Introduction PART I Genealogy of credibility 1 Form, content, and the treasury of devices 2 God’s people defending their ivory towers: reassessing the study of religion’s emergence in the U.S. 3 Autonomy, unity, and crisis: rhetoric and the invention of a discipline 4 Classification and the dog’s breakfast: the American Academy of Religion’s research interest survey PART II Techniques of dominance 5 The good, the bad, and the ugly: looking past the violence of cults and fanatics 6 Alienation, apprenticeship, and the crisis of academic labor 7 “Like small bumps on the back of the neck … ”: the problem of evil as something ordinary 8 The jargon of authenticity and the study of religion PART III Reworking the residue from our imperfect past 9 Methods, theories, and the terrors of history: closing the Eliadean era with some dignity 10 The perfect past and the irony of narrative: Bruce Lincoln’s Theorizing Myth 11 “Religion” and the citizen’s unrequited desires: chips from the religion industry’s workshop 12 “Religion” and the governable self, Afterword