PSG

PSG application, due Nov. 6, 2008

 

Response to NEH reviewers

            In November 2007, we submitted a proposal to the National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) for a Collaborative Research Grant titled “Religious Values and Environmental Practice.”  We were notified in June 2008 that our project had not been funded.  We recently received the reviewers’ comments from the NEH program officer. All five reviewers agreed on the significance of the topic and, further, the basic soundness of our research plan.  Their comments both provide specific ways for us to strengthen the proposal and encourage us to think that this is both an important project to pursue in the humanities and one that stands a strong chance of receiving significant support once we address weaknesses in the first proposal.

            One reviewer is concerned about the proposal’s expressed goal of drawing on findings to help close the gap between environmental values and actual practices.  The question about whether scholars should have a role in helping to “turn commitment into action” is legitimate. At the same time, however, we believe that research in the humanities can and should play a vital public role.  What we need to convey in our revised proposal is the distinction between shedding light on significant social problems, a legitimate and necessary role for humanistic scholars, and partisan advocacy.  We have no intention of engaging in the latter, but we do hope that our work will help scholars, policy makers, and a broader public understand how ethics are formed, expressed, and acted upon.  Such an increase in understanding can aid in efforts to translate widely-held values, such as concern for the natural environment, into more effective social practices and structures.

            In general the reviewers find the research questions valid and significant.  They praise specific aspects of our methodology, including the plan to hold repeated interviews with the same participants over time.  One reviewer raises questions about protocols regarding human subjects; this will not be an issue, since we will comply with all IRB requirements. 

            Several reviewers raise helpful questions about the details of our methodology, which we will incorporate into our proposal revisions.  One question concerns the numbers of informants to be interviewed and demographic data such as age, gender, etc.  Additional discussion and preliminary research during the next year will enable us to provide this information.  We will do so, further, in the light of the most significant questions raised about research design:  the selection of groups and their location.  These are among the most substantial changes that we will make in revising our proposal. 

            We proposed to study four groups with strong environmental concerns, including three religious institutions, the Episcopal Church, the Unitarian Universalist Fellowship, and the International Society for Krishna Consciousness (ISKON), in addition to one secular environmental group, the Sierra Club.  Regarding selection of groups, one reviewer notes that the absence of evangelical Protestants is a major gap.  Another notes that our informants will come entirely from the ranks of “the converted,” limiting our comparative depth.  We discussed this issue at some length in preparing our proposal last fall, and decided not to include Evangelicals at that time for several reasons, including their relative lack of attention to environmental issues.  As noted in our proposal, we chose specifically to concentrate on religious groups that have made environmental concerns a priority.  We believed that this focus would help us answer our key research questions, which ask if and how religion facilitates the translation of expressed ecological values into concrete practices and structures.

            The reviewers’ comments, however, point to the possibility of exploring this question in a broader context, especially by including religious groups (such as Evangelicals) that have not made environmental values as central to their ethical teachings as have the groups on which we originally chose to focus.  The possible inclusion of Evangelicals becomes more interesting, further, in light of developments in the last couple of years, including growing concern about climate change, in particular, among a broader religious constituency including Evangelicals.  In revising our proposal, then, we will add, as a fourth religious group, an Evangelical Protestant church that has made environmental values an important part of its ethical teachings. 

            The selection of the specific church is related to the possibility of geographic expansion,

which addresses the second limitation that concerned some reviewers: our decision to limit research to the Gainesville area.  Several reviewers noted this focus as a strength, insofar as it would both facilitate follow-up research with informants and make it more likely that we could follow our proposed time table.  These factors did indeed influence our decision to stay local with our research.  As we reflect on ways to strengthen the proposal, however, we find ourselves in agreement with the reviewers’ concern about the limitations of this local focus.

            In revising the proposal, we will look for ways to expand while retaining a manageable scope.  We will aim to add religious groups in at least one and possibly two locations.  These additional groups will be from the same traditions as the Gainesville groups we study, in order to provide comparative data, e.g., do Episcopalians in north central Florida differ significantly (and how) from Episcopalians in another region?

            This expansion will require additional background research on regional variations in attitudes, values, and organization.  Other background research will include studies of the religious groups’ statements on the environment – a factor included in our original proposal, but perhaps not emphasized enough, since one reviewer asks about it.

            Several reviewers suggest broader dissemination of the study’s results, and particularly a website.  We find this suggestion extremely helpful and will plan, in revising the proposal, to add on-line features including a website with information about the study method and groups, additional resources, and other features.  This is related to the question of follow-up research, which one reviewer would like to see in order to stimulate further studies in this area.  We agree that this is important, given the innovative nature of our project.  We will aim, in our revised proposal, to

 

Use of PSG funds

            In order to revise the proposal successfully, we request support for some initial research, consulting, and writing, to be undertaken primarily in summer 2009, with the goal of submitting a revised proposal to the NEH Collaborative Grants proposal for the November 1, 2009 deadline.

            During the summer we will conduct background research on religious groups under study and also preliminary field research in Gainesville and additional field sites, probably in North Carolina and the Pacific Northwest. This research will include interviews with religious leaders and focus groups with members of the congregations under study.  We will also conduct small surveys with these congregations.  The aims of this research will be first, to gather initial data that will help us write a better proposal, and second, to refine our interview and survey questions in preparation for more extensive research.