Elon Students, Faculty Present Research at Religion Conference in South Carolina

Five Elon University seniors delivered professional papers at the American Academy of Religion Southeast Regional Annual Meeting, held Feb. 27 through March 1 at Furman University in Greenville, South Carolina, with the group securing nearly a third of the conference's highly competitive undergraduate presentation slots.

The regional meeting featured four sessions dedicated to showcasing undergraduate research, with 16 total slots available to students from across the Southeast. Elon students filled five of those slots, a showing the university described as building "on a strong trajectory of undergraduate research in religious studies."

Each of the five seniors was guided through the research process by an Elon faculty member who worked with them over the course of their junior and senior years, helping to shape both the substance of their work and the mechanics of presenting it at a professional academic forum. Elon's recap did not name the individual faculty mentors or identify which students each guided.

In addition to the undergraduate presentations, Dr. Andrew Monteith, an Elon faculty member, presented his own research at Furman University during the conference. The university characterized his work as "innovative research," though no further details about his presentation topic were included in available information.

The American Academy of Religion is the primary scholarly organization for the academic study of religion, and its regional meetings serve as venues where faculty and advanced undergraduates present peer-reviewed work alongside established scholars in the field. Earning a slot at such a conference as an undergraduate is considered a meaningful credential in the discipline.

Elon's recap, posted March 5, did not include the names of the five senior presenters, the titles of their papers, or the specific sessions in which they appeared.