For our 2nd brownbag talk of the semester, Religious Studies is excited to hear from Chase Castle, PhD on Friday, October 24th. Castle is the current Robert M. Kingdon Fellow at the Institute for Research in the Humanities (IRH). Castle’s talk is titled: “Always Awakened: Gospel Hymns and the Spectacle of American Revivalism, 1875-1900.”
Abstract: Evangelical revivalism preoccupied American religious culture during the last quarter of the nineteenth century. In what some scholars have considered the “Third Great Awakening,” revival meetings grew into massive events that blended theatricality, music, and evangelical theology into a distinctly modern form of popular religion. At the center of this transformation were evangelists like Dwight Moody, who pioneered large-scale urban revivals that relied heavily on gospel music to generate emotional responses and stimulate conversion.
This talk examines early gospel music in the urban American revival tradition. Gospel hymns contained elements of popular culture that generated mass appeal. This music is one example of how revivalists like Moody provided religious alternatives to commercial culture at the end of the nineteenth century. Singing gospel hymns effectively modernized revival methods, incorporating performative spectacle that distinguished these events from earlier “awakenings.” In this talk, I argue that American evangelicalism remained always awakened across the nineteenth century, and what truly shifted was not the presence of revival but the affective structure of religious services.
Date: Friday, October 24th, 2025
Time: 12:15 – 1:15pm
Location: Room 202/204 (2nd Floor Conference Room), Bradley Memorial Building
Street Address: 1225 Linden Drive, Madison, Wisconsin 53706
This event is open to all! Please share widely with any interested students, faculty, staff, or community members. Save the date for 3rrd brownbag event happening on November 7th!