Race and Ethnic Minorities in The United States
AFST 202
M/W/F: 9:30 – 10:20 AM
TBD
This course explores interactions between racial and ethnic majority and minority groups in the United States. We examine the historical origins and formation of racial/ethnic hierarchies, the institutional and normative processes for reproducing these hierarchies, and the social and economic significance of stratified racial and ethnic group identities. The course is taught from a macro perspective that examines larger structural forces (e.g., colonization, slavery, and immigration) to explain inter-group relations, and a constructionist perspective to understand the way that power fashions the social meaning of identities (e.g., symbolic violence and hegemonic discourse), social categories (e.g., panethnic Asian and Hispanic groups), and everyday interactions (e.g., stereotypes and white racial frame). Specific topics include the formation and significance of white and black identities, reactive ethnicity, the racial privilege of whiteness, the politics of immigration, and the intersectionality of class, race and gender. Offered as AFST 202 and SOCI 202.

The Life and Science of Ernest Everett Just
AFST 233
T/Th: 10:00 – 11:15 AM
S. Haynesworth
Ernest Everett Just (1883-1941) was one of the most important developmental biologists of the first half of the twentieth century. He made important observations, discoveries, and contributions to the scientific debate regarding the mechanisms of fertilization and early embryonic development. E.E. Just authored over 70 scientific papers and two books during his relatively short life; he died at age 57. E. E. Just was also a Black man who was born and raised in Charleston, South Carolina during the post-reconstruction white redemption; a period characterized by restrictive Jim Crow laws and Klu Klux Klan violence against Black people in the South. This course will explore the life of E. E. Just in the context of his contributions to science, his life as a Black man growing up in the Jim Crow South, and as a Black scientist during a period in American history when racially discriminatory laws and customs at multiple levels prohibited or severely limited the ability of Blacks to participate in the field of scientific research. In so doing, this interdisciplinary course will connect scientific and humanistic disciplines by bringing together students interested in biology, American history, African American history, and the history of science to explore and critically analyze aspects of Just’s life and science from these various perspectives. Offered as AFST 233 and BIOL 233 and HSTY 233.

U.S. Slavery and Emancipation
AFST 260
M/W: 12:45 – 2:00 PM
N. Voltz
Begins with the African encounter with Europeans during the emergence of the modern slave trade. Students are introduced to the documents and secondary literature on the creation and maintenance of slavery, first in colonial America, and then in the United States. The course concludes with the destruction of slavery. Offered as AFST 260, ETHS 260 and HSTY 260.

Special Topics in American Politics and Policy – Race, Immigration and American
AFST 389
Th: 12:45 – 2:00 PM
G. Parris
Specific topic will vary but will consist of an in-depth investigation of a particular policy area or political phenomenon. Topics will involve policy controversies of some current interest. Offered as AFST 389, POSC 389, and POSC 489.

Introducing Judaism
RLGN 173
M/W: 3:20 – 4:35 PM
A. Cooper
Judaism – like all religions – structures the way its adherents view the world and inhabit it. In this course we will explore five aspects of the human experience and interrogate the ways in which the religion provides a framework for navigating each one. TIME: How is time marked and measured? SPACE: What sort of cultural work is done to create religious and cultural home/s? THE DIVINE: How might God be described and understood? And what is the nature of the relationship between the Divine and humanity? TEXTS: What are the Jewish sacred texts? When did they appear and who authored them? How are they read, studied and understood? COMMUNITY: What are the contours of the “Jewish Community” and how are boundaries drawn between who is “in” and who is “out”? Offered as RLGN 173 and JWST 173.

Interpreting Religion: Approaches and Current Issues
RLGN 201
T/Th: 1:00 – 2:15 PM
J. Bostic
Introduction to academic study of religion, exploring the history and development of the field, important theories and methodologies, and current issues, debates, and horizons of research. This course provides students with the opportunity to approach the global study of religion from an interdisciplinary perspective. It pays particular attention to how religious studies has approached the study of non-Western cultures and religions and provides students with the opportunity to reflect on their own assumptions about “religion” as a category. This course also engages students around comparative questions in relation to religions in Asia and Africa, in order to develop critical, yet empathetic approaches to the comparison of global religions through key terms in religious studies such as ritual, belief, myth, and authority. The course is foundational for majors and minors in religious studies but also open to other interested students who may find it valuable for their work in other fields of study. Particular readings and other assignments will be determined by the designated instructor. Students are expected to attend class regularly, complete readings and other assignments, and participate actively in class discussions and other activities.

Introduction to Christianity
RLGN 212
T/Th: 10:00 – 11:15 AM
J. Tan
This course introduces students to the emergence and historical developments of Christianity from its Jewish sectarian roots to a global religion, focusing on how the central doctrinal-theological and moral-ethical themes of the Christian tradition have emerged and developed in different ecclesial traditions of transnational Christianity — Orthodox and Oriental Orthodox, Catholic and Mainline Protestant, Evangelical and Renewal. It explores how the forces of cultural diversity and pluralism, historic colonialism and imperialism, globalization and migration, as well as contemporary postcolonial and transnational consciousness shape and challenge the trajectory of the growth and spread, as well as the socio-political transformation of Christianity from its Mediterranean roots across the globe over two millennia. It discusses the broader socio-cultural, philosophical-theological, moral-ethical, and political dimensions emerging from the Christian tradition generally, as well as evaluates the themes of community building, identity formation and constructions, moral-ethical codes, and social movements within the different ecclesial traditions of Christianity, their contributions on ongoing theological conversations and moral-ethical debates, as well as their contemporary significance and long term global and transnational implications of Christianity as a global religion.

