Daniel Winchester
Biographic Data
| ID | 3594896 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Daniel Winchester |
| GIVEN NAMES | Daniel |
| FAMILY NAME | Winchester |
| SIGNATURE | WINCHESTER D |
| AFFILIATIONS | Purdue University West Lafayette |
| ORCID | 0009-0003-7167-0079 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 20 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 153 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 18 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 2 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2011 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2026 |
| H-INDEX | 8 |
Religion Unbundled: Toward a Twenty-First-Century Paradigm for the Sociology of American Religion
Much recent sociological work on religion in the United States is written outside the field’s two established paradigms: secularization theory and the 1990s “religious economy” approach. Drawing together strands of recent theoretical innovation and contemporary religious developments that challenge the existing paradigms, we introduce elements of a twenty-first-century paradigm for the sociology of American religion. We argue that the shape-shift…
Making a Martyr: Scandal, Symbolic Power, and the Controversial Death of Evangelical Missionary John Chau
How do groups respond to accusations of scandal? Because scandals pose significant risks of moral stigma and loss of status to those associated with them, sociologists have analyzed how actors within an accused community use strategies like denial, scapegoating, public apologies, etc. to manage the general public's response to and interpretation of scandalous claims. While this focus on groups' "external" responses to scandal has been productive,…
Beyond Polarization: Right-Wing News as a Quasi-religious Phenomenon
Research on U.S. political media has demonstrated that mainstream and right-wing news are qualitatively distinct in a variety of ways. However, the dominant paradigm of political polarization and its attendant assumptions have restricted researchers from putting these descriptive insights into new and potentially generative theoretical context. In this article, we propose a way forward, arguing for the merits of conceptualizing right-wing news as…
Becoming Religious as an Education of Attention
A vast literature in the social scientific study of religion demonstrates that religious people are made not born. More specifically, researchers have shown that becoming religious is something that people must learn how to do. Adding to this well-established focus on the socialization of religious subjects, I argue that becoming religious also involves learning and being taught how to pay attention. Drawing from ethnographic findings on religiou…
Social Theory Re-Wired: New Connections to Classical and Contemporary Perspectives
Sensing the Sacred: Religious Experience, Somatic Inversions, and the Religious Education of Attention
While previous work has focused largely on discourse, contemporary sociological research has started to examine how the embodied, sensory dimensions of religious practice matter in the construction of religious experience. This paper contributes to this development by drawing sociological attention to the religious cultivation of a particular class of embodied experiences: somatic inversions. Somatic inversions, as we define them, are experiences…
What Happens When We Practice Religion: Textures of Devotion in Everyday Life, by Robert WUTHNOW
In What Happens When We Practice Religion? Robert Wuthnow takes readers on a wide-ranging and interdisciplinary journey through “the practice turn” in the study of religion. The idea that religion is something that people practice is nothing new, of course. But what is more novel is the contemporary move to make “practice” a central term for the study of religion, even supplanting concepts such as “belief” or “symbol system” as the principal cate…
Windows into Heaven, Mirrors for the Soul: How Icons Shape Identities among the Eastern Orthodox
Visit any Eastern Orthodox Christian church in the United States on a Sunday morning and one of the first things you are likely to notice are the icons. Painted on flat wooden surfaces with vibrant
"Praying "Straight from the Heart: Evangelical sincerity and the normative frames of culture in action
Talking Your Self into It: How and When Accounts Shape Motivation for Action
Following Mills, several prominent sociologists have encouraged researchers to analyze actors' motive talk not as data on the subjective desires that move them to pursue particular ends but as post hoc accounts oriented toward justifying actions already undertaken. Combining insights from hermeneutic theories of the self and pragmatist theories of action, we develop a theoretical position that challenges dichotomous assumptions about whether moti…
I Felt Guilty for Being So Happy”: Narrative Expressions and Management of Postdivorce Ambivalence
Scholars have highlighted ambivalence as a central feature of experiences of divorce and its aftermath and discussed ambivalence as an important issue for divorcees in adjusting to their new status. While most of this scholarship assesses postdivorce ambivalence as a psychological phenomenon to be addressed therapeutically, this study analyzes postdivorce ambivalence as an interpretive problem to be addressed sociologically. Following Merton’s (1…
A Part of Who I Am: Material Objects as 'Plot Devices' in the Formation of Religious Selves
