Courtney Bender is an associate professor of Religion at Columbia University. An ethnographer and qualitative sociologist, Bender’s primary research fields are the sociology of religion and culture, social theory, and North American religious history. She received her B.A. at Swarthmore College and her Ph.D. in Sociology at Princeton University.

Bender is the author, co-author and editor of numerous books and manuscripts. Most recently, she is author of The New Metaphysicals: Spirituality and the American Religious Imagination  (University of Chicago Press 2010), 2010 Winner of the AAP PROSE Award for Excellence in Scholarly Publishing in Theology/Religious Studies. 

She has served as the co-chair of the Social Science Research Council’s working group on Spirituality, Political Engagement and Public Life and as chair of the SSRC’s current initiative on “New Directions in the Study of Prayer.”