Ruth Braunstein is an SNF Agora Institute Professor of Sociology at Johns Hopkins University. Before joining JHU, she was Associate Professor of Sociology at the University of Connecticut. A cultural sociologist interested in the role of religion and morality in American political life, Ruth’s award-winning research has been published in the American Sociological Review, the American Journal of Cultural Sociology, Contexts, the Journal for the Scientific Study of Religion, Political Power and Social Theory, Sociology of Religion, Theory and Society, and Qualitative Sociology, among other outlets. She is the author of My Tax Dollars: The Morality of Taxpaying in America (Princeton University Press 2025), which was awarded the 2026 Mary Douglas Prize for Best Book in the Sociology of Culture. She also created the documentary podcast When the Wolves Came: Evangelicals Resisting Extremism, which was a Signal Awards Gold Winner in the Documentary category and was named one of the 20 best podcasts of 2025 by The Atlantic. She is also the author of Prophets and Patriots: Faith in Democracy Across the Political Divide (University of California Press 2017), and co-editor of Religion and Progressive Activism: New Stories About Faith and Politics (NYU Press 2017). She holds a Ph.D. in sociology from New York University, an M.A. in sociology from New York University, and a B.S. in Foreign Service from Georgetown University, where she studied international culture and politics.