What role do material objects play in the formation of religious subjects? Drawing from an ethnographic investigation of the evolving relationships between a group of Eastern Orthodox converts and their religious icons, this article develops a theoretical approach to this question that conceptualizes material artifacts as 'plot devices' in the formation of religious identity narratives. Integrating insights from studies of material religious cult…
Social Theory Re-Wired: New Connections to Classical and Contemporary Perspectives
This social theory text combines the structure of a print reader with the ability to tailor the course via an extensive interactive website. Readings from important classical and contemporary theorists are placed in conversation with one another through core themes—the puzzle of social order, the dark side of modernity, identity, etc. The website includes videos, interactive commentaries, summaries of key concepts, exams and quizzes, annotated se…
A Hunger for God: Embodied Metaphor as Cultural Cognition in Action
Drawing from an ethnographic study of fasting among converts to Eastern Orthodox Christianity in the United States, this article develops a conceptualization of embodied metaphor as a form of cultural cognition in action. The findings demonstrate that fasting reshaped converts’ subjectivities and subsequent actions through the creation of a series of metaphorical associations between concrete, bodily experiences related to food, hunger, and appet…
Reasoning Together Through Telling Stories: How People Talk about Social Controversies
Religion as Theoretical Case, Lens, and Resource for Critique: Three Ways Social Theory Can Learn from the Study of Religion
Can social theory learn from religion? My answer is “yes, and in several ways.” But why and how religion matters for social theory depends in large part on what kind of theorizing one is trying to do. In this article, I focus on three different modes of theorizing—(1) the crafting of general explanations of social phenomena; (2) the development and application of a paradigmatic framework; and (3) the practice of normative societal assessment and …
Converting to Continuity: Temporality and Self in Eastern Orthodox Conversion Narratives
Based on interviews with converts to Eastern Orthodox Christianity in the United States, this article documents and analyzes a narrative form in which conversion is described as the progressive discovery of a latent religious self that was part of one's life all along, or what I term a conversion to continuity. These findings contrast markedly with those of most contemporary conversion research, which emphasize the narration of a dramatic tempora…
Social Theory Re-Wired
Experiential careers: The Routinization and De-Routinization of Religious Life
How Americans Understand Racial and Religious Differences: A Test of Parallel Items from a National Survey
How can we better conceptualize attitudes about difference in an increasingly diverse, multicultural United States? This article uses data from a recent, nationally representative telephone survey with oversamples of African Americans and Hispanics to analyze attitudes about two prominent sources of distinction in the United States. Race and religion were selected because they tend to be understood in very different ways—race as a social problem,…
Experiential careers: The Routinization and De-Routinization of Religious Life
Talking Your Self into It: How and When Accounts Shape Motivation for Action
Following Mills, several prominent sociologists have encouraged researchers to analyze actors' motive talk not as data on the subjective desires that move them to pursue particular ends but as post hoc accounts oriented toward justifying actions already undertaken. Combining insights from hermeneutic theories of the self and pragmatist theories of action, we develop a theoretical position that challenges dichotomous assumptions about whether moti…
Converting to Continuity: Temporality and Self in Eastern Orthodox Conversion Narratives
Based on interviews with converts to Eastern Orthodox Christianity in the United States, this article documents and analyzes a narrative form in which conversion is described as the progressive discovery of a latent religious self that was part of one's life all along, or what I term a conversion to continuity. These findings contrast markedly with those of most contemporary conversion research, which emphasize the narration of a dramatic tempora…
How Americans Understand Racial and Religious Differences: A Test of Parallel Items from a National Survey
How can we better conceptualize attitudes about difference in an increasingly diverse, multicultural United States? This article uses data from a recent, nationally representative telephone survey with oversamples of African Americans and Hispanics to analyze attitudes about two prominent sources of distinction in the United States. Race and religion were selected because they tend to be understood in very different ways—race as a social problem,…
"Praying "Straight from the Heart: Evangelical sincerity and the normative frames of culture in action
Reasoning Together Through Telling Stories: How People Talk about Social Controversies
A Part of Who I Am: Material Objects as 'Plot Devices' in the Formation of Religious Selves
