Dr. Chance Bonar
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chancebonar.bsky.social
Dr. Chance Bonar
@chancebonar.bsky.social
Advisor, teacher, and writer

Researching ancient Christianity, slavery, authorship, antisemitism, and the literature of the ancient Mashriq

Cat dad | 🏳️‍🌈

http://chancebonar.com

Books: https://bit.ly/3R8LXbo & https://bit.ly/4iMBSwy
Pinned
The digital version of God, Slavery, and Early Christianity is officially out! If you're interested in ancient Mediterranean slavery's effects on Christian thought and practice, this is for you.

www.cambridge.org/core/books/g...
God, Slavery, and Early Christianity
Cambridge Core - History of Religion - God, Slavery, and Early Christianity
www.cambridge.org
Reposted by Dr. Chance Bonar
Non-ladder faculty do the riskiest teaching at most universities, an innovation that soothes both the routinized risk aversion that wins one tenure and the anxious admin desire for flexibility. The whole point of the arrangement is ensuring that it’s easy to shed anyone who becomes inconvenient.
also given the risk involved in teaching, it’s fucked up that universities don’t want to pay tenure-line professors to take the risk by being the lead instructors for these courses
December 1, 2025 at 1:21 AM
Reposted by Dr. Chance Bonar
also given the risk involved in teaching, it’s fucked up that universities don’t want to pay tenure-line professors to take the risk by being the lead instructors for these courses
December 1, 2025 at 12:30 AM
Reposted by Dr. Chance Bonar
"Why is there grade inflation? Why do our courses lack rigor?'

"Also we will immediately throw any graduate student TA or instructor who upsets an influential constituency under the bus, no matter how obviously manufactured their outrage is." 🤷‍♂️
OU has put the professor here on administrative leave:
November 30, 2025 at 10:32 PM
This morning's challenge: read through part of a dissertation written in Catalan for a chapter about Coptic documentary papyri
November 30, 2025 at 5:23 PM
Reposted by Dr. Chance Bonar
Welcome to ASU @platanoclassics.bsky.social!
“Dan-el Padilla Peralta is in the vanguard of scholars working to ensure that the complexities of the past are not flattened in service to the monochrome myths of our day,” said Jeffrey Cohen, dean of humanities at ASU.
news.asu.edu/b/20251112-d...
November 21, 2025 at 6:17 PM
Reposted by Dr. Chance Bonar
Whenever we go to a conference and @chancebonar.bsky.social wants to introduce me to all his online friends ❤️💚
November 28, 2025 at 8:23 PM
Reposted by Dr. Chance Bonar
Wonderful, urgent essay by @emilybaughan.bsky.social in @bostonreview.bsky.social on the recognition and politicisation of care work in the long shadow of Wages for Housework. www.bostonreview.net/articles/the...
November 27, 2025 at 10:29 AM
!!!!!!!!!
Welcome to ASU @platanoclassics.bsky.social!
“Dan-el Padilla Peralta is in the vanguard of scholars working to ensure that the complexities of the past are not flattened in service to the monochrome myths of our day,” said Jeffrey Cohen, dean of humanities at ASU.
news.asu.edu/b/20251112-d...
November 28, 2025 at 5:38 PM
Reposted by Dr. Chance Bonar
The guy shot two random people with a gun, I don't think you can say he wasn't assimilating into our culture
Stephen Miller is now arguing that assimilation is fundamentally impossible and that certain cultures are not compatible with Western civilization
November 28, 2025 at 3:23 PM
Reposted by Dr. Chance Bonar
Out now in Oxford Bibliographies in Classics: My biblio on "Jews in the Roman empire." My goal was to invite classicists/ancient historians into the rich world of rabbinic literature, which can transform (if we let it) how we talk about the Roman empire

