I began my academic work in Quaker studies in the late 1980s, co-founding the Quaker Studies Research Association in 1993. I was assistant Director of the Centre for Quaker Studies at the University of Sunderland, 1994-98, and then initiated what is now the Centre for Research in Quaker Studies in 1998. I have supervised over 90 postgraduate completions.

My specialism is in the sociology of religion although I have also published in history, theology, spirituality, travel and urban studies. I teach the online Quaker studies modules at Lancaster in the history of Quaker theology and the sociology of Quakerism.  I also supervise in Amish studies.

I have edited Quaker Studies for the past  25 years, and sit on Steering Group of the American Academy of Religion Quaker Studies Unit. I sit on two editorial boards.

Qualifications

BA, PhD

Research Interests

I have an ongoing interest in sects, secularisation and internal secularisation, as well as the decennial surveys of Quaker faith and practice.

Publications

Authored:

• Making our Connections: the spirituality of travel. London: SCM, 2013.
• Open for Transformation: being Quaker. London: Quaker Books, 2014.
• With Douglas Gwyn and Timothy Peat,  Heaven on Earth: Quakers and the second coming. Second Edition, Createspace, 2018
• The Cultivation of Conformity: a general theory of internal secularisation, Routledge, 2019.

Edited:

• With Sylvia Collins-Mayo, Religion and Youth. Aldershot, Ashgate, 2010.
• With Margery Post Abbott, Mary Ellen Chijioke, and John Oliver, The Historical Dictionary of Friends (Quakers). Second Edition. Lanham, MD: Scarecrow Press,  Second Edition, 2011
• With Stephen W. Angell, The Oxford Handbook of Quaker Studies, Oxford: OUP, 2013,  (Paperback 2015)
• With Stephen W. Angell, Early Quakers and their Theological Thought 1647 – 1723, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2015.
• With Stephen W. Angell, Quakers, Industry and Technology: FAHE,  2017.
• With Stephen W. Angell, The Cambridge Companion to Quakerism: Cambridge University Press, 2018.
• With Rebecca Wynter The Prison Letters of Wilfrid E. Littleboy, Handheld Press, 2020.
• With Stephen W. Angell and David H. Watt, The Quakers 1830 – 1937, New Garden, PA: Penn State University Press, forthcoming.

Articles

• ‘Guarded Domesticity and Engagement with “the World”: the separate spheres of Quaker Quietism’, Common Knowledge, 16/1 (2010), 95-109.
• With Bill Chadkirk, ‘Present and Prevented 2006 and 2008: Summary Report on the survey of the 11th May 2008 and comparison with the survey of the 7th May 2006’, Quaker Studies, 15 (2010), 84-97.
• With Peter Collins, ‘Transition as Normative: British Quakerism as Liquid Religion’, Journal  of Contemporary Religion 29/2 (2014), 287- 301.
• ‘Friends in Britain’, Quaker Religious Thought  123-24 (2014): 5- 23.
• ‘The British Quaker Survey’, Quaker Religious Thought  123-24 (2014): 136-40.

 Chapters

• ‘The Implicit Prophet: Larry Ingle’s persistent call to rigour.’ In festschrift for Larry Ingle, edited by Charles Fager, 2011.
• ‘From God’s People to a People of God: theology and testimony as symbols of truth amongst Quakers’ in Dudiak, J., ed., Befriending Truth: Quaker Approaches and Contributions, Philadelphia, PA: FAHE 2015, pp. 82 – 106.
• ‘Quakers and “the world”: religious freedom and citizenship’ in Skeie, G. and  Aarek, H. E., eds, Religious Freedom as seen from a Minority Perspective. Stavanger, Norway: University of Stavanger 2015, pp.21-32.
• With Frederick Martin, ‘ “Outcasts of Israel”: the apocalyptic theology of Edward Burrough and Francis Howgill’ in Angell, S. W. and Dandelion, P. Early Quakers and Their Theological Thought 1647 – 1723.  Cambridge; Cambridge University Press, pp. 118 – 36.
• ‘The Layered Theoscape of Philadelphia: the Quaker experiment as a religious crucible.’ in Eric Nelson and Jon Wright eds  Sacred Landcsapes, London: Routledge, 2017, pp.150 – 66.
• ‘Revelation 3:20’ in Timotheos Tsohantaridis and John S. Knox, eds, God in the Details: a biblical survey of the Hebrew and Greek Scriptures Dubuque, IA: Kendall Hunt,   2018, pp. 349 – 51.
• With Timothy Burdick, ‘Global Quakerism 1920 – 2000’ in Angell, S.W. and Dandelion, P., eds, The Cambridge Companion to Quakerism: CUP,  2018, pp. 49-65.
• ‘The Quakers’ in Possami, A. and Blasi, A. eds. The Sage Encyclopaedia of the Sociology of Religion, Volume 2: Sage, 2020.
• ‘Introduction: the remapping of Quakerism 1830-1937.’ in Angell, S.W., Dandelion, P., and Watt, D.H., eds,  The Quakers 1830 – 1937, New Garden, PA: Penn State Press, forthcoming.