Anthea Butler

Anthea Butler is Associate Professor of Religious Studies and Africana Studies at the University of Pennsylvania. A sought-after commentator on the BBC, MSNBC, CNN, The History Channel and PBS, Professor Butler regularly writes opinion pieces covering religion, race, politics and popular culture for NBC Think, Religion News Service, The Washington Post, and CNN.

Her books include Women in the Church of God in Christ: Making A Sanctified World, published by The University of North Carolina Press. Her current projects include two books for UNC Press, White Evangelical Racism: The Politics of Morality in America, out in March 2021, and Reading Race: How Publishing created a lifeline for Black Baptists in Post Reconstruction America.

Professor Butler was awarded a Luce/ACLS Fellowship for the Religion, Journalism and International Affairs grant for 2018-2019 academic year to investigate Prosperity gospel and politics in the American and Nigerian context. She was also a Presidential fellow at Yale Divinity School for the 2019-2020 academic year.

Professor Butler currently serves as President Elect of the American Society for Church history, and is also member of the American Academy of Religion, American Historical Association, and the International Communications Association.

She has also served as a consultant to the PBS series including God in America and the American Experience on Aimee Semple McPherson. Recently she served as a consultant for two forthcoming series on PBS: Evangelicalism and Billy Graham, and the Black Church in America.

A historian of African American and American religion, Professor Butler’s research and writing spans African American religion and history, race, politics, Evangelicalism, gender and sexuality, media, and popular culture.