Tibetan Buddhism

Professor: Dominique Townsend  

Course Number: REL 105

CRN Number: 10212

Class cap: 18

Credits: 4

Schedule/Location:

 Tue  Thurs    10:10 AM - 11:30 AM Olin 305

Distributional Area:

MBV  Meaning, Being, Value  D+J Difference and Justice

Crosslists: Asian Studies; Philosophy

Buddhist teachings came to Tibet relatively late in the history of Buddhism’s travels through Asia. Tibetan emperors adopted Buddhism from India around the eighth century, which sounds like a long time ago now, but by that time Buddhism was already well established in South, Southeast, Central, and East Asia. In addition to being known as a tradition of renunciants and forest dwelling philosophers, Buddhism was associated with cosmopolitanism—literacy, the arts, architecture, higher education and beyond. Tibetan rulers, like so many rulers before them, turned to Buddhism after amassing power through warfare and violence, and they became interested in Buddhism’s methods for cultivating wisdom and compassion as antidotes to ignorance and selfishness. They were also curious about whether Buddhism could help justify and support their claims to power. Because Buddhism was already a complex system, Tibetans were able to uniquely integrate all three of the major traditions of Theravada, Mahayana, and Vajrayana Buddhism. Thanks to the hard work of Tibetan and Indian translators and artists with imperial support, monks and nuns followed the rules of the earliest disciples of Buddha, philosophers pored over Indian Buddhist treatises, and ritualists fine-tuned the tantric, esoteric, intensive path to liberation from dissatisfaction and suffering. The new expressions of Buddhism that emerged in Tibet have shaped religion, education, literary production, the arts, and language across a massive and diverse swath of Asia, from northern India to Nepal, Bhutan, Mongolia, and areas of Western China. More recently, Tibetan Buddhism has spread across the globe. In this course, by analyzing primary textual sources in translation as well as visual and material culture, we will investigate the history and practice of Tibetan Buddhism in all its complexity, from its earliest origins to the present. All are welcome. 

Religions of the World

Professor: Shai Secunda  

Course Number: REL 108

CRN Number: 10213

Class cap: 22

Credits: 4

Schedule/Location:

Mon  Wed     3:30 PM – 5:30 PM Olin 202

Distributional Area:

MBV  Meaning, Being, Value  D+J Difference and Justice

Crosslists: Global & International Studies; Theology

This course offers an entrée into the academic study of religion. We will examine some global religions as they have developed over the course of world history. The approach will be comparative, and focus on two matters: (1) the idea of “scripture” and how the formative texts of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam, Hinduism, and Buddhism interacted with the ideas and practices of these religions, and also with the secular sphere; and (2) the lived, textured experience of religious life in these five traditions, as revealed by anthropological study. Class will not meet February 19, 21, 26, 29; March 25 and 27, and April 22 and 24, and May 1.  During periods when class does not meet, students will meet individually/in small groups with instructor over Zoom to plan and produce class projects.

Hindu Religious Traditions

Professor: Nabanjan Maitra  

Course Number: REL 117

CRN Number: 10214

Class cap: 22

Credits: 4

Schedule/Location:

 Tue  Thurs    10:10 AM - 11:30 AM Olin 202

Distributional Area:

MBV  Meaning, Being, Value  D+J Difference and Justice

Crosslists: Asian Studies

This course introduces students to the academic study of Hinduism. Students will be introduced to the canonical and constituent elements of the Hindu traditions, its principal texts, practices, and institutions. Complementing this study of the sources of the tradition, students will be introduced to the fundamental analytic frames for the disciplined study of religion (myth, ritual, hermeneutics, ethnography, among others). This complementarity will enable students to appreciate the myriad modes of religious study, even as they learn about the religious traditions that are comprehended by the term Hinduism. Finally, the examination of the heterogeneous traditions that are unified under the label Hinduism will serve as an impetus to consider, throughout the semester, the contingent task of defining religious traditions. In this vein, we will ask: which groups have attempted to define Hinduism? To what end? How have they attempted to do so?

Introduction to Christianity

Professor: Bruce Chilton  

Course Number: REL 119

CRN Number: 10215

Class cap: 22

Credits: 4

Schedule/Location:

 Tue  Thurs    3:30 PM - 4:50 PM Chapel

Distributional Area:

MBV  Meaning, Being, Value   

Crosslists: Jewish Studies; Theology

The purpose of this seminar is to enable us to understand how Christianity developed through systemic changes between the first century CE and the present, The course of study will include selective readings of principal contributors and the assessment of ritual practices.

The New Testament in Contexts

Professor: Bruce Chilton and Mary Grace Williams

Course Number: REL 154

CRN Number: 10216

Class cap: 22

Credits: 4

Schedule/Location:

 Tue  Thurs    10:10 AM - 11:30 AM Bard Chapel

Distributional Area:

MBV  Meaning, Being, Value   

Crosslists: Jewish Studies; Theology

This course investigates the literary, social, political, religious, and theological contexts in which Jesus’ movement arose, and then produced an innovative literature all its own. The itinerary of study follows chronological development, in order to trace the historical forces in play as accurately as possible.

