Our in-person November  AAR Annual Meeting, co-hosted with the Society of Biblical Literature, brings together scholars for the world’s largest gathering of those interested in the academic study of religion. Don’t miss the opportunity to connect with colleagues, publishers, and friends; engage with leading scholars in the field of religion; and network with potential employers and others from around the world. RAMS will be hosting the annual breakfast at the conference on Sunday, November 19th. 

We are happy to announce their will be two RAMS PhD graduate students that will be presenters this year, Bertram Liyanage and Adam Herpolsheimer. Their abstracts are below:

• Bertram Liyanage - https://papers.aarweb.org/node/111763. (link to his paper)
• Adam Herpolsheimer - He is presenting two papers:

"Canguilhem, Foucault, and the Concept: A Discursive View of 'Biological Sex' in Transexclusive Radical Feminism" 

"Lightning Round: Gender Ideology; Social Contagion ", Gender Ideology

There is a duplicitous irony to how commonplace “gender ideology” has become as a way to denigrate anything at all related to contemplating queer existence. On the one hand, it cloaks itself in a very explicit Marxian verbiage that users of the phrase would never see as legitimate given their deep-seated disdain for all things Marx. This rhetorical trick is meant to instigate a sense of urgency on top of the intellectual weight inherent in “jargon” of its sort. On the other hand, the term is intended to dispel outright any critical thought associated with thinking through or contemplating gender or sexuality altogether. As an attack or insult, “gender ideology” apparently wants to have its [completely heterosexual] cake and eat it too. But what if we unpack that Marxian verbiage a little? Is there anything in Louis Althusser’s notion of “Ideological State Apparatuses” that can enlighten us as to how queer identities are in and of themselves being formed? Are accusations of ideology even a bad thing?

Still, it's not my goal to find a way to reappropriate “gender ideology,” but there are insights to gain from treating the milieu surrounding the nebulous concept of “queer identity” as somehow entangled with Marxian ideology. Perhaps it is too queer to sincerely investigate the accusation, because there is always the possibility that “being queer” is less tangible than the foundations on which identity is presumed to
be built. Queerness is not so easily captured, but even that ambiguity could never make such an identity any less valid or encompassing. Instead, a genealogical pursuit into how identity comes to be could open up possibilities for and conceptions of queer futures of as of yet unimagined queer ways of being in the world—ways of being that are untethered from the current expectation that at the very least the basis for one’s identity is found in something “immutable,” “corporeal,” or otherwise accepted as “empirically”
valid.

By deconstructing the ideological commitments of those already disruptive queer identities, we can create room for the normative evaluation of being. My argument is that instead of critique being levied on individuals by those who deny them, embracing a more Marxist notion of gender ideology could open up a space for queer identified people to engage in their own self-study. With a greater understanding of why an individual’s identity is the way it ostensibly is, that individual can better assess the degree to which they currently inhabit what might be called their “authentic self” and, instead, appreciating more fully the constructive nature of identification, they might be freer to become more or less so as desired.
Importantly, this introspective endeavor, unlike the deployment of “gender ideology” by those who refuse queerness, such ideological critique does not rely on external forces to evaluate what it means to be or to be authentic. In this way an individual might be able to more fully inhabit their subject position through a greater knowledge about how or why they came to be. choices in how to be.

2025 AAR presenters include our very own Rouying Tang. She presented a paper in November 2025:

The Role of Human Agency in AI-Assisted Classical Chinese Translation: A Case Study of the 25th chapter of the Fahuajing, the Pumenpin

Rouying Tang, Temple University

This study examines the role of human agency in AI-assisted translation, focusing on how the selection of reference databases influences the translation of Classical Chinese Buddhist texts. Using Retrieval-Augmented Generation (RAG) with the Deepseek R1 model, the research evaluates how consciously selected knowledge sources impact translation accuracy and doctrinal interpretation. The study applies this methodology to the Pumenpin chapter of the Fahuajing, analyzing multiple translation iterations with varying reference materials. Evaluation is conducted against authoritative translations to assess accuracy, doctrinal nuance, and interpretive biases. The study demonstrates that AI does not replace human expertise but instead requires active engagement in selecting reference sources, which fundamentally shape translation outcomes. This research establishes a methodological framework for AI-assisted religious text translation, emphasizing the necessity of human oversight to maintain theological coherence while leveraging computational advancements. It highlights the evolving role of translators in curating AI inputs rather than merely post-editing outputs.