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Approaching 501 Park Street in Syracuse, a visitor would see what looks like a Catholic church. Though this site was once home to the Holy Trinity Roman Catholic Church, the building is now being converted into a mosque. As neighborhood demographics change, the need for specific religious spaces tends to shift as well. This summer, three students are working on a Levitt Group Research Project, “Sacred Spaces in Transition.”

Visiting Associate Professor of Religious Studies Brent Plate was invited to be a FIRST (Faculty-in-Residence Summer Term) scholar at the University of Colorado (CU) at Boulder this year.

On a typical Tuesday night this semester, many Hamilton students found themselves absorbed in their books or typing up papers on their computers, but for students taking Professor Brent Plate’s Religion and the Media course, much of the work happened at the microphone. As students in Plate’s course spent the spring investigating the influence of various media on religious practices, they also experimented with a new medium through which to communicate their research.

A History of Religion in 5 ½ Objects, authored by Visiting Associate Professor of Religious Studies S. Brent Plate, has recently been reviewed and featured prominently by several media outlets including the Library Journal, The Christian Century, The Los Angeles Review of Books, The New Republic and Marginalia Review of Books.

The New York Times published a letter to the editor written by Visiting Associate Professor of Religious Studies S. Brent Plate on May 2 under the title “Why Religious Literacy is Important in Our Culture.” Plate, author of A History of Religion in 5 ½ Objects, was responding to an opinion piece by Times columnist Nicholas Kristof.

Students in "Religion, Art, and Visual Culture" (RELST/ARTHT 375) spent two days exploring art museums in New York City. The class visited the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Rubin Museum of Art.

Visiting Associate Professor of Religious Studies Brent Plate gave invited public lectures at two of the top-ranked universities in Asia – National University Singapore and Seoul National University, Korea. At each, he was invited to present on his recently published book, A History of Religion in 5½ Objects.

WAMC/Northeast Public Radio will feature a reading by Visiting Associate Professor of Religious Studies S. Brent Plate on Monday, March 17, as part of the station’s Academic Minute. Plate’s piece is titled “An object lesson in religious history” and relates to the topics explored in his new book, A History of Religion in 5 ½ Objects. In a related essay, "A History of Religion in 11 Objects," Plate offered 11 images with his text to illustrate his Huffington Post piece.

On the eve of its release, A History of Religion in 5 ½ Objects, written by Visiting Associate Professor of Religious Studies S. Brent Plate, was given a starred review by the Library Journal. The publication described Plate’s work as “an elegant and sensitive book … highly recommended to general readers open to a different perspective on religious practice.”

Visiting Associate Professor of Religious Studies Brent Plate was elected president of the Association for Religion and Intellectual Life (ARIL)/CrossCurrents during a recent meeting of the board of directors in New York City.