Interviews from the DSR Fall 2025 Lecture Series

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As part of our 50th anniversary celebrations, the 2025-2026 DSR Lecture Series features eight talks by alumni at the forefront of innovative approaches to methods and theories in the study of religion. Each of our guest speakers is interviewed by one of our graduate students, providing illuminating insight into our alumni's research and professional paths. We are pleased to present here the first two interviews, from October and November 2025.

ANNIE HECKMAN (DSR PhD, 2023), Associate Translator for 84000: Words of the Buddha and currently teaches at Washington and Lee University. 
October 2025, Lecture: “Nuns, Monks, Soldiers, and Kings: Buddhist Monastics and the Rule of Law in the Mūlarsavāstivāda Vinaya”
Interview by MA student Felicia Sang

Interview

Be generous towards any translation effort and, simultaneously, trust no one.

L-R: Annie Heckman, Felicia Sang
   

 

SARAH ROLLENS (DSR PhD, 2013), R.A. Webb Associate Professor of Religious Studies at Rhodes College (Memphis, TN). Her research focuses on the social history of early Christianity.
November 2025, Lecture: “An Unknown Stranger: Misrecognition in the Gospel of Mark and W.E.B. Du Bois’s “Jesus Christ in Texas””
Interview by PhD candidate Connor Kokot

Interview

I want people to know how to read and analyze text and ideologies and presentations of information.

L-R: Sarah Rollens, Connor Kokot

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