Religion
Professors: T. COLEMAN; Associate Professors: D. GARDINER, P. REAVES (CHAIR), P. WRIGHT; Assistant Professors: Y. CHANDRANI, C. HUNT.
The purpose of the academic study of religion is to analyze and interpret religious beliefs and practices in their cultural contexts and historical development. The discipline of religious studies requires critical reflection on ideas about the nature of reality, ideal forms of human society, rituals of individual and societal identity, and sources of authority in personal and social morality. Our faculty is formally trained in Biblical studies, Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, and Buddhism. Our areas of expertise range from the ancient period to the present day, spanning the Near East and the Mediterranean, Europe, South, Southeast and East Asia, Africa, and the Americas. Every year we cross-list a variety of courses with Asian studies, with feminist and gender studies, and with race, ethnicity, and migration studies, and we regularly offer courses on indigenous traditions. Our department warmly invites you to explore our curriculum and discover the many ways that the study of religion inspires self-reflection and enhances critical thinking, offers knowledge of diverse cultures, and enriches the liberal arts education.
Major Requirements
The major in Religion consists of a minimum of 10-11 units, including:
- RE101: Introduction to Religion, which introduces students to the contemporary study of religion as a social and symbolic system and offers essential elements of critical methods and theories in religious studies.
- Three 100-level courses, at least one of which must be chosen from religions originating in Asia (160, 170) and at least one of which must be chosen from religions originating in the Middle East (110, 120, 130, 140). These courses introduce students to basic skills and concepts in the academic study of religion, such as critical methods for the close reading of texts, the relation between religious beliefs and practices and their historical and cultural contexts, and basic elements of religion including myth, ritual, devotion, theology, and ethics.
- Five courses at the 200- and 300-level, including at least two 300-level courses. 200-level courses include material from two or more religious traditions, examine different interpretive approaches within a tradition, or compare patterns of the formation of religious identity or institutions in various traditions. 300-level courses involve advanced study of a topic or tradition. These courses often carry prerequisites and demand greater depth of reading and higher quality of writing. Students will typically conduct independent research in the completion of a major project.
- As a major capstone, either (i) a 1-unit individualized tutorial (RE301) during their senior year; or (ii) a 2-unit honors thesis during their senior year, comprising a humanities thesis course in the fall (CO430) and an individualized thesis tutorial (RE406) in the spring. The thesis option requires pre-approval by the department by Block 8 of a student’s junior year, and, if successfully completed, earns the graduation honor of Distinction in Religion.
Students may apply a maximum of 2 courses cross-listed with the Department of Religion but taught by faculty from outside the Department towards the satisfaction of the major. We strongly recommend that majors gain proficiency in a foreign language, classical or modern. We further recommend that majors take a course in the study of religion in the social science division.
Study Abroad: The Department of Religion will consider giving students credit for courses taken abroad, but we do not typically award more than one unit towards the requirements for the major. To consider such requests, we require that materials from the relevant course abroad be submitted to the chair, and then reviewed by the appropriate faculty member. Students intending to study abroad and hoping to receive credit should therefore discuss proper procedures with their advisors prior to departing.
The department awards the graduation honor of Distinction in Religion for superior achievement in a senior thesis or cumulative excellence in departmental courses.
Minor Requirements
The minor in Religion consists of a minimum of five units, distributed as follows and chosen in consultation with an adviser in the department:
- Two 100-level courses.
- Two courses at the 200- and/or 300-level.
- RE301: Tutorial, during their junior or senior year.
Courses
Religion
An introduction to the contemporary study of religion as a social and symbolic system. An examination of religious experience and convictions and their expression in symbol, ritual, myth, theology, ethics and community. Meets the Critical Learning: AIM requirement.
Examines Jewish and Christian scriptures, with a focus on their ancient Near Eastern, Hellenistic, and Roman contexts. Surveys the Bible’s broad range of literary genres, including myth, historical narrative, law, prophecy, poetry, biography, and apocalypse. Explores the relationship between the Hebrew Bible and the New Testament, with special attention to resonances of Jewish prophetic and apocalyptic traditions in the latter. Meets the Critical Learning: AIM requirement. Meets the Critical Learning: HP requirement.
