ABOUT MARK EDWARD CHARD
Mark Edward Chard is a Research Associate at the Wits Centre for Diversity Studies, School of Social Sciences, University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg, South Africa, and an Affiliated Researcher in the Department of Philosophy and Religious Studies at Kenyatta University, Nairobi, Kenya. He is an independent biblical scholar and theologian, and a Full Member of both the Society of Biblical Literature and the European Association of Biblical Studies.
His research operates across biblical reception history, Black and womanist theology, phenomenology of religion, and consciousness studies. His peer-reviewed publications include work in Theology (T&T Clark/Duke University Press — two papers, both assessed by Professor George Pattison, former Lady Margaret Professor of Divinity at Oxford), Biblical Interpretation (Brill), the Journal of Theology for Southern Africa, Biblical Theology Bulletin, and the Scientific God Journal.
Further papers are currently under review or submission across more than thirty manuscripts in the pipeline, including at the Journal of Theological Interpretation, Anthropology of Consciousness, Old Testament Essays, the Journal of the American Academy of Religion, CrossCurrents, the Journal of Race, Ethnicity, and Religion, and the Journal of Near-Death Studies, among others.
His synthesis monograph, Transdiasporic Lament and the Revelationary Spirit: Relational Geometry, Black Maternal Theology, and the Architecture of Threshold Experience (~88,000 words), is currently under peer review with the University of Illinois Press.
At Wits, Mark's three-year research programme (2026–2029) develops Critical Geometric Literacy, extending Critical Diversity Literacy into the study of sacred geometry, symbolic cognition, and epistemic power. At Kenyatta, his affiliated research, Embodied Presence, Sacred Geometry, and African Theological Anthropology, brings African contextual and Ujamaa-inspired hermeneutics into dialogue with questions of digital identity and technological ethics — work developed in close collaboration with Professor Philomena Mwaura.
Profoundly shaped by the continuing relational presence of his twin brother, Darren John Chard (d. December 2020), Mark's scholarship explores grief, witness, and hope across biblical, psychological, and communal contexts. His research centres biblical reception history within Black religious traditions, womanist and Black liberation theology, trauma-informed hermeneutics, sacred geometry, and relational eschatology.
His work is freely accessible via Academia.edu, Humanities Commons (CORE), and SSRN.
"I write what I hear when God speaks."