This roundtable assembles scholars of religion to discuss Leslie Ribovich’s Without a Prayer: Religion and Race in New York City Public Schools, published in June 2024 in the North American Religions Series with New York University Press. The book is a detailed, skillful excavation of debates in midcentury New York schools, as administrators, school board members, parents, politicians, and other interested parties attempted to navigate desegregation and secularization.

Our four panelists, scholars of religion with a variety of backgrounds and interests in the study of education, will highlight and discuss key themes from Without a Prayer that are pertinent to the study of law, religion, and culture. Among these are secularization and public institutions; the entanglements of race and religion, particularly as they intersect with nationalism and national identities; and the complex relationships between moral formation, religious ideologies, and race-making.

Presider:

Charles McCrary, Eckerd College

Panelists:

Michael Graziano, University of Northern Iowa

Jolyon Thomas, University of Pennsylvania

Kim Akano, Princeton University

Stephanie Thurston, University of Illinois

Repondent:

Leslie Ribovich, Trinity College