Assistant Professor of Religious Studies Seth Schermerhorn and Lillia McEnaney ’17 co-authored an article published last week in Religious Studies and Theology: Interdisciplinary Studies in Religion.
Publication of “Through Indigenous Eyes: A Comparison of Two Tohono O’odham Photographic Collections Documenting Pilgrimages to Magdalena” was the culmination of almost four years of collaborative student-faculty research. The article is part of a special issue on the Mediazation of Indigenous Religion(s), guest edited by Bjørn Ola Tafjord of the University of Tromsø, the Arctic University of Norway, and Greg Alles of McDaniel College.
According to McEnaney, “the article examines 559 photos taken by two Tohono O’odham photographers, illustrating two of the many ways in which the pilgrimage is envisioned within contemporary O’odham communities.”
Schermerhorn and McEnaney presented an earlier draft of the article last summer as part of a panel on “Performances and Mediazations of Indigenous Religion(s)” at the European Association for the Study of Religion Conference at the University of Helsinki.
The presentation, the article, and the special issue are all part of a larger research project, “Indigenous Religion(s): Local Grounds, Global Networks,” organized by Siv Ellen Kraft and Bjørn Ola Tafjord of the University of Tromsø.
Generous funding of Schermerhorn and McEnaney’s research was provided by the Jacobs Research Funds, the American Philosophical Society’s Phillips Fund for Native American Research, Arizona State University and Hamilton College. Funding for printing color photos was provided by the Department of History and Religious Studies at the University of Tromsø.
