{"id":12160,"date":"2021-04-06T22:57:42","date_gmt":"2021-04-07T04:57:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=12160"},"modified":"2021-04-13T19:49:22","modified_gmt":"2021-04-14T01:49:22","slug":"farewell-to-the-bulletin","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=12160","title":{"rendered":"Farewell to the “Bulletin”"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"

M. declared that tonight’s dinner would be a farewell celebration.<\/p><\/div>\n

I just sent an issue of the Bulletin for the Study of Religion <\/em><\/a>to the printer<\/a> and said goodbye to the sales rep with whom I have been working for a number of years. He is in Pennsylvania, and I have never met him. (We never felt the need for a Zoom or Skype conference either.)<\/p>\n

This quarterly publication has been around for a while. I just completed volume 49 as production editor, and I started with volume 39, so I gave it a decade.<\/p>\n

The Bulletin<\/em> began as a publication of the Council of Societies for the Study of Religion<\/a> before being acquired by Equinox Publishing in 2009, shortly before I became involved.<\/p>\n

For a time it was published “in affiliation” with the North American Association for the Study of Religion<\/a>, a learned society that leans toward \u2014 as they put it \u2014 a “relentlessly reflexive critique of the theories, methods, and categories used in such study [of religion].”<\/p>\n

\"\"

Richard Newton, assistant professor of religious studies, U. of Alabama<\/p><\/div>\n

Its current editor, Richard Newton of the University of Alabama<\/a> (the third editor with whom I have worked), offers this brief history:<\/p>\n

Some of you will know that the\u00a0Bulletin<\/em> began in 1971 under the auspices of The Council of Societies for the Study of Religion<\/a>. Both the\u00a0Bulletin\u00a0<\/em>and the Council brought together a diverse array of scholars and associations invested in the academic study of religion. The Bulletin<\/em>\u00a0played a crucial role in facilitating exchanges about how we study religion in the academy, especially against the backdrop of departments<\/a>, guilds<\/a>, and nations<\/a> trying to determine their identity in relation to religion. After the Council disbanded in 2009, the Bulletin\u00a0<\/em>moved to Equinox Publishing where it remains one of the oldest ongoing publications in the academic study of religion in North America. [Then came the NAASR<\/a> era.]<\/em><\/p>\n

Earlier in 2020, Equinox and the Department of Religious Studies at the University of Alabama entered into an agreement to continue to bring you the\u00a0Bulletin for the Study of Religion.<\/em>\u00a0And I\u2019m honored to serve as editor in this chapter of the publication\u2019s history. In this capacity, I am excited to carry forth a vision for the\u00a0Bulletin\u00a0<\/em>that continues the tradition developed by all those who\u2019ve contributed to it over the years.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

As production editor, I had nothing to do with acquiring the content itself. My job was to clean up editorial problems, make sure the citations were in proper Chicago Author-Date format<\/a>, typeset it, proofread it, and produce an issue whose total page count was a number divisible by four.<\/p>\n

I worked with several editors and watched the pendulum swing between issues full of papers and reviews that could have appeared in a peer-reviewed journal and articles more focused on issues of definition, of techniques of teaching, and on that most enduring question, “What can you do with a PhD in religious studies besides<\/em> teaching?” (Quite a few things, actually, but they may not be obvious.)<\/p>\n

In Professor Newton’s words, “The Bulletin<\/em> is unique in that it offers a forum for various academic voices to debate and reflect on the ever-changing state of the field, and insofar as it encourages scholars continually to engage meta-level questions at the leading edge of inquiry<\/a>.”<\/p>\n

If I had a problem, it was “mission creep.” The print issue became a print-and-online issue. Well, making PDFs of the print articles is easy enough. Then the publisher started making noises about a fully HTML online issue. My Web-design skills are about early-2000s level, and I did not want to invest in more software and to climb the learning curve.<\/p>\n

