daisyvargas

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daisyvargas@arizona.edu
Office Hours
<p>Office hours by appointment</p>
Vargas, Daisy
Assistant Professor

Daisy Vargas (assistant professor in the Department of Religious Studies & Classics) specializes in Catholicism in the Americas; race, ethnicity, religion in the United States; Latina/o/x religion; and material religion. Her current project traces the history of Mexican religion, race, and the law from the nineteenth century into the contemporary moment, positioning current legal debates about Mexican religion within a larger history of anti-Mexican and anti-Catholic attitudes in the United States. In 2019, Vargas was chosen as one of the Young Scholars in American Religion at IUPUI’s Center for the Study of Religion & American Culture. She is involved in museum curatorial work, and she also serves on the advisory committee for Engaging Lived Religion in the 21st Century Museum at the Fowler Museum of UCLA. She is co-chair of the Religions in the Latina/o Americas unit, and steering committee member of the Catholic Studies unit for the American Academy of Religion, serves as curator of the American Religion journal’s “Sources, ” and is a board member of E-Feminist Studies in Religion

Vargas received a BA from California State University Fullerton (Religious Studies; minor in Chicana/o Studies), her MA from the University of Denver (Religious Studies), and her PhD from the University of California Riverside (History). She teaches courses on religion and popular culture, global Christianities, religion and immigration, and contemporary Catholicism.

Currently Teaching

RELI 302 – Ellis Island, 9/11, and Border Walls: Religion and Immigration in the U.S.

This course will explore the central role of religion in shaping constructions of race and ethnicity in U.S. history, especially in light of immigration debates. Since the country's founding, immigrants have expanded ethnic and religious diversity in the United States in the face of powerful anti-immigrant movements. Students will engage with in-depth studies of immigrant communities who shaped the American religious and ethnic landscape, including diverse American expressions of religions such as Roman Catholicism, Judaism, Hinduism, Buddhism, Islam, Evangelical Protestantism, and Vodou.

This course will explore the central role of religion in shaping constructions of race and ethnicity in U.S. history, especially in light of immigration debates. Since the country's founding, immigrants have expanded ethnic and religious diversity in the United States in the face of powerful anti-immigrant movements. Students will engage with in-depth studies of immigrant communities who shaped the American religious and ethnic landscape, including diverse American expressions of religions such as Roman Catholicism, Judaism, Hinduism, Buddhism, Islam, Evangelical Protestantism, and Vodou.

RELI 498H – Honors Thesis

An honors thesis is required of all the students graduating with honors. Students ordinarily sign up for this course as a two-semester sequence. The first semester the student performs research under the supervision of a faculty member; the second semester the student writes an honors thesis.