Academic Biography
Lorenzo DiTommaso received his Ph.D. in Religious Studies from McMaster University in 2002. He was a Postdoctoral Fellow at Yale University Divinity School in 2001-03 and NEH Postdoctoral Fellow at the Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies at Saint Louis University in 2003-04. He joined Concordia University Montreal as Assistant Professor in 2004, was promoted to Associate Professor in 2009 and to Professor in 2013, and has served as Chair of the Department. He is a member of the department's programs in Jewish Studies and Christianity, and teaches the graduate seminar on religion and popular culture biennially.
Research interests
- Apocalypticism, Ancient to Contemporary
- Apocalypticism and Popular Culture
- Apocalyptic and Millenarian Movements and Groups
- Mediaeval Manuscripts and Early Books
- Biblical Apocrypha and Pseudepigrapha
- Japanese Art and Culture
- Speculative Fiction
- Religion and Contemporary Popular Culture
Religious Traditions
Research Interests
Dr. DiTommaso's research focuses on apocalyptic speculation in all its forms and in every culture, from the ancient world to the present day. He has authored or edited a dozen volumes and nearly 200 articles, book chapters, and other short studies.
Dr. DiTommaso's research has been supported by four major grants from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council of Canada (2004-07, 2007-11, 2011-16, 2018-24). He has also received grants and fellowships from the Vatican Film Library, the U. of Chicago Library, the Herzog August Bibliothek, the Lilly Library (Indiana U.), the Medieval Studies Library (U. of Notre Dame), and the Hill Museum and Manuscript Library, where he was Nicky Carpenter Fellow in Manuscript Studies. In 2019 Dr. DiTommaso was awarded the Bibliographical Society of America - Pine Tree Foundation Fellowship in Hispanic Bibliography. More recently, and in aid of his project on apocalyptic comic art, he was a research fellow at the Stephen O. Murray and Keelung Hong Special Collections Library (Michigan State U.) in 2022 and the Elmer Andersen Special Collections Library (U. of Minnesota) in 2023, the latter as Marilyn Hollinshead Visiting Scholar. In 2024 Dr. DiTommaso will be a Research Fellow at the Herzog August Bibliothek, focusing on mediaeval commentaries on the Book of Revelation.
Dr. DiTommaso's current SSHRC grant focuses on the Medieval Antichrist tradition. Other major book-length research projects include the biblical book of Daniel and the dawn of apocalypticism; the post-classical Sibylline texts and traditions; the Latin texts and traditions of the Apocalypse of Pseudo-Methodius (with James Palmer); the commentary tradition on the Book of Revelation; apocalyptic comic art; and contemporary apocalyptic fiction.
Dr. DiTommaso has co-organised four conferences in Canada funded by SSHRC conference and workshop grants, as well as conferences in Israel, Italy, and the United States. In June 2020 he co-organised one of the first full-blown online conferences since the global pandemic lock-down, on "Conceptions of Evil in Early Judaism and Early Christianity," with Gabriele Boccaccini. Dr. DiTommaso is also co-director of the "Through a Glass Darkly" Symposium on Apocalyptic, with Colin McAllister, now in its eighth year, and which meets in alternate years in Colorado Springs and in Montreal.
The Department of Religions and Cultures is a great place for graduate study. I welcome M.A. and Ph.D students who are interested in (1) any area of modern or contemporary apocalyptic expression, including new religions, the resurgence of global fundamentalism, political apocalyptic and the rise of illiberalism, apocalypticism on the Internet, and environmental apocalypse; (2) religion and popular culture (anime, live-action films, manga/BD/GN, music, novels, television, and video games); or (3) topics or themes in pop-cultural apocalypticism broadly speaking. I would be delighted to supervise M.A. topics in ancient, mediaeval, or early modern Jewish or Christian apocalyptic speculation, but with very rare exceptions our faculty component cannot support doctoral students in these areas.
Doctoral
- Elliot Mason (2023): "Monsters on the Margins: Minority Identification with Monsters and the Monstrous."
- Lucas Cober (2023): "Without Blemish or Defect: Disability and Biblical Interpretation."
- Cimminnee Holt (2022): "A Cabal of Outsiders: Negotiating the (Virtual) Boundaries of Satanism in the Church of Satan." [Jesper Aagaard Petersen, co-supervisor]
Master's
- Jamaica Ernst (2025): TBA
- Rupert Mackie (2025): TBA
- Christian Robillard (2025): TBA
- Dustin Barker (2024): TBA
- Shivani Hunter (2024): TBA
- Marie Joron (2024): "The Myth of the Magical Romani: Romani Representation in Modern Popular Culture."
- Bernardo Palhau (2024): "The Intersection of Religion and Popular Culture in the Hōnensai Festival (Komaki) and the Kanamara Matsuri (Kawasaki)."
- Raphaëlle Bigras Burrogano (2023): "Apocalyptic Identities and the 'Other' in Nazi-Occupied Poland."
- Jennifer Gagne (2023): "The Anti-Hero John Constantine: A Comic-Book Vessel for the Other."
- Sarah Boyer (2022): "A Collective Trembling: Apocalyptic Affective Practice."
- Devan Morrell (2021): "The Ethics behind Montreal's Post-Graffiti Scene: A New Materialist Approach to Classical Allusions in Contemporary Street Art."
- Alexandra Black (2021): "Yokai and Japanese Folklore through the Miyazaki Lens: An Intertextual Analysis of Princess Mononoke and Spirited Away."
- Zachary Doiron (2020): "Screening the Enemy: Antichrist Films and the Politics of Horror"
- Gisoo Kim (2019):"End Game: Apocalypse and Post-Apocalypse in Video Games."
