American Evangelicalism: George Marsden and the State of American Religious History

No living scholar has shaped the study of American religious history more profoundly than George M. Marsden. His work spans U.S. intellectual, cultural, and religious history from the seventeenth through the twenty-first centuries. This collection of essays uses the career of George M. Marsden and the remarkable breadth of his scholarship to measure current trends in the historical study of American evangelical Protestantism and to encourage fresh scholarly investigation of this faith tradition as it has developed between the eighteenth century and the present. Moving through five sections, each centered around one of Marsden’s major books and the time period it represents, the volume explores different methodologies and approaches to the history of evangelicalism and American religion.

Besides assessing Marsden’s illustrious works on their own terms, this collection’s contributors isolate several key themes as deserving of fresh, rigorous, and extensive examination. Through their close investigation of these particular themes, they expand the range of characters and communities, issues and ideas, and contingencies that can and should be accounted for in our historical texts. Marsden’s timeless scholarship thus serves as a launchpad for new directions in our rendering of the American religious past.

American Evangelicalism is a grandly conceived and skillfully executed festschrift in honor of George M. Marsden. The affection and regard for Marsden from his colleagues and former students shine through one essay after another. As a major historian of American evangelicalism whose temporal range spans from the colonial era well into the twenty-first century, Marsden very much deserves this impressive tribute.” Leigh Eric Schmidt, Edward C. Mallinckrodt Distinguished University Professor in the Humanities, Washington University in St. Louis