Erin Nourse is assistant professor of religious studies at Regis University in Denver, Colorado. She is an historian of religion who employs an ethnographic approach to the study of religion. Her research has focused on birth rituals and rites of initiation for the newly born in the pluralistic very of Diégo Suarez, Madagascar. Her interests include ritual, African religions, and the manner in which people construct religious identities in pluralistic religious communities.