Jorge Gonzalez
Asst Professor
Weissman School of Arts and Sciences
Department: Sociology and Anthropology
Areas of expertise: Sociology, Religion and Culture, Anthropology, Critical Theory
Email Address: george.gonzalez@baruch.cuny.edu
> View CV- Biography
- Teaching
- Research and Creative Activity
- Grants
- Honors and Awards
- Service
George González is Assistant Professor of Sociology and Anthropology (Religion and Culture) at Baruch College-CUNY. Within religious studies, he specializes in religion and economy, secularism studies, theories and methods in the study of religion, and religion and society (Modern West). He is the author of several peer-reviewed and scholarly articles as well as a single-authored monograph entitled Shape-Shifting Capital—Spiritual Management, Critical Theory, and the Ethnographic Project. This first book is a critical analysis of the ‘spiritual’ turn in organizational theory and workplace practice.
Most broadly, Professor González’ research interests lay in the sociocultural legislation of Western metaphysics and the concrete and specific form of power that has attached to neoliberalism, as a historically specific kind of cosmology. In this, he pays special attention to cybernetic theory as a cultural dominant. He remains especially interested in approaching the study and criticism of what he calls post-secular capitalism through the framework of religious social change. Professor González’ has special interests in the work ethnography can do at the intersections of religion, science, and global capitalism and as a complement and corrective to critical theory.
Professor González’ second major research project focuses on the American ritualization of consumer capitalism. Within the scope of this project, Professor González conducted ethnographic fieldwork with the famed radical performance community and choir, the Stop Shopping Church (a.k.a. Reverend Billy and the Church of Stop Shopping) between 2016 and 2021. He has also conducted historiographical research into American marketing history in tandem with the fieldwork. He is busy at work on a new manuscript tentatively titled The Religion of Everyday Life (Under contract with NYU Press) based on this research. The manuscript draft is complete and the tentative publication year for the book is 2024.
Professor González is on the Editorial Board for Critical Research on Religion. He is also a Research Associate at the Center for Critical Research on Religion and Research Associate at the Edward Bailey Centre for the Study of Implicit Religion (U.K.).
While he works in sociology, anthropology, and allied disciplinay methods, Professor Gonzalez's home field is religious studies, whose professional association is the American Academy of Religion (AAR). Professor González served on the inaugural steering committee for the Religion and Economy Program Unit at the American Academy of Religion (AAR) from 2016-2021. Professor González has reviewed for various scholarly journals and academic publishers in the study of religion.
Trained as a philosophical anthropologist (or existential sociologist), Professor González is committed to empowering students to better comprehend how power is reproduced in their own richly textured lives and teeming lifeworlds. As the son of Latin-American immigrants (from Peru and Cuba), a first-generation college student, and a native New Yorker, Professor González enjoys pursuing a research and teaching agenda at Baruch College that is firmly grounded and anchored in City life.
Professor González is the recipient of several grants and awards, including the Eugene Lang Junior Faculty Fellowship (AY 22-23) and PSC-CUNY research grants (AY 20-21, 21-22, 22-23, 23-24).
Click here to stay up to date with Professor González’ scholarly and professional activities.
