H. Byron Earhart

Last updated
H. Byron Earhart
Born (1935-01-07) January 7, 1935 (age 89)
Education Knox College
University of Chicago
Occupations
  • Historian
  • author
Spouse
Virginia Margaret Donaho
(m. 1956)
Children3

H. Byron Earhart (born January 7, 1935) is an American historian, Ph.D, and author, especially about Japanese religions. [1]

Contents

Life and studies

He was born on January 7, 1935, in Aledo, Illinois; son of Kenneth Harry and Mary ( née Haack) Earhart. [2] His father enlisted in the U.S. Navy in 1942 and served on the battleship USS Missouri. His grandparents and mother held a frozen food locker in Havana, Illinois. [3] H. Byron Earhart married Virginia Margaret Donaho in 1956 and they had three children. [2]

Earhart attended Knox College in Galesburg, majoring in philosophy and religion. He enrolled at the University of Chicago in a graduate program, got a Fulbright grant and went to Japan for three years of doctoral research. [3] He studied under Mircea Eliade and Joseph M. Kitagawa at the University of Chicago, where he received a doctorate in History of Religions. [4]

Career

He is a professor emeritus in the Department of Comparative Religion at Western Michigan University [5] from which he received in 1981 a Distinguished Faculty Scholar Award. [6]

His textbook Japanese Religion: Unity and Diversity (1969) is considered a classic, through several editions, and "has remained one of the only treatments of Japanese religious history truly suitable for use in undergraduate classrooms". [7]

Bibliography (excerpts)

Related Research Articles

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References

  1. 1 2 Writers Directory. Springer. 2016-03-05. ISBN   978-1-349-03650-9.
  2. 1 2 Evory, Ann (1979). Contemporary Authors. Gale / Cengage Learning. p. 148. ISBN   978-0-8103-0040-8.
  3. 1 2 3 Moon, Jill (2020-08-19). "Illinoisan's story a tribute to everyday Americans". Alton Telegraph . Archived from the original on 2022-01-10. Retrieved 2020-11-19.
  4. "H. Byron Earhart". Cengage EMEA. Retrieved 2020-11-18.
  5. "H. Byron Earhart". Western Michigan University. Retrieved 2020-11-18.
  6. "Western news". October 15, 1981.
  7. 1 2 Thumas, Jonathan (2013-09-22). "H. Byron Earhart, Religion in Japan: Unity and Diversity (fifth edition)". Japanese Journal of Religious Studies . 40 (2): 383–386. doi: 10.18874/jjrs.40.2.2013.383-385 . It is no surprise that H. Byron Earhart's classic textbook, Japanese Religion, has remained one of the only treatments of Japanese religious history truly suitable for use in undergraduate classrooms. During its long publication history, Japanese Religion has, without equal, fulfilled and exceeded its role as a useful teaching material. Earhart has proved through various editions that his work remains relevant and indeed the foremost resource for those teaching introductory courses on Japanese and East Asian religions. This continues to be the case in the latest, fifth edition, aptly titled Religion in Japan.
  8. Reid, David (1982). "Review Of: H. Byron Earhart, Japanese Religion: Unity and Diversity". Japanese Journal of Religious Studies. 9 (4): 313–315. doi: 10.18874/jjrs.9.4.1982.313-315 .
  9. Aubin, Françoise (1984). "Earhart (Byron) Japanese Religion. Unity and Diversity". Archives de sciences sociales des religions (in French). 57 (2): 228–229.
  10. Lee, Andrew (2013-11-30). "Religion in Japan: Unity and Diversity". The Japan Times . Retrieved 2020-11-19.
  11. Blacker, Carmen (1971). "H. Byron Earhart: The new religions of Japan: a bibliography of Western-language materials. (Monumenta Nipponica Monograph Series.) xi, 96 pp. Tokyo: Sophia University, [1970]". Bulletin of the School of Oriental and African Studies . 34 (3): 679. doi:10.1017/S0041977X00129428. ISSN   1474-0699. S2CID   162313830.
  12. Ellwood, Robert S. (1971). "Review of The New Religions of Japan: A Bibliography of Western-Language Materials". Journal of the American Academy of Religion . 39 (1): 89–92. doi:10.1093/jaarel/XXXIX.1.89. ISSN   0002-7189. JSTOR   1461684.
  13. Hardacre, Helen (1984-08-01). "The New Religions of Japan: A Bibliography of Western-Language Materials. H. Byron Earhart". History of Religions . 24 (1): 89–90. doi:10.1086/462979. ISSN   0018-2710.
  14. Reid, David (Mar 1, 1984). "The new religions of Japan: A bibliography of Western-language materials, 2nd edition (Book Review)". Japanese Journal of Religious Studies. doi: 10.18874/jjrs.11.1.1984.95-96 .
  15. Mansfield, Stephen (Feb 26, 2012). "Fuji-san: reflections on Japan's iconic mother mountain". The Japan Times.
  16. MacWilliams, Mark (December 2014). "Mount Fuji: Icon of Japan. By H. Byron Earhart. Columbia: The University of South Carolina Press, 2011. Pp. 239". Religious Studies Review . 40 (4): 232. doi:10.1111/rsr.12185_2. ISSN   1748-0922.