Daniel Ott
Associate Dean of Academic Initiatives
Associate Professor and Chair, Philosophy and Religious Studies
Coordinator, Peace, Ethics, and Social Justice
Biography
I started my academic career by studying music. I sang opera and wrote ugly, avant-garde music. I was also always interested in theology, though.
My dad was a Presbyterian minister. Shortly before I graduated from college, I decided to follow in his footsteps and attend the same seminary that he had attended 40 years earlier. There, I had some great experiences in pastoral ministry, but I also fell in love with the academic study of religion. I decided to pursue graduate work in philosophical theology.
I still sing and do some preaching, but teaching and writing about religion are my deepest passions.
Monmouth is a great place for me to teach and work because I’m convinced that studying religion requires a multidisciplinary approach, and Monmouth’s commitment to inter-disciplinarity and integrated learning is a perfect setting for my scholarship.
Interests
Liberal and philosophical theology in the twentieth century (especially process and pragmatic theologies)
Peace and nonviolence
Education
B.Music — West Virginia University, 1993
M.Div. — Louisville Presbyterian Theological Seminary, 1996
Ph.D.— Claremont Graduate (California) University, 2006
Courses Taught
RELG 100: Intro. to World Religions
RELG 113: Christian Faith and Theology
RELG 217: Martin Luther King, Jr.
PESJ 218: Peace with Justice
INTG 101: Introduction to the Liberal Arts
Selected Work
“Nonviolence and the Nightmare: King and Black Self-Defense,” American Journal of Theology and Philosophy, Vol. 39, No. 1 (January 2018), pp. 64-73
“In einem Augenblick”: Christian naturalism, death, and Brahms’s Ein deutsches Requiem,” Theology Today, Vol. 74, No. 2 (July 2017), pp. 138–148.
Christian Thought in America: A Brief History, with Hannah Schell (Fortress Press, 2015) “Nonviolence and Moral Equivalency,” American Journal of Theology and Philosophy Vol. 35. No. 2 (May 2014), pp. 172-183.
Theological perspective essays on Matthew 25:1-13, Matthew 25:14-30, Matthew 25:31-45 in Feasting on the Gospels (Westminster John Knox Press, 2013)
“Toward a Realistic, Public, Christian Pacifism,” American Journal of Theology and Philosophy Vol. 33. No. 3 (September 2012), pp. 245-257.
“Church, Community and Democracy,” Political Theology 12.3 (2011), pp. 347-362.