feminist and queer theory – Faculty /faculty Tue, 30 Jun 2026 08:07:45 +0000 en-US hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=7.0.3 /wp-content/themes/b/bates-framework/styles/images/bates-favicon.png feminist and queer theory – Faculty /faculty 32 32 Halla A. Attallah /faculty/profile/halla-a-attallah/ Tue, 01 Jul 2025 08:08:14 +0000 /faculty/profile/halla-a-attallah/ Ph.D., Georgetown University; M.A., American University of Paris; B.S., M.S., University of Washington
Halla Attallah is an Assistant professor of religious studies, focusing on the Qur’an and early Islamic history through a gender- and disability-conscious lens. She enjoys teaching a range of classes on scriptural traditions, qur’anic and biblical stories, religion and embodiment, feminist approaches to scripture, and methods in reading religious texts. Attallah’s research examines embodiment in the Qur’an’s worldview. She is interested in how different bodies are used to shape various theological arguments central to both the Qur’an, as a historical text, and the later Muslim discourses. Her current work considers reproduction, infertility, and maternity in the Qur’an’s annunciation scenarios associated with Mary, Sarah, Abraham, and Zachariah. Recent and upcoming publications include “,” “,” and “Mary and the Birth of Jesus.”

When not in her office, she can be found exploring coffee shops in Portland or hiking different trails around Maine with her family.

]]> Cynthia M. Baker /faculty/profile/cynthia-m-baker/ Mon, 31 Aug 2015 15:47:26 +0000 /faculty/profile/cynthia-m-baker-2/ Ph.D., Duke; M.T.S., Harvard Divinity School; B.A., Wesleyan

Professor Baker teaches a wide range of courses including: Religion, Violence, and Nonviolence; Hebrew Bible; New Testament; Eve, Adam, and the Serpent; Jews and Judaism in Antiquity; History of Early Christianity; Human Suffering: Job, Genesis, Revelation; Gender and Judaism; The Nature of Spirituality; Biblical Criticism; Food and the Sacred; and Images of Jesus in Film.

Her research explores ideas about gender, race/ethnicity, and nationalism in the formative periods of Judaism and Christianity and in modern historiography on these periods.  Her recent book,  is the focus of a and was highlighted in a in April 2017.  It has been called “A rewarding and important book” and “Highly Recommended” by the American Library Association.

When not in her office she can often be found foraging about the woods for wild gourmet mushrooms.

]]>