Doctoral supervision and publication in Birmingham

I reached the end of my research supervision at the University of Birmingham in 2022 (I retired officially in December 2019). At that time I had reflected on the international nature of my doctoral research supervision over the past 25 years and its impact on my life. I want to put this (originally a Facebook post) up here. This was really an international work. Of the fifty graduates I supervised to completion, fourteen were from the UK, ten from South Korea, seven from Ghana, six from the USA, two each from India and China, and one each from Indonesia, Nigeria, Zambia, Romania, Sweden, Denmark, Germany, Ireland, and Canada. Besides those from Pentecostal churches, they often came from mainline Protestant and Anglican denominations. The research was almost entirely empirical work on global Pentecostalism and the relationship between religion and culture. As to where the research was situated, sixteen of these topics were on Africa, sixteen on Asia, eleven on Europe, five on North America, and two on Latin America. Most of them have subsequently published their theses and are doing very useful work, mostly in theological education and Christian ministry. When I came to Birmingham in 1995, I had a rather limited knowledge mainly confined to Southern Africa and African independent churches. I had three small books based on my graduate research in South Africa promoted by Inus (M.L.) Daneel, and published by the University of South Africa (Unisa Press). A further book, Zion and Pentecost, was published by this press in 2000. As a result of supervising this international research in Birmingham, I have been able to widen my specialism and publish widely: ten monographs, four edited collections, and translations of two of my books into five languages. My best-selling book is An introduction to Pentecostalism (2nd ed. 2014). I consider, however, that the three best books are my last book Spirit-Filled World (2018), which was a return to my earlier research in South Africa; Spreading Fires (2007), based on extensive archival research on early Pentecostal missionary work; and To the Ends of the Earth (2013), an attempt to address the changing nature of world Christianity and the role of Pentecostalism in these global changes. All this was stimulated by the doctoral supervision I was doing while these books were being prepared. Each of my fifty research students (and others that I handed over to other supervisors as a result of the increasing workload) made an important contribution to my life and work. 

But now well and truly retired, I find time for other, perhaps more important things, like enjoying grandchildren, doing genealogical research, writing memoirs, reading novels, listening to and playing music, watching TV dramas, exercising, and perhaps most importantly, volunteering. I grow weary of academic work, just as the Preacher in Ecclesiastes observed, "Of making many books there is no end, and much study wearies the body".