David Albertson

Tenure Track Appointments

• Associate Professor of Religion, University of Southern California, 2015 –
• Assistant Professor of Religion, University of Southern California, 2007 – 2015

Research Specialties

Medieval and early modern Christianity; Christian mysticism; medieval and early modern philosophy; religion and visual culture; philosophy of religion

Book

• Albertson, D. (2025). The Geometry of Christian Contemplation: Measure without Measure. Oxford: Oxford University Press. [Link to book]
• Albertson, D. (2024). Cusanus Today: Thinking with Nicholas of Cusa Between Philosophy and Theology. Washington, D.C.: The Catholic University of America Press. [Link to book]
• Albertson, D. (2014). Mathematical Theologies: Nicholas of Cusa and the Legacy of Thierry of Chartres. Oxford Studies in Historical Theology. New York: Oxford University Press. [Link to book]
• Albertson, D., King, C. (2009). Without Nature: A New Condition for Theology. New York: Fordham University Press. [Link to book]

Book Chapters

• Albertson, D. (2025). “To Defend the Gift,” in Thinking God Otherwise: Introduction to the Work of Emmanuel Falque, trans. Jacob Saliba (Eugene: Wipf & Stock), pp. xvii-xxv. [Link to book]
• Albertson, D. (2025). “Immanence as Exile: Hadewijch as Philosopher of Finitude,” in Radical Thinking in the Middle Ages: Acts of the XVth International Congress of the SIEPM, Paris, 22–26 August 2022, eds. Monica Brinzei, Irene Caiazzo, Christophe Grellard, and Aurélien Robert (Turnhout: Brepols), 2 vols., Vol 1: pp. 263-273. [Link to book]
• Albertson, D. (2025). “The Strength to Remain: On the Past and Future of Manence,” in To Die of Not Writing: Doing Philosophy of Religion with Emmanuel Falque, eds. Pablo Irizar, Donald Boyce, and Martin Koci (Eugene: Wipf & Stock), pp. 152-175. [Link to book]
• Albertson, D. (2025). “Fraternity in Finitude: Emmanuel Falque and the Future of Christian Philosophy,” in To Die of Not Writing: Doing Philosophy of Religion with Emmanuel Falque, eds. Pablo Irizar, Donald Boyce, and Martin Koci (Eugene: Wipf & Stock), pp. 275-290. [Link to book]
• Albertson, D. (2024). “Inside the Fold: Gilles Deleuze and the Christian Neoplatonist Tradition,” in Mystical Theology and Platonism in the Time of Cusanus: Essays in Honor of Donald F. Duclow, eds. Jason Aleksander, Sean Hannan, Joshua Hollmann, and Michael Edward Moore (Leiden: Brill), pp. 347-383. [Link to book]
• Albertson, D. (2024). “The Wild Science: Michel de Certeau and Cusan Topology,” in Cusanus Today: Thinking with Nicholas of Cusa Between Philosophy and Theology, ed. David Albertson (Washington, D.C.: The Catholic University of America Press), pp. 139-167. [Link to book]
• Albertson, D. (2021). “Entering the Ancient Courts of Ancient Men: On the Unfolding of Leinkauf’s Einleitung,” in Renaissance Philosophy and the Humanists’ Thought: Responses to Thomas Leinkauf’s Die Philosophie des Humanismus und der Renaissance, eds. Andrea Aldo Robiglia and Donald F. Duclow (Cordoba: University of Cordoba Press), pp. 19-35. [Link to book]
• Albertson, D. (2021). “Latin Christian Neopythagorean Theology: A Speculative Summa,” in Companion to the Reception of Pythagoras and Pythagoreanism in the Middle Ages and the Renaissance, eds. Irene Caiazzo, Constantinos Macris, and Aurélien Robert (Leiden: Brill), pp. 373-414. [Link to book]
• Albertson, D. (2020). “Cataphasis, Visualization, and Mystical Space,” in The Oxford Handbook of Mystical Theology, eds. Edward Howells and Mark A. McIntosh (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2020), pp. 347-368. [Link to book]
• Albertson, D. (2019). “Echoes of Eriugena in Renaissance Philosophy: Negation, Theophany, Anthropology,” in A Companion to John Scottus Eriugena, eds. Adrian Guiu and Stephen Lahey (Leiden: Brill, 2019), pp. 387-418. [Link to book]
• Albertson, D. (2019). “Plötzlichkeit und Schweigen: Nikolaus von Kues im Dialog mit christlichen Neuplatonismus,” in Nikolaus von Kues – Denken im Dialog. Philosophie: Forschung und Wissenschaft, Bd. 30, ed. Walter Andreas Euler (Münster: LIT Verlag, 2019), pp. 9-24. [Link to book]
• Albertson, D. (2018). “Before the Icon: The Figural Matrix of De visione Dei,” in Nicholas of Cusa and Times of Transition: Essays in Honor of Gerald Christianson, eds. Thomas M. Izbicki, Jason Aleksander, and Donald Duclow (Leiden: Brill, 2018), pp. 262-285. [Link to book]
• Albertson, D. (2017). “Philosophy and Metaphysics in the School of Saint Victor: From Achard to Godfrey,” in A Companion to the Abbey of Saint Victor in Paris, eds. Hugh Feiss and Juliet Mousseau (Leiden: Brill, 2017), pp. 353-386. [Link to book]
• Albertson, D. (2014). “De docta ignorantia I-III/Über die belehrte Unwissenheit I–III” and “De genesi/Über den Ursprung,” in Nikolaus von Kues: Leben und Werk. pp. 142-152, 170-174. Darmstadt: Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft. [Link to book]
• Albertson, D. (2012). “In Search of Unity: Reform and Mathematical Form in the Conciliarist Arguments of Heymeric de Campo’s Disputatio de potestate ecclesiastica (1433),” in Reassessing Reform: An Historical Investigation. pp. 149-169. Washington, DC: Catholic University of America Press. [Link to book]
• Albertson, D. (2009). “Without Nature?” in Without Nature: A New Condition for Theology. pp. 1-14. New York: Fordham University Press. [Link to book]
• Albertson, D. (2008). “Mapping the Space of God: Mystical Weltbilder in Nicholas of Cusa and the Structure of De ludo globi (1463),” in Weltbilder im Mittelalter: Perceptions of the World in the Middle Ages. pp. 61-81. Bonn: Bernstein Verlag. [Link to book]