It was more about time than money, really. The money has been helpful and the content was interesting, but I want to spend more time on The Pomegranate <\/em><\/a>and on other Pagan studies-related editorial and writing projects. I have worked with Richard Newton on a year’s worth of issues now, and I like what he is doing with the Bulletin<\/em>, but it is time for me to concentrate on other things.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I just sent an issue of the Bulletin for the Study of Religion to the printer and said goodbye to the sales rep with whom I have been working for a number of years. He is in Pennsylvania, and I have never met him. (We never felt the need for a Zoom or Skype conference […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[229,7,276,4],"class_list":["post-12160","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized","tag-pomegranate","tag-publishing","tag-religious-studies","tag-scholarship"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p6xQTg-3a8","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":8315,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=8315","url_meta":{"origin":12160,"position":0},"title":"“American Gods” as a Challenge to the Study of Religion","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"November 4, 2016","format":false,"excerpt":"I am still waiting to see American Gods on the screen; meanwhile, scholars of religion are turning to the book and upcoming TV series to see how they challenge conventional views of what \"religion\" is, particulary in the classroom. In the first of a series at the Bulletin for the\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"academia\"","block_context":{"text":"academia","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=academia"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":7089,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=7089","url_meta":{"origin":12160,"position":1},"title":"Polyamory and the Secret History of Wonder Woman","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"March 1, 2015","format":false,"excerpt":"Snow is falling, and I am elbow deep in putting together the next Bulletin for the Study of Religion, which among other things carries an article called \"What is a Superhero? How Myth Can Be a Metacode,\" by Kenneth MacKendrick of the University of Manitoba. So, with comics on the\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"culture\"","block_context":{"text":"culture","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=culture"},"img":{"alt_text":"wonder woman","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.chasclifton.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/03\/wonder-woman.png?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":5982,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=5982","url_meta":{"origin":12160,"position":2},"title":"A Pastafarian Prophet","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"September 28, 2013","format":false,"excerpt":"This recent post on Religion Clause describes the victorious struggle of a Texas Pastafarian for the right to wear the sacred pasta strainer in his driver's license photograph. It caught my attention because I had just finished editing an article by Joe \"Vampires\" Leycock, \"wandering anthropologist of the occult,\"\u00a0 for\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"American religion\"","block_context":{"text":"American religion","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=american-religion"},"img":{"alt_text":"A surrealist and a proto-Pastafarian, SE Portland, Oregon. ","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/blog.chasclifton.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/09\/pastafarian.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":4628,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=4628","url_meta":{"origin":12160,"position":3},"title":"The Multivalent Mothman","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"September 28, 2012","format":false,"excerpt":"Last month I wandered off into Mothman territory, but here is more, from the editorial blog of the Bulletin for the Study of Religion. There is an annual Mothman festival in Point Pleasant, West Virginia, and two entries deal with it: \u201cWest Virginia is one big portal!\u201d Reflections on the\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"American religion\"","block_context":{"text":"American religion","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=american-religion"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":4645,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=4645","url_meta":{"origin":12160,"position":4},"title":"Following Up the Hint of Jesus’ Wife","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"October 5, 2012","format":false,"excerpt":"The\u00a0 recent announcement of a bit of Coptic writing that apparently referred to Jesus' wife has stirred up plenty of controversy. Was the inscription really as old as claimed? Was it a forgery? Did it really mean \"wife\"? At the Bulletin for the Study of Religion blog, Ian Brown will\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"Christianity\"","block_context":{"text":"Christianity","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=christianity"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":4769,"url":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?p=4769","url_meta":{"origin":12160,"position":5},"title":"Journalism and the AAR-SBL","author":"Chas S. Clifton","date":"December 2, 2012","format":false,"excerpt":"Journalists are few at the American Academy of Religion and Society of Biblical Literature's joint annual meetings.\u00a0 But the New York Times' Mark Oppenheimer, searching around for \"the narrative,\" noted that some fraction of the participants wore flowing robes and weirdly remarked about people carrying hefty reference books, as\u00a0 Steven\u2026","rel":"","context":"In \"academia\"","block_context":{"text":"academia","link":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/?tag=academia"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12160","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=12160"}],"version-history":[{"count":13,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12160\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":12188,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/12160\/revisions\/12188"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=12160"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=12160"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.chasclifton.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=12160"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}