An introduction to the traditions, practices, and beliefs of Judaism as it has changed from biblical foundations to the transformations of the post-biblical period, to the creative flowering of rabbinic Judaism through the medieval and modern periods. This course will explore Judaism's origins and the questions it faces in the future. (Not offered 2024-25).
An introduction to Christianity as an object of intellectual inquiry. Attention to Christianity’s internal diversities from first-century Palestine to the present; disputes over its boundaries and how ‘it’ should relate with its ‘others’; complicity with and resistance to structures of power; literary and artistic expressions; role in shaping Western modernity; and contemporary growth in Latin America, Africa, and Asia.
An historical and thematic introduction to Islamic traditions from the seventh century CE to the present day, focusing on fundamental texts and practices. Topics include the Abrahamic context of Islam, the Prophet Muhammad, the Qur'an, the rise of sectarian movements (Shi'a and Sunni), ritual and pilgrimage, Islamic law, Sufism, women in Islam, the challenges of modernity, and Islam in America. Meets the Critical Perspectives: Global Cultures requirement. Meets the Critical Learning: HP requirement. Meets the Critical Learning: SHB requirement.
A historical and thematic introduction to Hindu traditions from ancient India to the present day, focusing on classic texts, iconography, and popular rituals. Topics include the Upanishads and the rise of Buddhism, the Sanskrit epics (Mahabharata and Ramayana), Yoga, Indian art and music, devotional movements and poetry, and the ethical system and social hierarchy encompassed by Dharma. Meets the Critical Perspectives: Global Cultures requirement. Meets the Critical Learning: AIM requirement.
An introduction to the life and times of the Buddha, his basic teachings and central monastic and lay practices. Emphases include key elements in the development of Buddhist philosophy, the purposes and styles of meditation, and theory and practice in Zen and Tibetan Buddhism. Meets the Critical Perspectives: Global Cultures requirement. Meets the Critical Learning: AIM requirement. (Not offered 2024-25).
This introduction considers the diverse traditions of Buddhism, drawing comparisons between centuries of developments in Asia and recent advancements in the West, particularly in the U.S., over the past century. The focus is twofold: (1) exploring the 5th century BCE life of Buddha, core teachings and practices, the dynamic relationship between monastic and lay communities, and the historical growth of Buddhism across Asia; and (2) examining early Western portrayals of Buddhism, the global spread of Buddhism beyond Asia, and the prominent patterns and issues associated with Buddhism's growth in the U.S., including aspects of commercialization. Meets the Critical Learning: AIM requirement.
Study of a topic in religious studies, drawing material from two or more religious traditions, examining different interpretive approaches within a tradition, or comparing patterns of the formation of religious identity or institutions in various traditions.
(Summer only 2024-25).
Religion has been central to the project of modern colonialism. Everywhere European conquerors went, they justified colonial rule in the name of Christianity, sponsored missionary projects of conversion, and regulated the traditions and practices of the colonized. Indeed, some scholars have argued that modern conceptions of religion (and its cognate, world religions) emerged out of colonial conquests. This course explores the constitutive relationship between colonialism and religion. Two broad questions will inform our inquiry: Howdid the colonial encounter shape modern knowledge of religion? How did colonial technologies of rule (law, education, the census, surveillance, welfare) effect transformations in the religious beliefs, traditions, and practices of both the colonizer and the colonized? Our readings will include materials from various modern empires in the Americas, Asia, Africa, and the Middle East. We will explore how religion was constitutive of modern colonialism; how religion relates to other sites of social power including race, gender, and nation, and how religion has informed resistance to colonialism. Themes for the course may include religious conversion and freedom of religion, religious institutions and reforms, textuality and interpretation, ritual and material cultures, and legal reforms and regulation. Meets the Critical Learning: HP requirement. Meets the Equity and Power: EPG requirement. (Not offered 2024-25).
Across diverse cultures and historical epochs, individuals have asserted a profound 'mystical' connection to reality. In this context, mystics claim an intimate familiarity with an alternative reality or profess the ability to discern reality from mere appearance. This course focuses on exploring a broad spectrum of mystics, extending from Classical to late ancient Greeks, early to medieval Christians, Muslims, and Jews. Additionally, we will engage with contemporary mystics associated with these traditions, emphasizing that mysticism is not confined to the past. Meets the Equity and Power: EPG requirement.
