REL 504: Studies in Greco-Roman Religions: Fashion, Footwear, and Faith
Graded */aud Total Enrollment 10
Professor(s): AnneMarie Luijendijk
1:30pm – 4:20pm W Seminar
How did women and men appear before the divine in late antiquity? And what did they wear in everyday life? This interdisciplinary seminar examines self-representation through dress, footwear, hairdo, and jewelry. Special attention is reserved for questions regarding religion and ritual. We study a wide range of sources, including literary and documentary texts (papyri, inscriptions), iconographic representations (mosaics, frescoes, sculpture), and archaeological finds (shoes, clothes). Students conduct research with these sources and relate them to modern theoretical works about dress and self-representation.
REL 508: Studies in Religion and Morality: Sin, Historical Injustice, and Political Theology
Graded */aud Total Enrollment 15
Professor(s): Eric Gregory
1:30pm – 4:20pm W Seminar
Recent developments in political theory, theology, and cultural criticism have led to revived interest in political theology, both as a matter of intellectual history and as a problematizing of secular politics. This graduate seminar examines these developments, assessing them in relation to classical thought and modern liberalism. This semester, we focus on questions of sin, historical injustice, complicity, reconciliation, and reparations. Traditional metaphysical and theological disputes are not excluded, but our attention focuses on social and political evil and varied responses to it.
REL 510: Special Topics in the Study of Religion: What is Scripture?
Graded */aud Total Enrollment 15
Professor(s): Seth Perry
9:00am – 11:50am M Seminar
This seminar explores the titular question across traditions and from a variety of material, methodological, and theoretical angles pertinent to the study of religion. These include book history, postcolonial analysis, genre theory, and the phenomenology of reading. Students pursue an article-length final paper bringing our work together to bear on their own areas of interest, and are responsible for sharing relevant sources and scholarship from their corners of the academy as readings for the seminar.
REL 517: Religion and Public Life
Graded P/D/F only Total Enrollment 10
Professor(s): Jonathan Gold
12:00pm – 1:20 T Seminar
Presentation and critical discussion of research in progress by participants, dealing with the social scientific study of religion, religion and public policy, and religion and contemporary social issues. Note: REL 517 (fall) and REL 517 (spring) constitute this year-long workshop. In order to receive credit and/or a grade, students must take the course both semesters.
REL 519: Religion and Critical Thought Workshop
Graded */aud Total Enrollment 15
Professor(s): Leora Batnitzky
10:00am – 11:30am TH Seminar
A weekly, year-long workshop focused on current student and faculty research in religion and critical thought, designed primarily for graduate students working on dissertations and general examination essays on the philosophy of religion, religious ethics, and the role of religion in politics. Note: REL 518 (fall) and REL 519 (spring) constitute this year-long workshop. In order to receive credit and/or a grade, students must take the course both semesters.
REL 522: Religion and Culture Workshop
Graded */aud Total Enrollment 10
Professor(s): Jenny Legath
12:00pm – 1:20pm M Seminar
A weekly, year-long workshop devoted to the critical discussion of research in progress in the ethnographic, historical, and normative study of religion and culture. Designed for dissertation writers receiving fellowships from the Center for the Study of Religion and post-doctoral fellows. Note: REL 521 (fall) and REL 522 (spring) constitute this year-long workshop. In order to receive credit and/or a grade, students must take the course both semesters.
REL 524: Religion in the Americas Workshop
Graded */aud Total Enrollment 15
Professor(s): Seth Perry
3:00pm – 4:20pm TH Seminar
A weekly, year-long workshop focused on the current research of visiting presenters, current students, and faculty in American religious history. Designed primarily for Ph.D. students in the field, but is open as well to undergraduate concentrators with a strong background in the study of American religion and culture. Note: REL 523 (fall) and REL 524 (spring) constitute this year-long workshop. In order to receive credit and/or a grade, students must take the course both semesters.
REL 526: Religions of Late Antiquity Workshop
Graded */aud Total Enrollment 15
Professor(s): Moulie Vidas
12:00pm – 1:30pm T Seminar
A weekly, year-long workshop providing students in the Religions of Late Antiquity with the opportunity to present their current research for discussion. Note: REL 525 (fall) and REL 526 (spring) constitute this year-long workshop. In order to receive credit and/or a grade, students must take the course both semesters.
REL 528: Asian Religions Workshop
Graded */aud Total Enrollment 15
Professor(s): Stephen Teiser
3:00pm – 4:20pm T Seminar
A weekly workshop focused on disciplinary questions, professional development, and presentation and discussion of work in progress. Required for all students, pre-generals and post-generals, in Asian Religions. Open to other students with permission of the instructor. REL 527 (fall) and REL 528 (spring) constitute this year-long workshop. Students must complete both semesters to receive credit.
REL 530: Workshop in Islamic Studies
Graded */aud Total Enrollment 10
Professor(s): Shaun Marmon
4:30pm – 6:00pm TH Seminar
A weekly year-long Religion workshop focusing on the research and writing of graduate students, faculty, and visitors in Islamic Studies. This workshop provides a forum for presentation of works in progress: drafts of dissertation chapters, dissertation proposals, seminar papers, conference papers, articles and book chapters. All Islamic Studies graduate students are encouraged to participate as presenters and as commentators. The workshop fosters collegiality and professional development. Note: REL 529 (fall) and REL 530 (spring) constitute this year-long workshop. Students must take the course both semesters to receive credit/grade.
REL 533/EAS 535: Readings in Japanese Religions: Popular Buddhism in Premodern Japan
Graded */aud Total Enrollment 10
Professor(s): Bryan Lowe
7:30pm – 9:50pm M Seminar
This seminar explores the issue of popular or folk Buddhism (minshu Bukkyo) in premodern Japan. We read primary sources and secondary scholarship on topics such as mountain practice, pilgrimage, sacred space, and social organizations to better understand the role of Buddhism in the lives of everyday people in premodern Japan. Significant time is spent on translation, as well as research methods and tools necessary for the study of premodern Japanese Buddhism. Readings require basic familiarity with at least one of the following languages: classical Chinese, kanbun, or classical Japanese.
REL 580/NES560: Major Trends and Debates in Islamic Studies
Graded */aud Total Enrollment 10
Professor(s): Tehseen Thaver
1:30pm – 4:20pm F Seminar
This course engages certain major trends, debates, and questions that populate the field of Islamic Studies today, broadly defined. A central objective of this course is to think carefully about ways in which anthropological and other theoretical perspectives currently operative in the field might enrich more textually oriented approaches to the study of Islam, and vice versa. In addition, this course allows students to explore the question of how their particular research projects fit into and intervene in the broader landscape of Religious Studies and Islamic Studies.
REL 583/NES551: Late Medieval-Early Modern Islam
Graded */aud Total Enrollment 10
Professor(s): Qasim Zaman
1:30pm – 4:20pm T Seminar
This seminar focuses on Islamic thought and society during the 17th and the 18th centuries. Our key concerns are two: to understand what Islam, and Islamic thought, looked like in the late medieval and the early modern world; and to think about how we should try to approach the study of Islam in that world. A good deal of our focus is on South Asia, though we also read about other regions, including Iran and the Arab Middle East. The required readings are in English. For those interested, some weeks might have supplementary readings in Arabic as well.