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.

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.

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.

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.

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.

This course explores the role of American Christianity in canonical and popular Korean and Korean-American novels and films. While the references to Christianity in these novels and films serve to indicate the active presence of American Christian missionaries in 20th century Korea, we will pay attention to the ways in which the figures of American Christianity function in these narratives.

Analysis of philosophical, literary, and theological accounts of love and justice, with emphasis on how they interrelate in personal and public life. Is love indiscriminate and therefore antithetical to justice, or can love take the shape of justice? What are the implications for law, politics, and social criticism? Particular attention will be given to discussions of virtue, tragedy, forgiveness, friendship, and happiness.

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.

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.

The very first Tibetan Buddhist and mandala in the west was constructed (and ceremonially destroyed) in 1988 at New York City's American Museum of Natural History. Tibetan Buddhist mandalas have since become a more familiar visual image to most westerners. Nevertheless, few are aware of the philosophical connection between their visually powerful aesthetic aspect and their soteriological function. In this course, students learn the theory and application of Tibetan Buddhist mandalas as they look into exactly how and why they make such a strong impression in hearts of Buddhists and non-Buddhists alike.

The decline of marriage in recent decades is often tied to the decline of religion. But why should marriage, a contractual relationship centered on sex and property, be seen as a religious practice? This seminar considers the varied and surprising ways in which the great monotheistic traditions of the Near East came to connect certain forms of human marriage - or their rejection- to divine devotion, and considers how marriage worked in societies shaped by these traditions. Spanning biblical Israel to the medieval Islamic world, this course will introduce you to the historical study of Near Eastern religions and to the field of family history.

The decline of marriage in recent decades is often tied to the decline of religion. But why should marriage, a contractual relationship centered on sex and property, be seen as a religious practice? This seminar considers the varied and surprising ways in which the great monotheistic traditions of the Near East came to connect certain forms of human marriage - or their rejection- to divine devotion, and considers how marriage worked in societies shaped by these traditions. Spanning biblical Israel to the medieval Islamic world, this course will introduce you to the historical study of Near Eastern religions and to the field of family history.

This course explores the relationship between religion and violence in the ancient Mediterranean world. We will investigate how the shifting discourses and practices of religiously-motivated violence directed both at the self and the other shaped the social, cultural and political histories of specific groups within ancient Mediterranean society. Of special interest will be the emergence of Jewish and Christian traditions of martyrdom against their biblical and Graeco-Roman backgrounds and the impact of the Christianization of the Roman Empire on the relationship between political power, religiously-motivated violence, and communal identity.

This seminar surveys recent trends in historiography about medieval Jews and Judaism. We read and compare major works of scholarship written mainly during the last two decades that focus on medieval Jewish history in both Europe and the Middle East, from the 9th century to the 14th century. Special emphasis is placed on works of social and cultural history that illuminate Jewish communal life and religious identity in varying historical contexts. All required readings are in English, but supplementary readings are suggested for students with reading knowledge of Hebrew.

This course will explore the various meanings of The Great Migration and mobility found in 20th century African American literature. Through careful historical and literary analysis, we will examine the significant impact migration has had on African American writers and the ways it has framed their literary representations of modern Black life.