Directed readings and research in comparative study of religious traditions or in different interpretive approaches within a tradition. Courses under this rubric will not be counted toward fulfillment of distribution requirements of the major or minor in Religion. Prerequisite: Consent of instructor.
An examination of the contested category known as 'gnosticism,' the texts found at Nag Hammadi, and the challenges posed by this material to our expectations as we attempt to understand developments in what became orthodox Christianity. (Not offered 2024-25).
Study of early Jewish and Christian texts that reflect and construct varied notions of gender and sexuality in their ancient Near Eastern and Greco-Roman contexts. Considers a range of roles and expectations for women as well as men. Attentive to symbolic femininity in the literary tradition, biblical perspectives on sexuality and marriage, and related use of the Bible in modern religious and political debates. Meets the Critical Perspectives: Social Inequality requirement. Meets the Critical Learning: AIM requirement.
Since the Enlightenment, philosophers and historians have argued that individual freedom and autonomy depend upon the confinement of religious beliefs and practices to the private sphere. On their view, the spread and entrenchment of institutions of modernity would result in the decline of religion as an active moral and political force. These modern ways of thinking assume that there are discrete entities called religion and the secular; where the latter is conceived as the arena of activities such as politics, economics and science in which religion has no place. In this seminar, we will examine the phenomena of religion and the secular and their place in the modern world through close readings of historical, sociological, philosophical and anthropological works that address the question of religion and its relationship to politics in diverse contexts such as the Middle East, South Asia, Europe and the United States. Our aim will be to acquire an understanding of the variety of ways in which the relationship between religion and politics is configured and debated and to complicate our understanding of key concepts and problems such as modernity, progress, freedom, citizenship and belonging, religious difference, toleration, and the question of religious minorities. Meets the Equity and Power: EPG requirement.
Meets the Critical Learning: AIM requirement. (Not offered 2024-25).
The study of the social organization and function of religion with emphasis on its interaction with other ideas, social structures, and processes. Consideration of major theorists (Durkheim, Weber, Troeltsch) will be integrated with contemporary socio-religious issues such as secularization, fundamentalism, televangelism, new religious movements, globalization, and the relations between religion and race, class, and gender. (No credit if taken after SO114.) (Not offered 2024-25).
In popular media, religion and violence are often portrayed as deeply implicated in one another, with religion depicted as a cause of violence. There is no question that religious texts not only depict violent acts but also may be read to condone them. At the same time, there is a growing body of scholarly literature that contests a simple cause-and-effect relation between the two. Drawing upon a wide variety of literature, film, historical, and scholarly reflection, this course introduces students to the claims and counterclaims in current circulation about the relation between religion and violence. In addition, it recognizes and interrogates the historical role that religion has played in promoting practices of non-violence. Studying religion’s relationship to acts of violence and practices of non-violence equips students to think critically about issues that have become emblematic of our time. Meets the Equity and Power: EPG requirement. (Not offered 2024-25).
A study of the genre of apocalypse, looking for common themes that characterize this popular and esoteric form of literature. Our primary source readings will be drawn from the Bible and non-canonical documents from early Jewish and Christian traditions. We will use an analytical perspective to explore the social functions of apocalyptic, and ask why this form has been so persistent and influential. Meets the Critical Learning: AIM requirement. Meets the Critical Learning: HP requirement. (Not offered 2024-25).
Participation in archaeological excavations in Israel. Field experience includes training in essential methods and theories of archaeology. Examination of early Judaism and Christian origins as well as the regional history, culture, and politics during the Hellenistic and Roman periods. Excursions to significant sites, including Jerusalem. Attention to the benefits and challenges of correlating ancient literary sources with the archaeological record. Meets the Critical Learning: HP requirement. (Not offered 2024-25).