Education
Ph.D., Religion and Society, Harvard Divinity School Cambridge MA
M.A., Ethics, Yale Divinity School New Haven
B.A., Comparative Literature, Yale College New Haven CT
| Semester | Course Prefix | Course Number | Course Name |
|---|---|---|---|
| Spring 2024 | REL | 3180 | The Religion of Everyday Life |
| Spring 2024 | SOC | 1005 | Introductory Sociology |
| Spring 2024 | ANT | 3180 | The Religion of Everyday Life |
| Spring 2024 | SOC | 3180 | The Religion of Everyday Life |
| Fall 2023 | SOC | 3180 | The Religion of Everyday Life |
| Fall 2023 | ANT | 3180 | The Religion of Everyday Life |
| Fall 2023 | REL | 3180 | The Religion of Everyday Life |
| Fall 2023 | SOC | 1005 | Introductory Sociology |
| Spring 2023 | SOC | 3180 | The Religion of Everyday Life |
| Spring 2023 | SOC | 1005 | Introductory Sociology |
| Spring 2023 | ANT | 3180 | The Religion of Everyday Life |
| Spring 2023 | REL | 3180 | The Religion of Everyday Life |
| Fall 2022 | SOC | 1005 | Introductory Sociology |
| Spring 2022 | IDC | 3001H | Honors - People of New York |
| Spring 2022 | SOC | 1005 | Introductory Sociology |
| Spring 2022 | SOC | 1005 | Introductory Sociology |
| Fall 2021 | SOC | 1005 | Introductory Sociology |
| Fall 2021 | SOC | 1005 | Introductory Sociology |
| Fall 2021 | ANT | 3180 | The Religion of Everyday Life |
| Fall 2021 | SOC | 3180 | The Religion of Everyday Life |
| Fall 2021 | REL | 3180 | The Religion of Everyday Life |
| Spring 2021 | IDC | 3001H | Honors - People of New York |
| Spring 2021 | SOC | 1005 | Introductory Sociology |
| Fall 2020 | ANT | 3085 | Sel Topics Ant/Soc |
| Fall 2020 | REL | 3085 | Spec Topics: Religion & Cult |
| Fall 2020 | SOC | 3085 | Sel Topics Ant/Soc |
| Fall 2020 | ANT | 5000 | Independent Study ANT I |
| Spring 2020 | IDC | 3001H | Honors - People of New York |
| Fall 2019 | REL | 3085 | Spec Topics: Religion & Cult |
| Fall 2019 | SOC | 3085 | Sel Topics Ant/Soc |
| Fall 2019 | ANT | 3085 | Sel Topics Ant/Soc |
| Fall 2019 | SOC | 1005 | Introductory Sociology |
| Spring 2019 | IDC | 3001H | Honors - People of New York |
| Spring 2019 | SOC | 1005 | Introductory Sociology |
| Fall 2018 | SOC | 1005 | Introductory Sociology |
| Fall 2018 | SOC | 3085 | Sel Topics Ant/Soc |
| Fall 2018 | ANT | 3085 | Sel Topics Ant/Soc |
| Fall 2018 | REL | 3085 | Spec Topics: Religion & Cult |
Books
Gonzalez, G. (2024). The Church of Stop Shopping and Religious Activism: Combatting Consumerism and Climate Change Through Performance (NYU Press) (Forthcoming, December 2024). (p. 336). New York, NY, NYU Press.
Gonzalez, G. (2015). Shape-Shifting Capital: Spiritual Management, Critical Theory, and the Ethnographic Project. (p. 413). Lanham, MD, U.S.A., Lexington Books, An Imprint of Rowman and Littlefield.
Journal Articles
Gonzalez, G. (2021). The Psychic Life of Consumer Power: Judith Butler, Ernest Dichter, the American Marketing Reception of Freud, and the Rituals of Consuming Religion. Critical Research on Religion , 9(1). 8-30.
Gonzalez, G. (2016). Towards an Existential Archeology of Capitalist Spirituality . Religions, 7(7). 22 (15,929 words).
Gonzalez, G. (2015). The Ritualization of Consumer Capitalism: Catherine Bell's Ritual Theory, Ritual Practice in the Age of Starbucks. Implicit Religion, 18(1). 3-44.
Gonzalez, G. (2012). Shape-Shifting Capital: New Management and the Bodily Metaphors of Spiritual Capitalism. The Journal for the Theory of Social Behaviour , 42(3). 325-344.
Gonzalez, G. (2010). Spirituality at Work: Commodification or Progress?. Interconnections , 5. 23-30.
“Gerd Stern, USCO and Intermedia Systems Corporation: Immersive Art, the Spiritual Counterculture, and the Rise of Post-Secular Capitalism (1967-1983)”. In Progress.
