Professor
Graham Harvey
Born (1959-08-25) 25 August 1959 (age 65)
EducationNewcastle University
Occupations
  • Religious studies
  • Research

Graham Harvey (born 25 August 1959) is an English religious studies scholar. He specialises in modern Paganism, indigenous religions and animism.

Life and work

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Graham Harvey was born in 1959.[1] He obtained a Ph.D. title at the University of Newcastle upon Tyne in 1991 on a dissertation about group identity in ancient Jewish literature. From 1991 to 1995 he taught religious studies in Newcastle. From 1996 to 2003 he worked as a reader and principal lecturer in religious studies at the King Alfred's College, Winchester.[2] Since 2003 he works at the Open University where he is a professor and was head of the religious studies department from 2013 to 2017.[3]

After being invited to do a presentation about contemporary druids, Harvey began to do fieldwork about modern Paganism which resulted in several books, notably Listening People, Speaking Earth: Contemporary Paganism (1997) and Researching Paganisms (2004).[3] He has written extensively about indigenous religions and animism, producing the monograph Animism: Respecting the Living World (2005) and the edited volume The Handbook of Contemporary Animism (2013).[4][5] In the monograph Food, Sex & Strangers: Understanding Religion as Everyday Life (2013) he seeks to define religion through people's behaviours and everyday practices rather than belief.[6]

Harvey practices modern Paganism with druid orders and as animism with ecological activists. He is married and also participates in Jewish celebrations with his wife.[7]

Selected publications

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Monographs

Edited volumes

References

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  1. ^ "Harvey, Graham 1959-". WorldCat. Retrieved 7 October 2021.
  2. ^ "Graham Harvey: Short CV" (PDF). University of Oslo. Retrieved 7 October 2021.
  3. ^ a b "Professor Graham Harvey". open.ac.uk. Open University. Retrieved 7 October 2021.
  4. ^ Wright, Robin M. (2010). "Graham Harvey, Animism: Respecting the Living World". Journal for the Study of Religion, Nature and Culture. 4 (1): 95–97. doi:10.1558/jsrnc.v4i1.95.
  5. ^ Davis, Erik (2015). "The Handbook of Contemporary Animism. Edited by Graham Harvey". Religious Studies Review. 41 (2): 53. doi:10.1111/rsr.12207_1.
  6. ^ Sutherland, Liam (2018). "Graham Harvey: Food, Sex & Strangers: Understanding Religion as Everyday Life". Journal of Religious History. 42 (2): 308–309. doi:10.1111/1467-9809.12521.
  7. ^ Harvey, Graham (2007). "About the Author". What Do Pagans Believe?. What Do We Believe. London: Granta. ISBN 978-1-84708-933-5.