What role do material objects play in the formation of religious subjects? Drawing from an ethnographic investigation of the evolving relationships between a group of Eastern Orthodox converts and their religious icons, this article develops a theoretical approach to this question that conceptualizes material artifacts as 'plot devices' in the formation of religious identity narratives. Integrating insights from studies of material religious cult…
Sensing the Sacred: Religious Experience, Somatic Inversions, and the Religious Education of Attention
While previous work has focused largely on discourse, contemporary sociological research has started to examine how the embodied, sensory dimensions of religious practice matter in the construction of religious experience. This paper contributes to this development by drawing sociological attention to the religious cultivation of a particular class of embodied experiences: somatic inversions. Somatic inversions, as we define them, are experiences…
Religion as Theoretical Case, Lens, and Resource for Critique: Three Ways Social Theory Can Learn from the Study of Religion
Can social theory learn from religion? My answer is “yes, and in several ways.” But why and how religion matters for social theory depends in large part on what kind of theorizing one is trying to do. In this article, I focus on three different modes of theorizing—(1) the crafting of general explanations of social phenomena; (2) the development and application of a paradigmatic framework; and (3) the practice of normative societal assessment and …
Beyond Polarization: Right-Wing News as a Quasi-religious Phenomenon
Research on U.S. political media has demonstrated that mainstream and right-wing news are qualitatively distinct in a variety of ways. However, the dominant paradigm of political polarization and its attendant assumptions have restricted researchers from putting these descriptive insights into new and potentially generative theoretical context. In this article, we propose a way forward, arguing for the merits of conceptualizing right-wing news as…
I Felt Guilty for Being So Happy”: Narrative Expressions and Management of Postdivorce Ambivalence
Scholars have highlighted ambivalence as a central feature of experiences of divorce and its aftermath and discussed ambivalence as an important issue for divorcees in adjusting to their new status. While most of this scholarship assesses postdivorce ambivalence as a psychological phenomenon to be addressed therapeutically, this study analyzes postdivorce ambivalence as an interpretive problem to be addressed sociologically. Following Merton’s (1…
How Americans Understand Racial and Religious Differences: A Test of Parallel Items from a National Survey
How can we better conceptualize attitudes about difference in an increasingly diverse, multicultural United States? This article uses data from a recent, nationally representative telephone survey with oversamples of African Americans and Hispanics to analyze attitudes about two prominent sources of distinction in the United States. Race and religion were selected because they tend to be understood in very different ways—race as a social problem,…
Experiential careers: The Routinization and De-Routinization of Religious Life
Social Theory Re-Wired
Converting to Continuity: Temporality and Self in Eastern Orthodox Conversion Narratives
Based on interviews with converts to Eastern Orthodox Christianity in the United States, this article documents and analyzes a narrative form in which conversion is described as the progressive discovery of a latent religious self that was part of one's life all along, or what I term a conversion to continuity. These findings contrast markedly with those of most contemporary conversion research, which emphasize the narration of a dramatic tempora…
Social Theory Re-Wired: New Connections to Classical and Contemporary Perspectives
This social theory text combines the structure of a print reader with the ability to tailor the course via an extensive interactive website. Readings from important classical and contemporary theorists are placed in conversation with one another through core themes—the puzzle of social order, the dark side of modernity, identity, etc. The website includes videos, interactive commentaries, summaries of key concepts, exams and quizzes, annotated se…
A Hunger for God: Embodied Metaphor as Cultural Cognition in Action
Drawing from an ethnographic study of fasting among converts to Eastern Orthodox Christianity in the United States, this article develops a conceptualization of embodied metaphor as a form of cultural cognition in action. The findings demonstrate that fasting reshaped converts’ subjectivities and subsequent actions through the creation of a series of metaphorical associations between concrete, bodily experiences related to food, hunger, and appet…
Reasoning Together Through Telling Stories: How People Talk about Social Controversies
Religion as Theoretical Case, Lens, and Resource for Critique: Three Ways Social Theory Can Learn from the Study of Religion
Can social theory learn from religion? My answer is “yes, and in several ways.” But why and how religion matters for social theory depends in large part on what kind of theorizing one is trying to do. In this article, I focus on three different modes of theorizing—(1) the crafting of general explanations of social phenomena; (2) the development and application of a paradigmatic framework; and (3) the practice of normative societal assessment and …
I Felt Guilty for Being So Happy”: Narrative Expressions and Management of Postdivorce Ambivalence
