A cultural historian by training, I am a faculty member in the graduate programs in Humanities and History at York University and an associate librarian in the Scott Library. In the latter role I am responsible for research collections in humanities, history, classical studies, and religious studies. I am also co-editor of the Historical Papers of the Canadian Society of Church History.

My current research interests lie mostly at the intersections of religion and print culture. I am also interested in the expression of religious values and themes in literature. Although these two agendas are quite distinct in focus and method, most of my published work is marked by a common preoccupation with religion and the nature of things: the human soul as a thing; literary representations of being and goodness; and, more recently, the relationship between religion and material culture.

"Aiming the Most Deadly Blows at our Book Concern: Azor Hoyt and the Piracy of the Methodist Hymnbook, 1824-1836." Paper presented at the annual conference of the Canadian Society of Church History, Vancouver, British Columbia, June 2019.

"His Style was Diffuse and Feeble: American Methodist responses to Egerton Ryerson." Paper presented at the annual conference of the Canadian Society of Church History, Toronto, Ontario, June 2017.

"A Democratic Religious Press? Transatlantic Forces and the Origins of Denominational Publishing in America." Paper presented at the annual conference of the Canadian Society of Church History (Presidential Address), Calgary, Alberta, June 2016.

"Injuring the Cause of God: John Wesley's struggle to control Methodist publishing in America, 1769-1789." Paper presented at the annual conference of the Canadian Historical Association, Ottawa, ON, June 2015.

"Anti-British in Every Sense of the Word? American books and the growth of Common, public, and Sunday school libraries in Upper Canada, 1827-1857." Paper presented at the annual conference of the Canadian Society of Church History, Victoria, BC, June 2013.

Pulpit, Press, and Politics: Methodists and the Market for Books in Upper Canada. Toronto: University of Toronto Press. Studies in Book and Print Culture Series. August 2019. 264pp.

A Canadian, then an English subject: American Impressions of Egerton Ryerson. Historical Papers of the Canadian Society of Church History (2017): 113-121.

May I Print any of your Books? John Wesley and the rise of Methodist publishing in America. Historical Papers of the Canadian Society of Church History (2016): 127-144.

Religion and the Book. Special issue of Mémoires du livre/Studies in Book Culture. 6.2 Guest editor. Includes introduction "The End of Religion and the Death of the Book." September 2015.

Producing the Text: Production and distribution of popular editions of the Bible. New Cambridge History of the Bible. Volume IV: Modernity, Colonialism, and Their Successors. Edited by John Riches. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2015. 49-82. With Leslie Howsam.

Brandishing Their Grey Goose Quills: The struggle to publish an official life of John Wesley, 1791-1805. Book History 17 (2014):191-220.

Anti-British in Every Sense of the Word? Methodist preachers, school libraries, and the problem of American books in Upper Canada, 1820-1860. Historical Papers of the Canadian Society of Church History (2013): 55-76.

Before the Christian Guardian: American Methodist periodicals in the Upper Canadian backwoods, 1818-1829. Papers of the Bibliographical Society of Canada. 49.2 (2011): 143-165.

European Bible Societies. Encyclopedia of the Bible and its Reception. Area editor James Deming. Vol. 3. Berlin: Walter de Gruyter, 2011. 1086-1088.

Saving the Monsters? Images of redemption in the Gothic tales of George MacDonald. Christianity and Literature. 55.2 (2006): 245-269.*

Hermeticism and the Metaphysics of Goodness in the Novels of Charles Williams. Mythlore. 93/94 24.3/4 (2006): 5-29.

The Evolution of Joss Whedon's Vampire Mythology and the Ontology of the Soul. Slayage:  The Journal of Whedon Studies. 18 5.2 (2005): 29 pars. [Link]

A Problem of Morality: Sacramentalism in the early novels of Charles Williams. Renascence: Essays on Values in Literature. 56.2 (2004): 109-127.