David Morgan: Religious Visual Culture

David is Professor of Religious Studies and Director of Graduate Studies in the doctoral program in Religion at Duke University with an additional appointment in the Department of Art, Art History, and Visual Studies at Duke. He is a recipient of many grants and fellowships, including support from the National Endowment of the Humanities, the Getty Foundation, the Henry Luce Foundation, the Lilly Endowment, and fellowships at Yale University and Princeton University.

David has explored various religious traditions and sought to theorize the study of visuality in two books: "The Sacred Gaze and The Embodied Eye: Religious Visual Culture and the Social Life of Feeling." In 2018, he published "Images at Work: The Material Culture of Enchantment," a study of the role that images play in producing enchantment in religion, magic, and everyday life during the modern era. His latest book, "The Thing about Religion," which appeared last year, is an introduction to the material study of religion. In this episode, David and I discussed the nature of visual culture, both secular and religious, and the ways our beliefs and ideas about the world are influenced by the images we consume. We also explored how ideas about the sacred, enchantment, and revelation function through different modes of visual culture.