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RELIGN M70 - Demons, Fear, and Uncanny in Ancient World
Instructor(s):
Nora Bairamian, Sarah Harrington, Gina Konstantopoulos, Crystal Melara, Andrew Bock
(Same as Ancient Near East M70.) Lecture, three hours; discussion, one hour. Consideration of place of demons and fear in several different societies and cultures in ancient world: Mesopotamia; ancient Egypt, Greece, and Rome; and Biblical and early Jewish contexts. Investigation into why demons and monsters existed in these cultures; how they were opposed or protected again; and what these different societies feared, and how that fear was represented. As demons and monsters are reflections of particular culturally specific fears and norms, studying them allows for examination of societies that constructed them. Examination of how fear of threats such as disease, illness, and death were constructed alongside fears of foreign and of women. Critical examination of wide range of primary source texts, addressing core question of how different societies construct unique fears--and how those fears shape those societies in turn. P/NP or letter grading.
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RELIGN M135 - Religion in Ancient Israel
Instructor(s):
Jeremy Smoak
(Same as Ancient Near East M135.) Lecture, three hours. Introductory survey of various ancient Israelite religious beliefs and practices, their origin, and development, with special attention to diversity of religious practice in ancient Israel and Canaan during 1st millennium BCE. P/NP or letter grading.
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RELIGN 150 - Women, Gender, and Religion
Instructor(s):
Karen Muldoon-hules
Lecture, four hours. Investigation and consideration of roles, status, and representations of women and gender in one or more religious traditions. Examination of how cultural conceptions of gender as well as social realities (as far as they can be known) for women and men in particular historical periods shape and are shaped by these religious traditions, including discussions regarding ritual practices, spirituality, sexuality, sexual renunciation, religious authority, marriage and family life, fertility, conceptions of body, public life, and/or literary representations of gender (including those of divine). Variety of approaches to be employed, including feminist, literary, historical, sociological, and anthropological. P/NP or letter grading.
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RELIGN 156 - Religion and Liberation
Instructor(s):
Eric Martin
Lecture, two hours; discussion, 30 minutes. Study traces ways religion and liberation have been understood to connect in the later 20th-century phenomenon called liberation theology. Started by James Cone's embrace of Christian Black Power movement in the U.S. and Gustavo Gutiérrez's Latin American theology against poverty, this method of religious interpretation spread across world and sacred traditions. Reading of central texts that sparked the movement, and sampling of various ways movement was picked up and adapted by people of other identities: queer, South African, Islamic, Palestinian, etc. Highlights key issues of the relationship between religion and liberation, political-religious theory, utopia, oppression, justice, and hope. P/NP or letter grading.
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RELIGN M175 - Topics in Philosophy of Religion
Instructor(s):
Mark Johnson
(Same as Philosophy M175.) Lecture, three hours; discussion, one hour. Requisite: Philosophy 21 or 22. Intensive investigation of one or two topics or works in philosophy of religion, such as attributes of God, arguments for or against existence of God, or relation between religion and ethics. Topics announced each term. May be repeated for credit with consent of instructor.
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RELIGN 177 - Variable Topics in Religion: Religious Fascism and Antifascism
Instructor(s):
Eric Martin
Study looks through lens of religion to understand what fascism is, whence it comes, and how it has been opposed. Examination of specific types of religious fascism and antifascism in order to see present moment more clearly, and see role of religion in its creation. Focus on three primary national eras to sample much wider phenomena of fascism and antifascism: post-Civil War U.S. South, Nazi Germany, and recent U.S. events. Examination of how these moments drew inspiration from one another, and continue to shape international events. Consideration of extent to which religion is inherent in or accidental to fascism's appearance, continuation, and potential eradication.
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RELIGN 177 - Variable Topics in Religion: God and Good
Instructor(s):
Ryan Gillespie
Can one live good life without God? Is good something objectively discoverable by means of reason or revealed through sacred texts? Does one get to decide what good life is? Exploration of relationship between conceptions of good--understood here as both morally normative good in general, and living good life--and conceptions of transcendent, with specific focus on divine transcendence. Topics include naturalism, meaning, love, death, imagination, and sickness. Study of classic and contemporary philosophical texts, as well as some fiction and film.
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RELIGN M186C - Jesus of Nazareth in Historical Research
Instructor(s):
Simon Joseph
(Same as History M185I.) Lecture, three hours; discussion, one hour (when scheduled). Recommended preparation: course M185F. Designed for juniors/seniors. Stimulated by significant post-Enlightenment historical evaluations, students are led into firsthand knowledge (in translation) of various multilayered sources for reconstruction of life, teaching, and initial impact of Jesus of Nazareth in his social, economic, political, and religious contexts. P/NP or letter grading.
