When religion meets academia: Millennial Christians becoming cultural Others on a minority-serving campus in the United States

ABSTRACT

Given that religion is an understudied yet important topic, this exploratory research investigates how millennial Christians negotiate their intersecting cultural identities on college campuses. Specifically, this research took place on a Hispanic-serving, four-year public university in the Southwestern United States. The research team analyzed interview transcripts with student leaders and members of religious organizations. Following analytical steps of thematic analysis, we interrogated three themes: becoming Christian Others on a “liberal” college campus; avowing and ascribed as raced/sexualized/immigrant Christian “outsiders within;” and negotiating contradictions in avowing a faithful college life. The authors conclude by discussing implications for inter-belief communication.

KEYWORDS:

• Religion
• cultural identity
• intersectionality
• inter-faith communication
• millennial Christians

Acknowledgements

This project would not have been possible without the student leaders and research participants sharing their time, insights, and stories. The authors would like thank the journal editor, Dr Todd Sandel, and two anonymous reviewers for their generous comments and insightful suggestions. They also wish to thank the 2017 Summer Undergraduate Research Program at San Diego State University for supporting the second and third authors’ involvement in this research.

Notes on contributors

Yea-Wen Chen is an associate professor of intercultural communication at the School of Communication at San Diego State University.

Kelsey Chalko is a graduate student in the Department of Counseling and School Psychology at San Diego State University.

Michael Bonilla is an associate (missionary) with Chi Alpha San Diego.