Talk:List of religious studies scholars

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No consensus to delete. VfD notice removed. Deletion debate is archived below. Cecropia 01:25, 25 Apr 2004 (UTC)

A list of non-famous professors from a college in Georgia, USA. Guanaco 02:38, 19 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Delete. Let's not encourage somebody to write an article about all of those people who are linked to on this page. RickK 03:14, 19 Apr 2004 (UTC)


 * Delete -- Cyrius|&#9998 03:44, Apr 19, 2004 (UTC)
 * Comment: Karen Armstrong, at least, is fairly well-known. I've just googled a few of the others, and they seem to be relatively notable. Don't see anything about a college in Georgia. Radicalsubversiv 07:10, 19 Apr 2004 (UTC)
 * I did some net research. Harvey Hill is the department chair at Berry College . Pascal Boyer is a professor at Washington University in St. Louis. .  Glen Mullen does not show up in a Google search.  Joseph Kitagawa appears to be a notable scholar of Japanese religion.  Aihwa Ong is an anthropologist at Berkeley. .  Haven't checked the others, but the list seems to be legit.  Whether or not it's an unbiased list, it's clearly not just a list of some professors in Georgia. Isomorphic 08:02, 19 Apr 2004 (UTC)
 * Do we really need a list of religion scholars? Is anyone likely to do a search on such a topic?  None of the scholars listed has an article either.  Delete.  Exploding Boy 13:47, Apr 19, 2004 (UTC)
 * I should think anyone interested in theology or theologians would be interested in such a topic. The fact that none of the scholars listed have an article may indicate a weakness in Wikipedia, not in the list. Keep. Snowspinner 14:58, 19 Apr 2004 (UTC)
 * Agreed for now, though we should be sure to restrict the list to important religious scholars. -Seth Mahoney 18:08, 19 Apr 2004 (UTC)
 * Keep. We have lists of much more bizarre stuff (e.g. List of fictional mice and rats), and this might actually spawn some interesting material. Pteron 19:02, 19 Apr 2004 (UTC)
 * Keep. I'm familiar with several of these, and most of those are very important to their specific fields. Rhymeless 04:24, 20 Apr 2004 (UTC)
 * Keep. Needs expanding, though. -Sean 19:58, 20 Apr 2004 (UTC)
 * Keep. We have other list of people grouped by occupation. I think a name change might help; most of these people appear to be currently active. Maybe rename it "List of contemporary theologians". MK 02:59, 21 Apr 2004 (UTC)
 * Current title is more appropriate, as most of them are not theologians. Most appear to be scholars who study religion from a secular standpoint. Isomorphic 02:07, 24 Apr 2004 (UTC)
 * Keep. Cribcage 05:36, 24 Apr 2004 (UTC)

Tylor and Max Müller are scholars of religion. The latter is the very founder!

--Yanemiro 11:45, 21 January 2007 (UTC)

This list has several (fixable) problems. First, it does not distinguish between classic figures (e.g., Weber, Durkheim, Frazer, Freud, van Gennep, Malinowski, Evans-Pritchard) and contemporary scholars. Second, it is titled "religious studies scholars," but many of the people listed are not in that specific discipline (e.g., anthropologists Boyer and Hurston; sociologists Berger and Stark). It should perhaps be re-titled "List of scholars of religion." Third, other appropriate people with existing articles on wikipedia are not included (e.g., Bron Taylor, Jan Assman, Manuel A. Vásquez, Russell T. McCutcheon, Robert A. Orsi). (I ran across a wikipedia page of scholars or new religious movement, which I can no longer find [a separate problem] and everyone on that much longer list qualifies.) Fourth, as always, people are missing who more important than many who are included (e.g., Jane Ellen Harrison, Karl Marx, Tylor and Múller as noted above; Hans G. Kippenberg, Gustavo Benavides, Michel Despland, Thomas Tweed). On the one hand, that is just the usual invitation for further articles. On the other hand, this list is particularly problematic in that regard. 68.146.91.93 (talk) 13:17, 8 April 2013 (UTC)

I second Yanemiro's observations. A list of scholars of Reliigon is an odd category - sending people to links of scholarly organizations or else featuring significant theorists would be better.