In celebration of Hispanic/Latinx Heritage Month, Dr. Daisy Machado, professor at Union Theological Seminary and executive director of the Hispanic Summer Program, will give a public lecture titled “Of Marginal Identities and Heterotopic Saints: Lived Religion in the Borderlands.” This lecture will examine what lived religion looks like in these borderlands with a focus on how religion crosses borders.

If you prefer to join the lecture via Zoom, please register online. After registering, you will receive a confirmation email containing information about joining the meeting.

You are also welcome to join us after the lecture for refreshments and a charla with Dr. Machado. We will meet in the Duke Chapel Memorial Gardens.

Dr. Machado will also preach in Goodson Chapel at 11:45 a.m.

  • Guest Speaker

    The Reverend Dr. Daisy L. Machado, PH.D., a native of Cuba who grew up in New York City, is a professor of American religious history at Union Theological Seminary, where she also served as academic dean, the first Latina to hold this position. Prior to coming to Union she served as vice president for academic affairs and dean at Lexington Theological Seminary in Lexington, Ky. Rev. Dr. Machado holds a B.A. from Brooklyn College; a Master of Social Work from Hunter College School of Social Work; a Master of Divinity from Union Theological Seminary; and a Ph.D. from the University of Chicago. She is also the first Latina ordained in the Christian Church (Disciples of Christ) in the Northeast Region (1981) having served a Latinx congregation in Brooklyn before moving to Texas to do the work of pastor developer, helping to establish two new Disciples Latinx church starts, one in Houston and one in Fort Worth.

    Rev. Dr. Machado is the author of numerous articles and encyclopedia entries. She is also the author of Borders and Margins: Hispanic Disciples in the Southwest, 1888-1942, and co-editor of A Reader in Latina Feminist Theology: Religion and Justice. She has written “History and Latino Identity: Mapping A Past That Leads to Our Future” (in Companion to Latina/o Theology, edited by Orlando Espín, 2015); “Borderlife and the Religious Imagination” (in Religion and Politics in America’s Borderlands, edited by Sarah Azaransky, 2013); “Promoting Solidarity with Migrants” (in Justice In a Global Economy, ed. Pamela Brubaker, Rebecca Todd Peters and Laura Stivers) and “Voices from Nepantla: Latinas in U.S. Religious History” (in Feminist Intercultural Theology: Latina Explorations for a Just World, ed. María Pilar Aquino and María José Rosado-Nunes). She is co-editor of an anthology on borderland religion that collects the work of scholars from South Africa, Norway, Austria, Denmark, and the U.S. published in 2019 titled Borderland Religion: Ambiguous practices of difference, hope and beyond (Routledge Press).

    Dr. Machado is currently director of the Hispanic Summer Program (HSP), the first woman to hold this position. The HSP is a national program of theological education for Latinx seminary students from around the country who are enrolled ATS schools. The HSP’s program in June 2022 will be hosted by Duke Divinity School and will be its 33th consecutive summer session.  

  • Lecture Details

    “Of Marginal Identities and Heterotopic Saints: Lived Religion in the Borderlands” 

    The term “borderlands” has become commonplace and is now a multi-vocal term used to describe much more than the U.S. Latinx border reality. Today’s borderlands do not have to be geographically located in the southwestern U.S., and the 21st century Latinx borderlands are understood as places where culture, race, identity, and religion intersect in complicated and even violent ways.

    This lecture will examine what lived religion looks like in these borderlands with a focus on how religion crosses borders, in this case, how marginal people bring with them beliefs in what some call “pseudo-saints” further complicating the practices of lived religion in marginal Latinx communities. One such “pseudo-saint” is Santa Muerte, an example of the “unorthodox religiosity” found in Mexico that has crossed the border into major U.S. cities and communities. We will look at the connections between marginality and belief as expressed in the veneration of this “heterotopic saint,” Santa Muerte.

  • Schedule

    The schedule of events on October 5, 2021:

    11:45 a.m.-12:30 p.m.: Preaching in Goodson Chapel; Sermon:  "A Midwife to God's Vision"  (Exodus 1:6-22)

    5:00 p.m.-6:00 p.m.: Lecture in room 0014 Westbrook; Lecture: “Of Marginal Identities and Heterotopic Saints: Lived Religion in the Borderlands”

    6:00 p.m.-7:00 p.m.: Charla with Dr. Machado. Botanas and drinks will be provided.