Scholars have highlighted ambivalence as a central feature of experiences of divorce and its aftermath and discussed ambivalence as an important issue for divorcees in adjusting to their new status. While most of this scholarship assesses postdivorce ambivalence as a psychological phenomenon to be addressed therapeutically, this study analyzes postdivorce ambivalence as an interpretive problem to be addressed sociologically. Following Merton’s (1…
A Part of Who I Am: Material Objects as 'Plot Devices' in the Formation of Religious Selves
What role do material objects play in the formation of religious subjects? Drawing from an ethnographic investigation of the evolving relationships between a group of Eastern Orthodox converts and their religious icons, this article develops a theoretical approach to this question that conceptualizes material artifacts as 'plot devices' in the formation of religious identity narratives. Integrating insights from studies of material religious cult…
"Praying "Straight from the Heart: Evangelical sincerity and the normative frames of culture in action
Talking Your Self into It: How and When Accounts Shape Motivation for Action
Following Mills, several prominent sociologists have encouraged researchers to analyze actors' motive talk not as data on the subjective desires that move them to pursue particular ends but as post hoc accounts oriented toward justifying actions already undertaken. Combining insights from hermeneutic theories of the self and pragmatist theories of action, we develop a theoretical position that challenges dichotomous assumptions about whether moti…
Windows into Heaven, Mirrors for the Soul: How Icons Shape Identities among the Eastern Orthodox
Visit any Eastern Orthodox Christian church in the United States on a Sunday morning and one of the first things you are likely to notice are the icons. Painted on flat wooden surfaces with vibrant
What Happens When We Practice Religion: Textures of Devotion in Everyday Life, by Robert WUTHNOW
In What Happens When We Practice Religion? Robert Wuthnow takes readers on a wide-ranging and interdisciplinary journey through “the practice turn” in the study of religion. The idea that religion is something that people practice is nothing new, of course. But what is more novel is the contemporary move to make “practice” a central term for the study of religion, even supplanting concepts such as “belief” or “symbol system” as the principal cate…
Sensing the Sacred: Religious Experience, Somatic Inversions, and the Religious Education of Attention
While previous work has focused largely on discourse, contemporary sociological research has started to examine how the embodied, sensory dimensions of religious practice matter in the construction of religious experience. This paper contributes to this development by drawing sociological attention to the religious cultivation of a particular class of embodied experiences: somatic inversions. Somatic inversions, as we define them, are experiences…
Social Theory Re-Wired: New Connections to Classical and Contemporary Perspectives
Making a Martyr: Scandal, Symbolic Power, and the Controversial Death of Evangelical Missionary John Chau
How do groups respond to accusations of scandal? Because scandals pose significant risks of moral stigma and loss of status to those associated with them, sociologists have analyzed how actors within an accused community use strategies like denial, scapegoating, public apologies, etc. to manage the general public's response to and interpretation of scandalous claims. While this focus on groups' "external" responses to scandal has been productive,…
Beyond Polarization: Right-Wing News as a Quasi-religious Phenomenon
Research on U.S. political media has demonstrated that mainstream and right-wing news are qualitatively distinct in a variety of ways. However, the dominant paradigm of political polarization and its attendant assumptions have restricted researchers from putting these descriptive insights into new and potentially generative theoretical context. In this article, we propose a way forward, arguing for the merits of conceptualizing right-wing news as…
Becoming Religious as an Education of Attention
A vast literature in the social scientific study of religion demonstrates that religious people are made not born. More specifically, researchers have shown that becoming religious is something that people must learn how to do. Adding to this well-established focus on the socialization of religious subjects, I argue that becoming religious also involves learning and being taught how to pay attention. Drawing from ethnographic findings on religiou…
Religion Unbundled: Toward a Twenty-First-Century Paradigm for the Sociology of American Religion
Much recent sociological work on religion in the United States is written outside the field’s two established paradigms: secularization theory and the 1990s “religious economy” approach. Drawing together strands of recent theoretical innovation and contemporary religious developments that challenge the existing paradigms, we introduce elements of a twenty-first-century paradigm for the sociology of American religion. We argue that the shape-shift…
Sociology (19 works) · Philosophy (13 works) · Epistemology (12 works) · Religion and Society Interactions (12 works) · Political science (9 works) · Psychology (9 works) · Law (8 works) · Social Psychology (8 works) · Religious Tourism and Spaces (6 works) · Social science (6 works)