Areas of specialization: death, race, and urban religion in the United States and Latin America.
Prof. Amoruso teaches courses on religion in the Americas. In addition to regionally-focused surveys like Introduction to American Religion, he teaches thematic courses on issues including race and ethnicity, politics, and violence.
His research focuses on death, race, and religious movement in the United States and Latin America. His book, Moved by the Dead (forthcoming with UNC Press in April 2025), explores these themes in a widespread devotion to afflicted souls in Brazil. A study of religion in the city, the book locates the devotion within the shifting cultural geography of São Paulo to trace how religion and race intersect in public struggles over historical representation in urban space.
Read his Oxy Story profile.