RELIGIOUS STUDIES COURSES
SPRING 2024
Religions of the World - RELG 101 - Gen Ed: G, H
Cross listed: JUST 100 / AFST 180E / ANTH
Time: TR 02:50 - 04:15
Instructor: Michael Kelly
What does it mean to study various religions from an academic perspective? How do
we, as outsiders at a public university, discuss different traditions responsibly?
Answering questions like these and developing our skills as scholars of religion is
of no small importance in an increasingly global society. This class will take a thematic
approach to a number of traditions, including Hinduism, Buddhism, Judaism, Christianity,
and Islam. Prominent themes include the history of Religious Studies as a discipline,
religion and popular culture, religion and violence, the history of utopian thought,
and the status of new and controversial movements across the globe.
RELG 180B - Islam: Texts and Contexts - Gen Ed: G, H, W
Cross listed: ARAB 150 / AFST 180L / COLI 180C / ENG 280E / HIST 180A / MDVL 180T
Time: T/R 08:30 - 09:55 am
Instructor: Omid Ghaemmaghami
This course is a textual survey (in English or English translation) of religious currents
in the Islamic world, past and present. We will begin by looking at the origins of
Islam, and placing the most salient textual expressions of its principles, practices,
and beliefs in their historical context. In an attempt to explore the enduring ties
that bind the myriad interpretations of Islam across time and space to their universal
foundations, each week will be devoted to a different theme. Topics include the origins
of Islam; the life of the Prophet Muḥammad; major themes of the Quran; Tradition (Ḥadīth)
in the making; the Imamate in Shīʿī Islam; Sufism and the aesthetics of Islamic mysticism;
Islamic messianism; the Islamic world in the 19th century; and Islam in America: From
African Slaves to Malcolm X. This course has no prerequisites, and no prior knowledge
of Islam is required or will be assumed by the instructor.
RELG 280B - Islamic Cultures in Africa - Gen Ed: W
Cross listed: AFST 251 / COLI 280J / SOC 280B / ANTH 280V / ARAB 281E
Time: T/R 10:05-11:30 a.m.
Instructor: Moulay Ali Bouanani
Islam has a rich cultural and artistic heritage in Africa. With a history that goes back to the seventh century, it is now a vital part of the African cultural landscape. This introductory course explores a range of Islamic cultural productions from the advent of Islam to modern times by Muslim men and women in different regions of Africa from North to South and from East to West. It will focus on religious didactic writings, literature, music, architecture and documentary films in studying the syncretism of Islam and indigenous African religions and/or cultures, and in highlighting the unifying cultural influences of the religion. The course will also attend to the distinctive character of the vast contemporary post-colonial cultural productions in music (religious & profane), film, architecture and literature in large African metropolises with significant Islamic populations, and it will devote attention to the underlying factors and issues of artistic production of Muslims of Africa.
RELG 312 - Radical Religious Movements - Gen Ed: H
Cross listed: JUST 312
Time: T/R 10:05-11:30
Instructor: Douglas Jones
This course focuses on movements that are deemed radical by their contemporaries.
Topics will vary from week to week, though generally we will focus on the self-professed
religious identity of these movements alongside their relationship with the broader
religious culture. Do radical religions consider themselves radical? How do they communicate
with, or seek to influence, the mainstream? Major themes include the proliferation
of utopian and messianic movements in the seventeenth-century, socialism and religion,
religion and violence, religion and suicide, the anti-cult movement in America, and
the relatively recent appearance of sci-fi religions. Students who took RELG 212 course
will not receive credit for 312.
RELG 361 – The Bible and Its Interpretations - Gen Ed: C, H
Cross listed: JUST 361
Time: M/W/F 2:20-3:20
Instructor: Douglas Jones
This course takes a comparative approach to the history of biblical interpretation
by looking at diverse communities within the Jewish and Christian traditions. How
have these communities used the Bible to understand their place in history, address
present tribulations, and even predict the future? What major conflicts have arisen
over the issue of interpretation? Some topics include the theme of movement in the
Torah and rabbinical tradition, 18th and 19th century biblical scholarship, the meaning
of allegory in Catholic and Protestant interpretation, and the so-called literal sense
of scripture. We will also close by considering the issue of biblical interpretation
as it relates to new religious movements in America.
RELG 380D - Landscapes and Lit- Gen Ed:
Cross listed: COLI 381X / ENVI 380A
Time: T/R 2:50 - 4:15 pm
Instructor: Alexander Sorenson
This class examines the “place” of natural landscapes in literature by focusing on
the river as a foundational site and symbol of the human imagination. Using the figural,
narrative, and philosophical dimensions of the river as a lens, we will explore key
epochs of literary history from antiquity to the present. In doing so, we will trace
how rivers from the Styx to the Susquehanna can play a role within a community’s self-understanding.
