Professor Beliso-De Jesús Wins Journal of Africana Religions Book Prize

The Journal of Africana Religions announced on August 1 that Professor Aisha Beliso-De Jesús’s Electric Santería: Racial and Sexual Assemblages of Transnational Religion Columbia University Press, 2015) has won the 2016 Albert J. Raboteau Book Prize for the Best Book in Africana Religions.

Drawing on eight years of ethnographic research in Havana and Matanzas, Cuba, and in New York City, Miami, Los Angeles, and the San Francisco Bay Area, Beliso-De Jesús’ book examines the vibrant religious world of Santería practitioners, a world that is shaped by the travel and the meeting of spirits, deities, priests, and practitioners across local and national boundaries. Beliso-De Jesús is Associate Professor of African American Religions at Harvard Divinity School.

This Albert J. Raboteau award is given each year to an academic book that exemplifies the ethos and mission of the Journal of Africana Religions, an interdisciplinary journal that publishes scholarship on African and African diasporic religious traditions. To become eligible for the award, books must be nominated by an academic publisher, and a prestigious five-member committee is responsible for assessing these nominations and determining a winner. The 2016 committee included Hebert Berg, University of North Carolina, Wilmington; Cécile Fromont, University of Chicago; J. Lorand Matory, Duke University; Jalane Schmidt, University of Virginia; and Tamelyn Tucker-Worgs, Hood College.

“We couldn’t be more pleased for Aisha Beliso-De Jesús,” proclaimed the journal’s founding co-editors, Edward E. Curtis IV and Sylvester A. Johnson. “Beliso-De Jesús’ compelling book embodies an intellectual premise at the heart of the journal: namely, that a transnational approach can reveal deep insights into the nature of Africana religions.”