Prof. Dr. Peter Gottschalk

Peter Gottschalk is Professor of Religion, Global South Asian Studies, and Education Studies at Wesleyan University (Connecticut, USA).  He received his B.A. in History with Honors at the College of the Holy Cross, his M.A. in South Asian Studies at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, and his Ph.D. in the History of Religions at the University of Chicago. He has been the recipient of grants and fellowships from the International Centre of Advanced Studies (ICAS:MP), Fulbright, Mellon, and the National Endowment for the Humanities, among others.

The project Emotional Discourse about Muslims and Tolerance: Islamophobia in the Histories of Emotions and Globalized Journalism endeavors to explore how, through the coalescing global newspaper network of the long nineteenth century, the British empire served as a vector for ideas and emotions promoting Islamophobia, anti-Muslim sentiment, and religious tolerance in ways still evident today.  Anglophone newspapers published in India, the UK, and the US in this period reflect both the imaginaries and the emotions perpetuated through reporting. Quantitative analysis of hundreds of newspapers in 1796-1807, 1852-1863, and 1911-1922 demonstrates that reporting on Muslims in these decades proved particularly salient in the countries under consideration.  Relevant newspaper articles, editorials, advertisements, and book reviews are coded by emotional and affective vocabulary and the valence of journalistic reporting. This approach recognizes the historical and cultural differences and changes in meanings ascribed to various emotional and affective categories (e.g., hatred, sympathy, disgust, compassion). The project will consider how journalism helped constitute, reinforce, and challenge normative regimes of social belonging and religious commitment. 

• Hindu, Muslim, and the Dynamics of Identity in South Asia: Belonging and Conflict from the Past to the Present. Edited volume with twelve contributors. Critical Perspectives in South Asian History Series (Bloomsbury Press, 2026).
• Islamophobia and Anti-Muslim Sentiment: Picturing the Enemy. With Gabriel F. Greenberg (Rowman & Littlefield, 2018). Revised and expanded second edition of Islamophobia: Making Muslims the Enemy (2007).
• American Heretics: Catholics, Jews, Muslims, and the History of Religious Intolerance (Palgrave, 2013).
• Religion, Science, and Empire: Classifying Hinduism and Islam in British India (Oxford University Press, New York, 2013).
• Engaging South Asian Religions: Boundaries, Appropriations, and Resistance. Volume with ten contributors co-edited with Mathew N. Schmalz (SUNY Press, 2011).
• Beyond Hindu and Muslim: Multiple Identity in Narratives from Village India (Oxford University Press, New York and Delhi, 2000 and 2001).