This interdisciplinary course traces the many musical traditions of the Jewish world communities in a journey from Temple singing and desert ceremonies in biblical times, through music of Mendelssohn, Mahler, and Schoenberg, to works of individuals such as Gershwin, Copland, Berlin, and Bernstein. Included will be a comparative study of the three major religions of the Western world exploring their respective voices and musical interaction. Sociology, literature, religion, and history, as well as issues of ethnicity, anti-Semitism, cultural identities, social justice, and equality will be explored in depth throughout the course. May meet either the Critical Perspectives: Global Cultures or Social Inequality requirement. (Not offered 2024-25).
An examination of critical questions philosophers raise about religious claims and a consideration of how religious thinkers respond to those criticisms. Topics of discussion include religious experience, arguments for God, problem of evil, ideas of immortality. Meets the Critical Learning: AIM requirement.
Examines the historical role that varieties of Islam have played in North America as well as in the Caribbean and South America. Topics include: the trans-Atlantic slave trade that brought West African Muslims to North and South America; slave religion in the antebellum South; the complicated role that Islam has played in African-American identity and that race and religion have played in White (Euro-American) conceptions of Islam in the U.S. and abroad; Black Nationalist critiques of Christianity; and issues of race, ethnicity, socio-economic class, and religion affecting immigrant Muslim communities in the U.S. since 1965, May meet either the Critical Perspectives: Global Cultures or Social Inequality requirement. (Not offered 2024-25).
Explores the growing field of queer studies in religion. Students will explore how queerness is always and already present within the sacred texts of religious communities (giving special attention to the Hebrew and Christian scriptures). Students will explore ways in which queer persons queer traditional interpretations of sacred texts, disrupting and reimagining figures and teachings within varying religious faiths, and the discourse of queer theology, a field of study that brings queer studies to bear on Christian theological thought and claims. This course will introduce students to the ongoing discussion of how queer modes of being might be conceived as “religious” and spiritual in and of themselves. Meets the Equity and Power: EPUS requirement.
Masculine superheroes have always been popular. Whether in biographies of the Buddha and later stories about Buddhist monks; whether in the ascetic traditions of yoga, or in the popular Puranas with stories of beloved Hindu gods; or in the lives of modern-day global gurus and superstars in film -- the leading man has been carefully fashioned to represent purity, beauty, virility, authority, and power. Exploring texts and traditions from South Asia and beyond, this course examines popular ideologies that masculinize divinity, divinize masculinity, and thus marginalize women and non-masculine others Meets the Equity and Power: EPG requirement.
An examination of gender and power in Hindu traditions, through an in-depth study of divine figures or historical women identified with goddesses, such as Sītā, Rādhā, and Kālī, or medieval saints and contemporary global gurus. May meet either the Critical Perspectives: Global Cultures or Social Inequality requirement. Meets the Critical Learning: AIM requirement. Meets the Critical Learning: CP requirement. Meets the Equity and Power: EPG requirement.
The premodern poetic traditions of China and Japan focusing on Daoist, Buddhist, and Shinto influences. This course explores connections between poetry, meditation, painting, spirituality, and the natural world. Students will study individual poet’s lives and historical contexts and will examine the impact of Zen aesthetics on haiku expression. Meets the Critical Perspectives: Global Cultures requirement. Meets the Critical Learning: AIM requirement. (Not offered 2024-25).
Studies in the religious life of African-Americans from the 17th century to the present. Particular attention to religious organizations, theological formulations and experiential patterns of Black Americans and the relationship of those phenomena to American religious life in general. Meets the Critical Perspectives: Social Inequality requirement. (Not offered 2024-25).
An introduction to James Baldwin’s literature and his robust engagement of religious themes throughout his literary corpus. Students will explore the autobiographically inspired religious and theological questions which often serve as the foundation for Baldwin’s complex understanding/critique of the socio-political realities of race, sexuality, and gender in the United States. This course also considers the ways in which Baldwin “queers” Christian theological language and symbols in putting forth his own unique post-Christian religious vision. Meets the Equity and Power: EPUS requirement.
(Not offered 2024-25).
This course provides an individualized research and reading block, offering students the opportunity to examine a specific facet of religion in depth and in close collaboration with a faculty adviser. Required of all Religion majors and minors, this block ensures a focused and personalized experience in religious studies.
Investigation of theories of the origin and function of religion and of academic methods of religious studies through close reading of classic and contemporary texts. (Not offered 2024-25).
