Education

PhD, Princeton University, 2023
MA, Princeton University, 2020
MDiv, Princeton Theological Seminary, 2016
MA, Illinois State University, 2012
BA, Juniata College, 2006

About

Mary Nickel is currently an Instructor of Philosophy at the University of South Carolina. Before joining the faculty at USC, she taught at the University of Virginia. She received her doctoral degree in Religion, Ethics, and Politics from Princeton University in 2023. Dr. Nickel’s research integrates religious ethics and political philosophy. Her current book-length project, “Bearings,” focuses on what pregnancy and motherhood teach us about collective agency and human sociality. 

Dr. Nickel teaches both metaethics and applied ethics. She holds a certificate in teaching from Princeton’s McGraw Teaching & Learning Center and received a teaching award from Princeton’s Religion Department in 2020.

Research Interests

• Political Theory
• Christian Ethics
• Feminist Theory
• Metaethics

Publications

• “The theological conception of voluntary motherhood.” Forthcoming in Body and Religion.
• "Choris Andros: St. Paul on Worlds without Men.” Forthcoming in Political Theology.
• "Critical Piety: Our urgent need to recover an ancient virtue.” Forthcoming in the American Journal of Theology and Philosophy.
• “Seeing Visions, Dreaming Dreams, Prophesying: The Pentecost as a Resource for Democratic Politics.” Journal of the Society of Christian Ethics 43, no. 2 (2024).
• “Incorporating Intimacy: The Evocative Story of Francis J. Grimké.” Black Religious Thought 1, no. 2 (2022): 196–227.
• “Conceiving selves: What pregnancy can teach us about the ethics and piety.” Journal of Religious Ethics 49, no. 2 (2021): 337-357.