Robert M. Baum

His first book, Shrines of the Slave Trade:  Diola Religion and Society in Pre-Colonial Senegambia won an American Academy of Religion award for the best first book in the history of religions (2000). He has written numerous articles on the history of Diola religion, field research, religious constructions of gender, indigenous religions and has recently completed a book on the history of Diola women's prophetic movements. He has also played an extensive role in the Ford Foundation funded program "Difficult Dialogues" which trained faculty at the University of Missouri and in other Big Twelve universities in how to deal with controversial issues that have a religious dimension in the university classroom. He has conducted similar workshops for K-12 teachers.