Jon Bialecki is a Continuing Lecturer in the Department of Anthropology at the University of California, San Diego, a position he has held since 2020. His research centers on the anthropology of religion, the anthropology of the subject, ontology and temporality, religious language ideology, and religious transhumanist movements. He approaches these topics with a keen interest in religious authority and its intersections with other authoritative discourses, such as science.
Bialecki's prior work includes a major field project with Southern California evangelicals, where he studied Pentecostal practices and the constitution of religious authority. This groundwork led to his current participant observation research focused on the Mormon Transhumanist Association (MTA).
He holds a BA, MA, and PhD from the University of California, San Diego, as well as a JD from the University of San Diego. His work has appeared in numerous edited volumes and in academic journals such as the South Atlantic Quarterly, American Ethnologist, Anthropological Theory, and the Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute. He also served as co-editor for a special issue of Anthropological Quarterly focusing on Christian language ideology.