Explores how ancient Jewish and Christian writings came to be valued as sacred scriptures. “Making” encompasses the physical production and transmission of ancient texts (authorship, sources, material aspects, scribal activity, and circulation) as well as assertions of scriptural authority and related processes of canonization. “Faking” involves alleged forgeries, both ancient and modern, as well as intentional alterations to scriptural texts. Prerequisite: Any biblical studies based RE course or Consent of Instructor. Meets the Critical Learning: HP requirement. (Not offered 2024-25).
Selected readings in Islamic literature in translation. Meets the Critical Perspectives: Global Cultures requirement. (Not offered 2024-25).
The Qur'an in its historical and literary context. Students engage the text in translation but develop a technical vocabulary in transliterated Qur'anic Arabic; those who have prior experience with Arabic language are encouraged to develop their skills with the printed text of the Arabic Qur'an. Meets the Critical Learning: AIM requirement.
Cults of masculinity have been intrinsic to South Asian culture for millennia. Whether in ancient vedic literature, or in the heterodox traditions of Buddhism and Jainism and the Hindu epics that followed; whether in the ascetic traditions of yoga, the popular puranas, or the lives of modern-day saints -- the leading Man has been carefully fashioned to represent power, purity and prestige. This course examines such texts and traditions from diverse periods in Indian history in order to identify and deconstruct the ideologies that divinize masculinity and masculinize divinity. May meet either the Critical Perspectives: Global Cultures or Social Inequality requirement. Meets the Critical Learning: AIM requirement. Meets the Equity and Power: EPG requirement. (Not offered 2024-25).
An exploration of constructions of gender and the status of women in Hinduism and Buddhism, with primary focus on normative developments in ancient and medieval India and the impact of this formative history on the lives of contemporary women. Readings from primary and secondary materials, with attention to both ideology and practice. (Also listed as Asian Studies 257 and Feminist & Gender Studies 257.) (Offered in alternate years.) May meet either the Critical Perspectives: Global Cultures or Social Inequality requirement. (Not offered 2024-25).
A study of diverse Hindu devotional movements from classical and medieval periods. Primary readings include poetry by both men and women, devotees of Vishnu, Krishna, Shiva, Rama, and the Great Goddess. Critical articles help situate the devotees and their songs in cultural context. (Offered in alternate years.) Meets the Critical Perspectives: Global Cultures requirement. (Not offered 2024-25).
An in-depth look at either a particular practice tradition within Buddhism, such as Zen or Tantric meditation, or on a theme central to various traditions, such as devotional elements, artistic representations, ritual, visualization, and so on. (Offered in alternate years.) Meets the Critical Perspectives: Global Cultures requirement. (Not offered 2024-25).
An in-depth treatment of important themes, or textual traditions, in the history of Buddhist thought. Examples might include topics such as karma, death and rebirth, compassion, or possibly a body of writings from a particular author or Buddhist school. (Also listed as Asian Studies 372.) (Meets the Critical Perspectives: Diverse Cultures and Critiques requirement.) (Offered in alternate years.) Prerequisite: RE 170 or COI. 1 unit - Gardiner. Meets the Critical Perspectives: Global Cultures requirement. Meets the Critical Learning: AIM requirement. (Not offered 2024-25).
Explores the intersections of race and religion in the modern world, alongside a brief examination of possible racialization in the medieval period. As contemporary theorists of race and religion have demonstrated, religion serves as a means of racializing various human groupings, producing understandings of “peoplehood” with the goal of categorizing and marginalizing particular communities within the social body. This course exposes students to competing definitions of race and the ways in which race and religion co-constitute one another both historically and contemporarily. Diverse historical and cultural moments will be examined, including but not limited to, European colonial expansion, transatlantic slavery, nineteenth-century U.S. American understandings of race in relation to the Bible, and the racialization of Islam in contemporary U.S. culture and politics. Meets the Critical Learning: HP requirement. Meets the Equity and Power: EPG requirement.
Directed readings and research for advanced students. Prerequisite: Consent of instructor. 1 unit - department.
An independent block of thesis composition and revision. Offered in the Spring.
An independent block of research paper composition and revision. Offered in the Spring.