Book Chapters
Gonzalez, G. (2017). Towards an Existential Archeology of Capitalist Spirituality. Religion and the Individual: Belief, Practice, and Identity (pp. 107-128). Basel,Swtizerland.
Conference Proceedings
Gonzalez, J. (2023). I delivered the the keynote address at the 45th annual Implicit Religion Conference in the U.K (Remote). My paper was entitled "Prismatic Religion: The Stop Shopping Church & The Post-Religious Religious Critique of Post-Secular Capitalism.".
Presentations
Gonzalez, J. (2024, March 18). "Profe. Carrasco, a Borderlands Lens, and La Virgencita in my Back Den". CarrascoFest, a Festschrift in Honor of David Carrasco.
Gonzalez, J. The Religion of Everyday Life. Religion in America Colloquium, Princeton University. Princeton, NJ: Department of Religion, Princeton University.
Gonzalez, J. (2021, June 3). The Ritual Commitments of Consumer Capitalism. Implicit Religion U.S.A.. Chicago: The Edward Bailey Centre for the Study of Implicit Religion.
Gonzalez, J. Management Pedagogies. American Academy of Religion (AAR) Annual Conference. : American Academy of Religion.
Gonzalez, G. (2020, December 3). "Losing his (Fake) Religion?: Reverend Billy's Unfunny Environmental Turn". American Academy of Religion Annual Conference. Boston (Virtual): American Academy of Religion.
Gonzalez, J. (2019, June 30). "Consumer Ritual and its "Saintly" Discontents". Implicit Religion Conference (U.S.A.). West Long Branch, N.J.: The Centre for the Study of Implicit Religion.
Gonzalez, G. (2019, March 31). The Flexibility of Postindustrial Work. Implicit Religion Research Fellow Seminar. UK: Bishop Grosseteste University.
Gonzalez, G. (2018, March 31). The Flexibility of Postindustrial Work. : The Murphy Institute--CUNY (Prof. Youngdahl).
Gonzalez, G. (2018, November 30). Ernest Dichter, the "Good Life", and the Study of Religion. American Academy of Religion Annual Conference. : AAR.
Gonzalez, G. (2017, November 30). Conjurations of Spiritual Capitalism: The Anthropology of Galina Lindquist Between the Imperatives of Critique and Real Presence. Society for the Anthropology of Religion. : SAR-AAA.
Gonzalez, G. (2016, October 31). “From Shape-Shifting Capital to the Ritualization of Consumer Capitalism: The ‘Religious’ Implications of Performativity as Cultural Dominant”. Stirling Students Critical Religion Association. : University of Stirling.
Gonzalez, G. (2015, November 30). Exploratory Remarks on Religion and Economy. American Academy of Religion Annual Conference. : AAR.
Gonzalez, G. (2015, June 30). The Ritualization of Consumer Capitalism. Faith at Work in the New Economy: An Interdisciplinary Symposium in the Study of Religion and Labor. : Princeton University.
Gonzalez, J. (2015, May 31). The Ritualization of Consumer Capitalism: Catherine Bell's Ritual Theory, Ritual Practice in the Age of Branding". Th Denton Conference in Implicit Religion (UK). U.K.: Centre for the Study of Implicit Religion.
Gonzalez, G. (2015, November 30). Towards an Existential Archeology of Corporate Spirituality. American Academy of Religion Annual Conference. : AAR.
Gonzalez, G. (2014, March 31). The Violence of Non-Critical Thinking. : Red Bank Humanists.
Gonzalez, G. (2013, July 31). Encountering Differences. : Universalist Unitarian Congregation of Monmouth County.
Gonzalez, G. (2013, November 30). The Ritualization of Consumer Capitalism: Catherine Bell's Ritual Theory, Ritual Practice in the Age of Branding. American Academy of Religion Annual Conference. : AAR.
Gonzalez, G. (2013, February 28). The Sweat of Sweets and the Souls of Our Lost Communications. : The Ranney School.