www.oxfordbibliographies.com/display/docu...
www.oxfordbibliographies.com
November 25, 2025 at 10:34 PM
Reposted by Dr. Chance Bonar
NATIONAL DAY OF MOURNING and some living history today at Patuxet/Plimouth
November 27, 2025 at 10:37 PM
Spent today at Plymouth/Patuxet to observe National Day of Mourning & visit the Plimouth Patuxet Museums — incl. a historical actor depicting my settler colonizer ancestor Susannah White. It’s really meaningful, as a white settler working in slavery studies, to continue to wrestle with 1/x
November 27, 2025 at 10:36 PM
Reposted by Dr. Chance Bonar
Happy thanksgiving! I am so grateful to be working with an incredible group of scholars, including @epikt.bsky.social, @drewjakeprof.bsky.social, @chancebonar.bsky.social, @kkaelin.bsky.social, @davidaustinwalsh.bsky.social, @anypersons.bsky.social
November 27, 2025 at 8:22 PM
Reposted by Dr. Chance Bonar
6 years ago, as I prepared to host students for Thanksgiving, I received a call informing me Harvard denied me tenure. Before I had a chance to process, it was all public. This year the memory stings more as I watch dear colleagues and friends like @durba.bsky.social experience the same violence.
Why Lorgia García Peña Was Denied Tenure at Harvard
A decision not to retain a beloved Latinx-studies professor raised questions about the university’s commitment to students of color.
www.newyorker.com
November 27, 2025 at 3:12 PM
Reposted by Dr. Chance Bonar
Today on AOH, Dr. Chance Bonar, an Advising Fellow at the University of Virginia, discusses critical inquiries into texts outside the New Testament and broader socio-political-religious contexts, the legacy of slavery in ancient texts, and the modern interpretations of religious & cultural history.
November 26, 2025 at 4:08 PM
Reposted by Dr. Chance Bonar
Bringing ancient and modern peace studies into dialogue... To launch the Ancient Peace Studies Network, we are hosting an inaugural workshop @uniofstandrews.bsky.social @staclassics.bsky.social 20-22 January 2026. More info here: apsn.wp.st-andrews.ac.uk/events/
November 25, 2025 at 9:05 PM
Reposted by Dr. Chance Bonar
OMG look what was on my doorstep! i haven’t seen the print version yet, but it’s prettier than i expected!!
November 25, 2025 at 8:18 PM
My big takeaways from #aarsbl25:

- I should either present or preside, but never both in the same year

- getting to be on panels alongside all your friends makes it even more entertaining

- there aren’t enough fun-colored blazers yet

- more people are reading my work than I realized 😅
November 25, 2025 at 5:34 PM
Reposted by Dr. Chance Bonar
Assistant Professor of Religion (Jewish culture) job with Bowdoin College
Assistant Professor of Religion (Jewish culture) - Maine, United States job with Bowdoin College | 37918093
Assistant Professor of Religion (Jewish culture) Bowdoin College Posting Number: F00270JP Department: Religion Position Summary: Bowdoin...
jobs.chronicle.com
November 25, 2025 at 5:07 PM
Reposted by Dr. Chance Bonar
This is a late ancient (5-7th c.?) Greek account of the life of a rich woman who was raised Jewish, converted to Christianity when her parents died, lived for 20 years as a male monk named John, was discovered & made head of a woman's monastery, & was later martyred
well, what the heck. it's the tuesday before thanksgiving, and whoever is on here deserves a treat: the first new translation I've posted in a long while: the Life and Martyrdom of Susanna:

andrewjacobs.org/translations...
Life and Martyrdom of Susanna
andrewjacobs.org
November 25, 2025 at 3:27 PM
Reposted by Dr. Chance Bonar
Visiting Assistant Professor in Religious Studies at Lake Forest College. Deadline January 5, 2026. #AcRel

www.lakeforest.edu/offices-and-...
Visiting Assistant Professor of Religion
www.lakeforest.edu
November 18, 2025 at 1:47 PM
Reposted by Dr. Chance Bonar
Phew, *finally* got the @universitypress.cambridge.org website to work with the #AARSBL25 discount. That took far too long, but @chancebonar.bsky.social 's "God, Slavery, and Early Christianity" should be winging its way to me!

Page w/details (thx, @willwhim.com )
www.cambridge.org/us/universit...
American Academy of Religion/Society for Biblical Literature Annual Meeting | Cambridge University Press & Assessment
www.cambridge.org
November 24, 2025 at 11:22 PM
Reposted by Dr. Chance Bonar
"While other universities report that the humanities are shrinking, at Berkeley, the opposite is true. The music major is the fastest-growing major on campus. We are finding bigger classrooms because film is exploding. English is back to the numbers we saw 15 years ago. We are hiring" bit.ly/4ohKuOe
"The humanities really are a resource — a confidence for living in our times.” Dean Sara Guyer on the modern utility of humanities degrees
This interview originally appeared on the Division of Arts
bit.ly
November 23, 2025 at 3:38 PM