Faith and Politics in Islam
RLGN 218
Th: 4:00 – 6:30 PM
R. Islambouli
An overview of the relationship between Islam as a religion and Islam as a political system and the effect of this relationship on Islamic society from its origin to the present time.

Indian Philosophy
RLGN 221
T/Th: 1:00 – 2:15 PM
D. Sarma
We will survey the schools of Indian philosophy. Our concern will be the methods, presuppositions, arguments, and goals of these schools and their trajectories of thought. What were their theories on the nature of the person, the nature of reality (ontology), the nature and process of knowing (epistemology), and the right cognitive habits needed for breaking out of the cycle of birth/rebirth? What were the debates between the schools and the major points of controversy? And, most importantly, are the positions/arguments internally (in)coherent? The class will focus on intellectual cultures outside the United States. It will address in a substantive way ethnic, gender, sexual, philosophical, religious, or other cultural practices outside the United States, to provide students with new perspectives on their own cultural assumptions, traditions, and experiences. It will also address the examines the complexities of socially/humanly constructed categories. Offered as PHIL 221 and RLGN 221.

Food, Culture, Ethics, and Religion
RLGN 246
T: 4:00 – 6:30 PM
J. Tan
This interdisciplinary seminar explores the complex intersecting relationships between food, culture and ethnicity, ethics and religion, as well as society and globalization. It introduces students to the symbolic, socio-cultural, political and economic, as well as moral-ethical roles that food plays in shaping how peoples in different cultures and societies across history and geography have defined themselves through their foodways. It critically analyzes the multiple intersecting relationships between food, ethnicity and culture, ethics and morality, as well as the transnational forces of globalization in shaping contemporary food systems, food production and consumption in an increasingly diverse and pluralistic contemporary US society shaped by forces of ongoing transnational migration. It explores how food choices and preferences both influence, as well as influenced by intersecting socio-cultural, as well as moral-ethical forces arising from constructions of ethnicity, gender, class, nationality and national origin, as well as religion and human spiritualities. It will use historical and contemporary food practices as a lens through which we can understand the ongoing processes of globalization, intersecting dynamics of power, socio-economic class, ethnic identity, as well as the implications of colonialism, industrialization, and globalization on food in human cultures and societies. Offered as ETHS 246 and RLGN 246.

Jews in the Modern World
RLGN 286
M/W/F: 10:35 – 11:25 AM
J. Geller
This course examines the social, economic, political, and cultural development of the Jews in the modern world from the middle of the eighteenth century to the present. While particular emphasis will be on the Jews of Europe, we will examine the Jewish communities of the Middle East, pre-1948 Palestine, Israel, and the United States. Central themes of the course are the challenges to the traditional religious and social structures of pre-modern Jewry, migration, cultural innovation, and politicization. Offered as ETHS 286, HSTY 286, JWST 286, and RLGN 286.

Power of Words: Ritual Uses of Premodern Japanese Literature
JAPN 341
M/W: 10:00 – 11:15 AM
B. Carter
In premodern Japan, it was not only death and mourning ritual and practice that could pacify the spirit of the deceased, but also language. Authors consciously crafted the words of their works to simultaneously express the grief associated with longing and pacify the spirits of the dead. These words are called kotodama (power of words). From as far back as the eighth-century Kojiki (Records of Ancient Matters) and Nihon Shoki (The Chronicles of Japan) textual representations of mourning were linked with special uses of language and spirit pacification. At the death of Ame-no-wakahiko (a mythological god), his parents constructed a mourning hut and performed songs to secure his spirit in the afterworld. As several authors have demonstrated, from kotodama in the mid-eighth-century poetic anthology Man’y’sh, (Collection of Ten Thousand Leaves) to linked verse (renga) in medieval Japan, carefully constructed literary language also had a place in ritual pacification of the spirits of the dead. Words were not simple expressions of grief; they held power. All material is in English translation. The course is conducted in English. All material will be provided via PDF. Offered as JAPN 341 and WLIT 341 and RLGN 341.

Independent Study
RLGN 392
Up to three semester hours of independent study may be taken in a single semester. Must have prior approval of faculty member directing the project.

Honors Research II
RLGN 395
Intensive study of a topic or problem leading to the writing of an honors thesis. By department approval only.

Majors Seminar
RLGN 399
This capstone seminar is required for all Religious Studies majors and is typically taken in the junior or senior year. Students will explore a research question in religious studies, build their theoretical and methodological expertise in the field, engage in critical reflection on the writing process, and conduct peer review. The course culminates in the final capstone project and an oral presentation.