Gonzalez, G. (2012, November 30). Galina Lindquist: Conjuring Hope and Critique at the Dawn of Millennial Capitalism". American Academy of Religion Annual Conference. : AAR.
Gonzalez, G. (2010, November 30). Spiritual Discipline and the New Metaphors of Contemporary Business Management. American Academy of Religion Annual Conference. : AAR.
Other Scholarly Works
Gonzalez, G. (2017). Shopping for Salvation in a Brand New World.
Gonzalez, G. (2011). The Market, Warren Buffet, and the Occupation of Wall Stteet.
Gonzalez, G. (2011). All the Market's a Stage.
Reviews
Gonzalez, J. (1970,January 1). Review of Michael Jackson's Critique of Identity Thinking. Reading Religion, American Academy of Religion (AAR).
Gonzalez, G. (2020,January 1). Review of Francis Stewart's Punk Rock is My Religion--Straight Edge Punk and "Religious" Identity. Critical Research on Religion.
Gonzalez, G. (2018,March 22). Review of Kathryn Lofton's Consuming Religion. NYU Revealer.
Gonzalez, G. (2017,January 1). Review of Lauren Langman and George Lundskow's God, Guns, Gold, and Glory. Critical Research on Religion.
Gonzalez, G. (2017,January 1). Review of Kerry Mitchell's Spirituality and the State--Making Nature and Experience in America's National Parks.
Gonzalez, G. (2017,January 1). Review of Faegheh Shirazi's Brand Islam. Contending Modernities Blog (Notre Dame).
Research Currently in Progess
Gonzalez, J. (.(n.d.). Article for David Carrasco Festschrift. In Progress.
I have been invited to submit an article for a festschrift for Prof. David Carrasco (Harvard). I will explore the significance of Prof. Carrasco's work on the history of religions for considering the phenomenology of religious experience that is mediated through popular culture. Empirically, my archive for content analysis is the hit Spanish-language TV show, La Rosa de Guadalupe.
Gonzalez, J. (.(n.d.). Floating Signifiers, Floating Economies, and the Study of Religion. In Progress.
A cultural history of the study of religion in the 1970s and 1980s. The project, which will culminate in the publication of a major article, explores, by way of the history of the field of religious studies, the interrelationships between the American reception of deconstruction, on the one hand, and the Nixon Shock (1971) and its cancellation of the convertability of the dollar to gold, on the other hand.
| Title | Funding Agency Sponsor | Start Date | End Date | Awarded Date | Total Funding | Status |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| “Beyond Nature: The Stop Shopping Church’s (Post) Religious Resurrection of an Animate World” | PSC CUNY 53 | 07/01/2022 | 06/30/2023 | 04/15/2022 | 800 | Completed |
| After Religion, at the Shopocalypse: Performance and Earth Activism at Reverend Billy and the Church | PSC CUNY 52 | 07/01/2021 | 06/30/2023 | 04/15/2021 | 3500 | Completed |
| Counter-Visions of ‘Religion’: Performance and Politics at Reverend Billy and the Church of Stop Shopping | PSC-CUNY 51 | 07/01/2020 | 12/31/2022 | 04/17/2020 | 3350 | Completed |
| “Gerd Stern, USCO and Intermedia Systems Corporation: Immersive Art, the Spiritual Counterculture, and the Rise of Post-Secular Capitalism (1967-1983)” | PSC-CUNY 54 | 07/01/2023 | 06/30/2024 | 04/18/2023 | 2700 | Funded - In Progress |
| Eugene Lang Application | Eugene Lang Fellowship | 06/01/2022 | 06/30/2023 | 04/11/2022 | 7077.02 | Funded - In Progress |
| Honor / Award | Organization Sponsor | Date Received | Description |
|---|---|---|---|
| Eugene Lang Junior Faculty Fellowship | 2022-06-28 | The Eugene Lang Junior Faculty Fellowship is awarded to promising young scholars on the faculty. | |
| PSC-CUNY Research Award | 2022-03-01 | ||
| PSC-CUNY Research Award | Professional Congress/City University of New York | 2021 | |
| PSC-CUNY Research Award | Professional Congress/City University of New York | 2020 | Traditional-A grant in the amount of $3350.00 for the book project:<br>"Counter-Visions of ‘Religion’: Performance and Politics at Reverend Billy and the Church of Stop Shopping". |
