Hello! My name is Ariel Schwartz, and I currently serve as the Associate Director for Research at the Northwestern University Roberta Buffett Institute for Global Affairs.
As a program director with 14 years of experience, I am an expert in pioneering and spearheading projects, from innovation and development to execution and evaluation. Community building and connection are at the core of my work.
I excel at helping diverse stakeholders speak to and hear one another so that they can work together to address today’s greatest global challenges
A specialist in religion, politics, and violence, I am particularly interested in the effects of hate crimes and micro-aggressions, as well as the legal management of these violences, on religious pluralism. Through attention to space and place, my research in religious studies explores phenomenological experiences of violence and the formation of collective narrative and identity.
My work is anchored in a deep dedication to interdisciplinary community building, research, and learning. While a doctoral student at Northwestern, I organized a certificate program in Religion and Global Politics and founded and co-coordinated a Graduate Student Workshop in Religion and Global Politics. I was a Graduate Fellow with Northwestern’s Alice Kaplan Institute for the Humanities and earned a 2015 American Dissertation Fellowship from the American Association of University Women.
I earned my Ph.D. in Religious Studies from Northwestern University, with a certification in Religion and Global Politics. Before that, I received an M.A. in Religious Studies from Northwestern University, a B.A. in Religion from Barnard College of Columbia University, and a B.A. in Hebrew Bible from the Jewish Theological Seminary of America.
