Education: 

A.B., 2004, Harvard College 
M.A., 2012, Vanderbilt University 
Ph.D., 2015, Vanderbilt University 

 

About Dr. Adler 

A first-generation college student from Bloomington, Indiana, Dr. Jennifer Axsom Adler graduated Phi Beta Kappa from Harvard College with an A.B. in Government and earned an M.A. and Ph.D. in Religion from Vanderbilt University. Her dissertation explored how nineteenth-century American Protestants came to regard the Holy Land as a material gospel — a place that preserved an authoritative and experiential account of sacred history and that could be plainly read, interpreted, and reproduced. Her primary research focuses are American religious history, sacred space, ritual, material culture, and lived religious experience. She teaches courses on American religious history, world religions, African American religions, gender, and material culture. 
 

Areas of Academic Specialty 

American Religious History 
Christian History 
Sacred Space and Landscape 
Religion and Material Culture 
Holy Land Travel and Pilgrimage