion, and Culture
• Korean Religions
• Latina/o Religion, Culture, and Society
• Law, Religion, and Culture
• Lesbian Feminisms and Religion
• Liberal Theologies
• Liberation Theologies
• Martin Luther and Global Lutheran Traditions
• Men, Masculinities, and Religions
• Middle Eastern Christianity
• Moral Injury and Recovery in Religion, Society, and Culture
• Mormon Studies
• Music and Religion
• Mysticism
• Native Traditions in the Americas
• New Religious Movements
• Nineteenth Century Theology
• North American Hinduism
• North American Religions
• Open and Relational Theologies
• Pentecostal–Charismatic Movements
• Philosophy of Religion
• Platonism and Neoplatonism
• Practical Theology
• Pragmatism and Empiricism in American Religious Thought
• Psychology, Culture, and Religion
• Quaker Studies
• Queer Studies in Religion
• Qur'an
• Reformed Theology and History
• Religion and Cities
• Religion and Disability Studies
• Religion and Ecology
• Religion and Economy
• Religion and Food
• Religion and Humanism
• Religion and Migration
• Religion and Politics
• Religion and Popular Culture
• Religion and Public Schools: International Perspectives
• Religion and Science Fiction
• Religion and Sexuality
• Religion and the Social Sciences
• Religion in Europe
• Religion in Premodern Europe and the Mediterranean World
• Religion in South Asia
• Religion in Southeast Asia
• Religion in the American West
• Religion, Affect, and Emotion
• Religion, Colonialism, and Postcolonialism
• Religion, Film, and Visual Culture
• Religion, Holocaust, and Genocide
• Religion, Media, and Culture
• Religion, Memory, History
• Religion, Sport, and Play
• Religions in the Latina/o Americas
• Religions, Medicines, and Healing
• Religions, Social Conflict, and Peace
• Religious Conversions
• Ricoeur
• Ritual Studies
• Roman Catholic Studies
• Sacred Texts and Ethics
• Sacred Texts, Theory, and Theological Construction
• Schleiermacher
• Science, Technology, and Religion
• Scriptural Reasoning
• Secularism and Secularity
• Sikh Studies
• Sociology of Religion
• Space, Place, and Religion
• Study of Islam
• Study of Judaism
• Tantric Studies
• Teaching Religion
• Theology and Continental Philosophy
• Theology and Religious Reflection
• Theology of Martin Luther King Jr.
• Tibetan and Himalayan Religions
• Tillich: Issues in Theology, Religion, and Culture
• Traditions of Eastern Late Antiquity
• Transformative Scholarship and Pedagogy
• Vatican II Studies
• Wesleyan Studies
• Western Esotericism
• Womanist Approaches to Religion and Society
• Women and Religion
• Women of Color Scholarship, Teaching, and Activism
• World Christianity
• Yoga in Theory and Practice
• Yogācāra Studies