Journal Article

• Albertson, D. (2025). The Limits of Earth: The Question of Finitude in the Young Marx and Two Popes. Crossing: The INPR Journal. Vol. 4, pp. 217-246. [Link to article]
• Albertson, D. (2025). “Bernard McGinn’s Modern Mystics” (editor). Spiritus: A Journal of Christian Spirituality. Vol. 25 (2), pp. 262-304. [Link to article]
• Albertson, D. (2019). “Ecce Quadratura! An Early Reader of Thierry of Chartres’s Arithmetica Commentary,” in Ad argumentum: Quaestio’s Special Issues, Supplement Vol. 1. Achard de Saint-Victor métaphysicien: Le De unitate Dei et pluralitate creaturarum, ed. Gilles Olivo: 107-132. [Link to article]
• Albertson, D. (2016). “Boethius Noster: Thierry of Chartres’s Arithmetica Commentary as a Missing Source of Nicholas of Cusa’s De docta ignorantia“. Recherches de Théologie et Philosophie médiévales. Vol. 83 (1), pp. 143-199. [Link to article]
• Albertson, D. (2012). “Achard of St. Victor (d. 1171) and the Eclipse of the Arithmetic Model of the Trinity”. Traditio. Vol. 67, pp. 101-144. [Link to article]
• Albertson, D. (2012). “A Late Medieval Reaction to Thierry of Chartres’s (d. 1157) Philosophy: The Anti-Platonist Argument of the Anonymous Fundamentum Naturae“. Vivarium. Vol. 50 (1), pp. 53-84. [Link to article]
• Albertson, D. (2010). “Mystical Philosophy in the Fifteenth Century: New Directions in Research on Nicholas of Cusa”. Religion Compass. Vol. 4 (8), pp. 471-485. [Link to article]
• Albertson, D. (2010). “A Learned Thief? Nicholas of Cusa and the Anonymous Fundamentum Naturae: Reassessing the Vorlage Theory”. Recherches de Théologie et Philosophie Médiévales. Vol. 77 (2), pp. 351-390. [Link to article]
• Albertson, D. (2006). “‘That He Might Fill All Things’: Creation and Christology in Two Treatises by Nicholas of Cusa”. International Journal of Systematic Theology. Vol. 8 (2), pp. 184-205. [Link to article]
• Albertson, D. (2005). “On ‘the Gift’ in Tanner’s Theology: A Patristic Parable”. Modern Theology. Vol. 21 (1), pp. 107-118. [Link to article]

Proceedings

• Albertson, D. (2025). “Secreta sapientiae: Cusanus Among the Women Mystics – Trier Cusanus Lecture 2024,” in Ansichten und Ausblicke. Cusanus-Rezeption und Cusanus-Bilder vom 19. bis zum 21. Jahrhundert. Zeitenwende. Mitteilungen und Forschungsbeiträge der Cusanus-Gesellschaft, N.F., Band 2, ed. Petra Schulte (Köln: Böhlau Verlag).
• Albertson, D. (2016). “The Beauty of the Trinity: Achard of St. Victor as a Forgotten Precursor of Nicholas of Cusa,” in Mitteilungen und Forschungsbeiträge der Cusanus-Gesellschaft, Bd. 34. pp. 3-20. Trier. Paulinus Verlag.
• Albertson, D. (2012). “Gott als Mathematiker. Das Schöpfungsverständnis des Nicolaus Cusanus,” in Der Gottes-Gedanke des Nikolaus von Kues. Mitteilungen und Forschungsbeiträge der Cusanus-Gesellschaft, Bd. 33. pp. 99-122. Trier. Paulinus Verlag.

• J. E. & Lillian Byrne Tipton Distinguished Visiting Professor of Catholic Studies, Department of Religious Studies, UC Santa Barbara, Spring 2025
• Alexander von Humboldt Fellowship Recipient, 2021-2022
• NEH Scholarly Editions and Translations Grant, 2016 – 2021
• USC ASHSS Research Grant, 2020-2021
• American Council of Learned Societies, Charles A. Ryskamp Research Fellowship, 2015-2016
• Dibner Research Fellowship in the History of Science and Technology, The Huntington Library, 2012-2013
• NEH Enduring Questions Grant, 2010-2011
• USC ASHSS Research Grant, 2008-2009
• USC General Education Teaching Award, Spring 2009