Professor Ángel J. Gallardo called to teach church history

The Austin Seminary Board of Trustees has called Dr. Ángel J. Gallardo to be Assistant Professor of Church History, effective July 1, 2022.

“We are thrilled that Ángel will be joining the Austin Seminary community,” says Austin Seminary President Ted Wardlaw. “He is an accomplished scholar, lecturer, and colleague, and he will inspire our students with respect to the love of church history. It will be a pleasure to welcome the Gallardo family.”

Dr. Gallardo is currently the Associate Director of the Intern Program and serves on the faculty of Perkins School of Theology at Southern Methodist University in Dallas. He earned the PhD from SMU in 2018; the subject of his dissertation was “Mapping the Nature of Empire: The Legacy of Theological Geography in the Early Iberian Atlantic.” He holds a BA in theological studies at Eastern University and an MDiv from the Duke University Divinity School; he later served on the Duke Divinity Board of Visitors. He is an active lay member of the United Methodist Church.

In addition to Perkins, he has had teaching experience at Lexington Theological Seminary, House of Hispanic Studies at Duke, CEPAS a non-profit educational center for at-risk youth in Brazil, and Seminario Metodista, Huancayo in Perú.

Dr. Gallardo is looking forward to beginning his teaching at Austin Seminary. “I am excited to invite seminarians to explore, and be shaped by, the complex and enthralling legacy of the global Christian movement,” he says. “I also look forward to developing courses that examine the origins of race and religion in the Americas. Ultimately, I hope my students can learn to reimagine themselves, their congregations, and their contexts in light of God’s broader story of redemption by critically engaging the history of Christian thought.”

Ángel Gallardo is deeply involved in academic conversations, currently co-chairing of the Latina/o Religion, Culture, and Society program unit of the American Academy of Religion & Society of Biblical Literature (AAR/SBL). He participated in the roundtable “Making Sense of /from the 2020 U.S. Election” at the AAR/SBL conference in 2020, and he served as an officer of La Comunidad, the Association of U.S. Latino/a Scholars or Religion and Theology (2015-19). He presented a paper at the Latinx Studies Now: DC 2018+, Latina/o Studies Association 3rd Biennial Conference Panel: “Toward a Nepantla Poetics: Exploring Decolonial Options in Latinx Theology.” He also holds membership in the Hispanic Theological Initiative at Princeton Theological Seminary.

Dr. Gallardo and his wife, Kendrea Tannis, are parents to two young children, and they will make their home in Austin following the conclusion of the spring 2022 term.