| Summer Research Fellowship | Monmouth University | 2016 | Competitive grant for summer research |
| Nomination: Wabash Center Dinner for New Teachers | Wabash Center for Teaching and Learning in Theology and Religion | 2014 | I was nominated by a dean, department chair, or colleagues for this event. Every year only a handful of invitations are extended. |
| Dean's Dissertation Fellowship | Harvard University | 2008 | |
| Marquand Scholar | Yale Divinity School | 2000 | |
| Distinction in the Major | Yale College | 1996 |
Department
| Committee Name | Position Role | Start Date | End Date |
|---|---|---|---|
| Curriculum Committee | Committee Chair | 5/1/2019 | Present |
| Executive Committee of the Department | Committee Member | 3/1/2021 | Present |
College
| Committee Name | Position Role | Start Date | End Date |
|---|---|---|---|
| Macauley Honor's Admissions Committee | Committee Member | Present | |
| Weissman Curriculum Committee | Committee Member | Present | |
| Curriculum Committee | Liaison | Present | |
| Weissman Curriculum Committee | Secretary | Present | |
| Department Academic Advisor | Faculty Advisor | Present | |
| Executive Committee of the Department | Committee Member | Present | |
| Baruch PSC Chapter Executive Committee | Alternate Delegate | 7/31/2021 | |
| Weissman Diversity, Equity & Inclusion Alliance | Committee Member | 6/30/2021 |
University
| Committee Name | Position Role | Start Date | End Date |
|---|---|---|---|
| Faculty Membership Committee (FMC) | Committee Member | 8/29/2024 | Present |
Professional
| Organization | Position Role | Organization State | Organization Country | Start Date | End Date | Audience |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| American Academy of Religion (AAR) Religion and Economy Unit Steering Committee | Committee Member | 1/1/2016 | Present | |||
| Center for Critical Research on Religion | Research Associate | Massachusetts | United States | Present | International | |
| Religion and Economy Program Unit (AAR) | Committee Member | Georgia | United States | Present | International | |
| Critical Research on Religion | Reviewer | Massachusetts | United States | Present | International | |
| Implicit Religion | Reviewer | International | United Kingdom | Present | International | |
| Religions | Reviewer | International | Switzerland | Present | International | |
| Bloomsbury | Reviewer | New York | United States | Present | International | |
| Journal of Critical Research on Religion | Board Member | Massachusetts | United States | Present | International | |
| American Academy of Religion | Member | Georgia | United States | Present | International | |
| Edward Bailey Centre for Implicit Religion | Research Associate | International | United Kingdom | Present | International | |
| Bloomsbury | Reviewer, Ad Hoc Reviewer | 1/1/2016 | Present | |||
| Implicit Religion | Reviewer, Ad Hoc Reviewer | 1/1/2014 | Present | |||
| Critical Research on Religion | Reviewer, Ad Hoc Reviewer | 1/1/2014 | Present | |||
| Religions | Reviewer, Ad Hoc Reviewer | 1/1/2016 | Present | |||
| Religion and Popular Culture | Reviewer, Ad Hoc Reviewer | 1/1/2016 | Present | |||
| Critical Research on Religion | Editorial Review Board Member | 1/1/2016 | Present | |||
| Center for Critical Research on Religion | Member | 1/1/2016 | Present | |||
| American Academy of Religion | Session Chair | California | 11/23/2019 | 11/23/2019 | ||
| Implicit Religion Conference (U.S.A.) | Workshop Organizer | 1/1/2019 | 5/31/2019 |
Public
| Organization | Position Role | Organization State | Organization Country | Start Date | End Date | Audience |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Quad Cinema | Discussant | New York | United States | Present | Regional |