Hazelnut Notes is the work of Dr. Benjamin Knoll, a political science professor by day and a Master’s of Divinity student at Bexley Seabury Episcopal Seminary by night, who somehow also finds time to co-parenting three daughters in between.
Along with Cammie Jo Bolin, I am the co-author of She Preached the Word: Women’s Ordination in Modern America (Oxford University Press, 2018). Along with Jana Riess, I am the co-director of the Next Mormons Survey.
Here on Hazelnut Notes I write about things related to spirituality, religion, society, science, and politics, with a specific interest in American religion and the two religious traditions I am most familiar with: Anglicanism/the Episcopal Church USA and Mormonism/the LDS Church. Writing is how I process and organize my thoughts, express my identity, manage my anxieties, and endeavor to fulfill my vocation.
The blog’s name is an homage to Julian of Norwich’s theology of the hazelnut. Similar to an academic “research note,” the word “notes” is to remind myself that I can publish short missives without the need to explain all of the background, context, implications, and cite every relevant thing that has ever been written on the topic, as my academic training has conditioned me to do.
My other writings can be found in a variety of places on the internet:
- InformationKnoll – my professional academic website and blog on politics and political science.
- My professional scholarly written work can be found on my Google Scholar profile.
- I write about the intersection of social science and American religion at Religion in Public.
- I review books on politics, science, and religion for the New York Journal Review of Books.
- I am an emeritus contributor to HuffPost, writing on politics and religion.
- My contributions to essays at Religion News Service can be found here.
- I am an emeritus permablogger at RationalFaiths, writing on Mormonism and the LDS Church. My RationalFaiths essays are also archived on this site.
- My scholarly research on the Next Mormons Survey can be found here.
[ Site hazelnut image credits via Wikipedia Media Commons, Pixabay, and Francesco Meschia, Marco Verch, Fabrizio Monti, Steffen Zahn, and Bo Jorgensen via Flikr. ]
Hazelnut Notes 