Duke Divinity School

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Duke University campus
Divinity School
Use Divinity School
Style Gothic
Erected 1926
Location West Campus
Namesake None
Architect Horace Trumbauer
Julian Abele, Chief Designer
Addition 2005 by Hartman-Cox Architects
Website Duke Divinity

The Divinity School at Duke University in Durham, North Carolina is one of thirteen seminaries founded and supported by the United Methodist Church. It has 39 full time and 18 part time faculty and over 500 full time students.

It was founded in 1926 as the first graduate school at Duke, following a large endowment by James B. Duke, a tobacco magnate, in 1924. The Divinity School carries on from the original founding of Trinity College at the site in 1859, which provided free training for Methodist preachers in exchange for support from the church.

The Divinity School building was recently renovated and also expanded. The Hugh A. Westbrook Building, which opened in 2005, is 53,000 square feet (4,900 m²). It also contains the 315-seat Bishop W. Kenneth Goodson Chapel with 55-foot (17 m)-high ceilings, office space, a bookstore, cafe, outdoor patio, and a 177-seat lecture hall.

Contents

[edit] Academics and Programs

The Divinity School offers Master of Divinity, Master of Theological Studies, and Master of Theology degrees. A Ph.D. in religion is available through the Graduate School. A Doctor of Theology, or Th.D, program began in the fall of 2006. It focuses on areas of study such as worship, evangelism, preaching, and the arts which are neglected by the Ph.D. program.

The programs run through the school include[1]:

  • Center for Studies in the Wesleyan Tradition
  • Anglican Episcopal House of Studies
  • Baptist House of Studies
  • Black Church Studies
  • Center for Reconciliation
  • Duke Institute on Care at the End of Life
  • Duke Youth Academy for Christian Formation
  • Ormond Center
  • Pulpit and Pew
  • Sustaining Pastoral Excellence
  • Health Initiatives Program
  • Thriving Rural Communities
  • Leadership Education at Duke Divinity

The Divinity School is perhaps most noted in American theological circles for serving as a fountainhead of postliberalism, or narrative theology, a movement originating in the 1960s and 1970s at Yale Divinity School.

[edit] Notable Faculty

The recently completed Goodson Chapel, part of the Divinity School's latest addition.
The recently completed Goodson Chapel, part of the Divinity School's latest addition.
  • Stanley Hauerwas, Gilbert T. Rowe Professor of Theological Ethics (1984- )
  • Richard B. Hays, George Washington Ivey Professor of New Testament
  • Reinhard Hütter, Associate Professor of Theology
  • Geoffrey Wainwright, Robert Earl Cushman Professor of Christian Theology
  • Richard Heitzenrater, William Kellon Quick Professor of Church History and Wesley Studies
  • David C. Steinmetz, Amos Ragan Kearns Professor of the History of Christianity
  • Randy Maddox, Associate Dean for Faculty Development; Professor of Theology & Wesleyan Studies
  • Samuel Wells, Dean of Chapel and Research Professor of Ethics
  • Warren Smith, Assistant Professor of Historical Theology
  • Amy Laura Hall, Professor of Theological Ethics
  • Timothy Tyson, Visiting Professor of American Christianity and Southern Culture
  • Grant Wacker, Professor of Church History
  • Lauren Winner, Assistant Professor of Christian Spirituality
  • Paul Neff Garber, Dean (1941-44), later Bishop of The Methodist Church
  • J. Kameron Carter, Associate Professor in Theology and Black Church Studies
  • William C. Turner, Jr., Associate Professor of the Practice of Homiletics

[edit] Notable Alumni

The interior of Goodson Chapel
The interior of Goodson Chapel

[edit] External links