Contact Information
Southwestern University
Georgetown, TX 78626
(512) 863-1959 (office)
Office: Kyle E. White 108
vanhorng@southwestern.edu
Personal Links
Gavin Van Horn
Visiting Brown Junior Scholar in Environmental Studies
Areas of expertise
species reintroduction issues, animal studies, bioregional pedagogy, religion & ecology
Gavin Van Horn received his undergraduate degree in religion from Pepperdine University, a Master of Divinity from Princeton Theological Seminary, and his doctorate from the Universtiy of Florida, with an emphasis on Religion and Nature. His primary areas of interest include animals in religious traditions and myths, contested (sacred) spaces, and environmental history. His dissertation, Howling about the Land: Religion, Social Space, and Wolf Reintroduction in the Southwestern United States, addressed the religious,cultural, and ethical values involved in the reintroduction of wolves to the southwestern United States. He served as an assistant editor for the Encyclopedia of Religion and Nature (Continuum, 2005) and was the assistant editor of the Journal for the Study of Religion, Nature and Culture from 2005-2009.
Education
PhD, University of Florida 2008
Positions
Brown Junior Visiting Scholar in Environmental Studies
Southwestern University
March 01, 9999 - present
Courses: Fall 2009
Introduction to Sustainability
Intro to Environmental Studies
Wildlife Encounters & Ethics
Publications
Book Chapters
Bron Taylor and Gavin Van Horn, "Nature Religion and Environmentalism in North America", in Charles Lippy (ed.),
Faith in America: Changes, Challenges, New Directions, vol. 3 (New York: Praeger, 2006): 165-190.
Journal Articles
Gavin Van Horn and Lucas Johnston, "Evolutionary Controversy and a Side of Pasta: The Flying Spaghetti Monster and the Subversive Function of Religious Parody", Golem: Journal of Religion and Monsters 2.1 (Spring 2007): 1-32.
Gavin Van Horn, "Hindu Traditions and Nature: A Survey", Worldviews 10.1 (2006): 5-39.
Encyclopedia Entries
Gavin Van Horn, "Wolves as Predators, Ethical and Religious Perspectives", in Marc Bekoff (ed.), Encyclopedia of Animal Rights and Animal Welfare (Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, rev. edn, forthcoming 2009).
Gavin Van Horn, "Biocentrism", in Willis Jenkins (ed.), The Spirit of Sustainability: Religion, Ethics, and Philosophy, vol. 3 of The Encyclopedia of Sustainability (Great Barrington, MA: Berkshire Publishing Group, forthcoming 2009).
Gavin Van Horn, "Religion and Predators", in Marc Bekoff (ed.), Encyclopedia of Human-Animal Relationships, vol. 2 (Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 2007): 590-595.
Gavin Van Horn and Anna Peterson, "Animals and the New World", in Marc Bekoff (ed.), Encyclopedia of Human-Animal Relationships, vol. 3 (Westport, CT: Greenwood Press, 2007): 881-887.
Gavin Van Horn and Bron Taylor, "Sierra Club", in Bron Taylor (ed.), Encyclopedia of Religion and Nature (London and New York: Continuum, 2005): 1544-1548.
Gavin Van Horn and Brent Blackwelder, "David Brower", in Bron Taylor (ed.), Encyclopedia of Religion and Nature (London and New York: Continuum, 2005): 225-226.
Under
Consideration or Review
Gavin Van Horn, "The Buzzing, Breathing, Clicking, Clacking, Biting, Stinging, Chirping, Howling Landscape of Religious Studies", in Whitney Bauman, Kevin O?Brien, and Richard Bohannan (eds.), Inherited Land: The Changing Grounds of Religion and Ecology (Philadelphia: Temple University Press).
Gavin Van Horn, "The Making of a Wilderness Icon: Green Fire and
the Changing Status of Wolves in the United States", in Aaron Gross and Anne
Vallely (eds.), Animal Others and the
Human Imagination: Explorations of the Non-human in Self-Understanding
(New York: Columbia University Press).
Seminars & Presentations
"Making Sense of Data: Narrative and
Environmental Topography" ~ Annual Meeting of the Association
for Environmental Studies and Sciences (University of Wisconsin, Madison) ~
October 2009
Honors & Awards
National Endowment for the Humanities, $3200
Summer Institute sponsored by the
Arizona State University Institute for Humanities Research,
"A Fierce Green Fire at 100: Aldo
Leopold and the Roots of Environmental Ethics", Prescott, Arizona, June 22 - July 17, 2009
McLaughlin Dissertation Fellowship, $5000
College of
Liberal Arts and Sciences, University of Florida, Spring 2008
Alumni
Fellowship, $14,500/yr.
College of
Liberal Arts and Sciences, University of Florida, Fall 2003-Fall 2007
PTS
Grant, full tuition
Princeton
Theological Seminary, Fall 1997-Spring 2001
Dean's
Scholarship, half tuition
Pepperdine
University, Fall 1993-Spring 1997
Interests
guitar, hiking, camping, growing veggies, chasing my son