A core question that will guide these discussions is: how can rivers (and natural
environments more broadly) function as guides through literary history, and why have
cultures so often chosen the imagery of the river in particular as a means for imagining
and (re)constructing their own histories? Tentative genres and subjects include ancient
and medieval epic poetry, Romanticism, modernism, and contemporary literature.
RELG 380F - Ancient Christianity - Gen Ed: G, I, J, N, T
Cross listed: JUST 380P / MDVL 382J/ HIST 386F
Time: T/R 11:40 AM - 01:05
Instructor: Nathanael Andrade
This course will trace the emergence of positive attitudes toward the worldwide dispersion
of the Jews from the 19th century to the present. It will examine the rejection of
the idea that Jews living outside of Palestine are by definition in Exile, the diverse
ideologies of the proponents of diaspora nationalism, the diasporists’ critique of
Zionism and their involvement in the establishment of alternative Jewish homelands
– both in fact and in fiction.
RELG 380G - Christ & Jews in Islamic Spain - Gen Ed:
Cross listed: AFST 370 / MDVL 382H / ARAB 386H / WGSS 383B / JUST 380G
Time: 11:40 - 01:05
Instructor: Moulay Ali Bouanani
This course acquaints students with the contribution of Muslims, Christians and Jews
to Al-Andalus (Islamic Spain & Portugal), from the eighth century to the 1400's.
In the Islamic far west, Andalusian society was different from what existed in the
Arabic-Islamic East and far more developed and sophisticated than any civilization
Europe had known. During this time period, Al-Andalus was the most materially advanced
area of Europe. Ethnic (Arabs, Iberians, North Africans) and religious minorities
such as Christian Muwallads and Mozarabs enjoyed a high degree of tolerance and, like
the Jews, formed prosperous and erudite communities. Women were, with the exception
of those of Baghdad, the envy of even other Arabic-Muslim women. Cordoba was the most
splendid city on the European continent with magnificent buildings, gardens, libraries,
baths. There was a stable political system that facilitated opulence, education, beautiful
homes, well-designed cities and towns, art and scholarship. This course will examine
the civilization and culture of Islamic Spain and the contribution of each of the
religious groups to its greatness.
RELG 480B - Nature and Cosmos in East Asian Religions – Gen Ed:
Cross listed: AAAS 481L/ AAAS 582D / MDVL 480B
Time: T/R 04:25 - 05:50
Instructor: Kristina Buhrman
Nature and Cosmos in East Asian Religions, Philosophy and History. This seminar introduces
students to aspects of the worldviews found in East Asian culture and religions, particularly
how people in the past understood how the natural world and the universe worked, and
the role of humans within it. Students will become familiar with scholarly work on
the subject, and will have practice reading primary materials in translation. Topics
included are cosmogony (the origin of the world), the relationship between human actions
and natural phenomena, the effect of these worldviews on architecture and literature,
and how the influence of Buddhism and Confucianism affected the development of a distinctively
premodern East Asian scientific tradition. At the end of the course, students will
be introduced to how this tradition affected the adoption of western science in 16th-19th
century Japan. As a major project, students will undertake research on one aspect
of these worldviews in comparison with classical, Christian, or modern western religious
and scientific traditions.
RELG 480C - Existential Problems – Gen Ed: H
Cross listed: ENG 450M
Time: T/R 11:40 - 01:05
Instructor: Joseph Church
Existential Problems - A study of philosophical, religious, artistic, and psychobiological
thought pertinent to contemporary existential problems with alienation, impermanence,
and possible meaninglessness. We’ll read work by Kierkegaard, Nietzsche, Sartre, Tillich,
Buber, McGilchrist, Dostoyevsky, Borges, Beckett, and Kafka, among others. And we’ll
view relevant films by Aronofsky, Bergman, Fincher, Gondry, Kurosawa, Leigh, Lynch,
Ki-Duk, and von Sternberg, among others. Lecture and discussion. For each meeting
students come to class with a question or observation about the assigned material.
Final grade based on this daily work, two shorter papers, engagement in discussion,
consistent attendance. NOTE: I DO NOT ALLOW STUDENTS’ USE OF LAPTOPS OR PHONES DURING
CLASS. NOTE: I want our first class meeting, Tuesday, January 16, to be as productive
as possible: toward that end, in preparation for class discussion, I ask that you
read Gordon Bigelow’s “A Primer of Existentialism” (posted on Brightspace) and develop
a question or observation about something in the piece you find interesting.
