Professor Ben Hartley’s Dissertation Receives Accolades

Not long after Palmer Assistant Professor of Christian Mission Ben Hartley found out that the Wesleyan Theological Society had chosen his doctoral dissertation to receive its 2007 “Outstanding Dissertation Award,” he learned that the United Methodist Church’s General Commission on Archives and History was giving the dissertation, “Holiness Evangelical Urban Mission and Identity in Boston, 1860-1910,” yet more recognition.

The Commission has honored Professor Hartley with its Jesse Lee Prize, awarded just once every four years to encourage the writing and publication of serious monographs in Methodist history (including studies of antecedent bodies or offshoots of Methodism in the United States or its missions). The prize includes a $2,000 stipend to to be applied to the publication of the manuscript.

In his dissertation, Professor Hartley explores five related themes: evangelicals’ lower socioeconomic status; intense anti-Catholic feelings; commitment to the holiness movement; the synergistic influence of foreign mission and home mission; and dependence on recent rural immigrants, European immigrants, and women as leaders in urban mission.

Among other things, the dissertation illustrates how pragmatic decisions (as opposed to intellectual developments) became more influential in directing mission priorities and demonstrates holiness evangelicals’ abilities to cross boundaries of class and culture.