Religion and Catastrophe

Professor: Bevin Blaber  

Course Number: REL 210

CRN Number: 10269

Class cap: 16

Credits: 4

Schedule/Location:

 Tue  Thurs    3:30 PM - 4:50 PM Olin 310

Distributional Area:

MBV  Meaning, Being, Value   

Crosslists: Jewish Studies

What can religion tell us about disaster? In this course, we will explore a wide range of religious responses to catastrophe, including articulations of apocalypticism, theology and theodicy that struggle with the problem of evil, and reimaginations of religion in the wake of calamity. We will examine sources that give voice to despair alongside those that offer grounds for hope, asking throughout whether or how we might see religion and the religious as resources for navigating devastation. 

An Epic Introduction to Sanskrit

Professor: Nabanjan Maitra  

Course Number: REL 214

CRN Number: 10270

Class cap: 22

Credits: 4

Schedule/Location:

 Tue  Thurs    11:50 AM - 1:10 PM Olin 310

Distributional Area:

FL  Foreign Languages and Lit   

Crosslists: Literature

This course has two objectives. First, all students enrolled in the course will be guided through a close reading of an English translation of The Book of the Great Hall (Sabhāparvan), the second book of the Indian epic, the Mahābhārata (The Great Lineage of King Bharata). The course will be interested in understanding the literary and ritual world of the Indian epic, and to consider the questions of morality, judgement, justice, female agency, kinship, kingship, and competition that the text raises. Additionally, and optionally, students may enroll in a complementary tutorial that will focus on learning the rudiments of Sanskrit grammar through the text itself. In this additional session, students will be introduced to the basic grammatical paradigms of the Sanskrit language and will be guided in their application of these paradigms to the text.

Ritual Bodies

Professor: Claire-Marie Hefner  

Course Number: REL 218

CRN Number: 10271

Class cap: 18

Credits: 4

Schedule/Location:

 Tue  Thurs    1:30 PM - 2:50 PM Hegeman 102

Distributional Area:

MBV  Meaning, Being, Value  D+J Difference and Justice

Crosslists: Asian Studies; Gender and Sexuality Studies

What embodied knowledge does the body carry? How does the body “know” how to participate in ritual and religious knowledge? How does religion shape understandings of sex and gender categories? In this class, we examine understandings of the body across religious traditions. We ask, how can religion shape understandings of the body? How are notions of modesty and propriety religiously informed? How do different traditions understand the relationship between practice and interiority? Together we explore how and what bodily performance creates, in both practice and theory. We pay particular attention to the different ways in which the body is perceived in religious narratives, aesthetics, gender expressions, religious spaces, and dance. Case studies include (but are not limited to) Hindu religious pedagogy through Indian classical dance, tattoo practices among Catholic men in Brooklyn, Muslim women’s veiling practices in Egypt, and menstrual taboos in Central Asia.

Gender and Intimacy in the Muslim World

Professor: Claire-Marie Hefner  

Course Number: REL 246

CRN Number: 10272

Class cap: 18

Credits: 4

Schedule/Location:

 Tue  Thurs    11:50 AM - 1:10 PM Olin 309

Distributional Area:

MBV  Meaning, Being, Value  D+J Difference and Justice

Crosslists: Asian Studies; Gender and Sexuality Studies; Middle Eastern Studies

This course examines the many forms and understandings of gender and intimacy across the Muslim world. We consider contemporary readings and interpretations of religious sources on these matters while foregrounding the lived realities of gender and sexuality in contemporary Muslim cultural contexts. Themes include: debates about ideal gender roles for men and women; strategies and spaces for women's religious authority; contemporary women’s activism in conservative pietist movements; changing images of masculinity, romance, and fatherhood; as well as how new forms of education have changed the social imaginaries and real-life possibilities for women in many Muslim contexts. In our final units we take a historical approach to understanding Muslim transgender ritual specialists in South and Southeast Asia where local understandings of sex/gender categories shed light on the complex intersections of gender, sexuality, and Islam.

Imagining Religion: Theory and Methods for the Study of Religion

Professor: Dominique Townsend  

Course Number: REL 317

CRN Number: 10273

Class cap: 15

Credits: 4

Schedule/Location:

  Wed     9:10 AM - 11:30 AM Albee 106

Distributional Area:

MBV  Meaning, Being, Value   

How does "religion" relate to our experiences of being human? How does it intersect with politics, cultural production, social hierarchies and justice? With these big questions in mind, together we will explore diverse religious traditions, philosophies, and experiences through a variety of academic lenses. In the process, we'll reflect upon the field of religious studies as a discipline, paying critical attention to the history of colonialism and chauvinism in shaping scholarship. To support students as they cultivate interpretive methods that better fit their own concerns and commitments, the course will convey contemporary research methods and critical concepts. Assigned texts focus on several religious traditions and demonstrate a spectrum of disciplinary methodologies including literary, historical, anthropological, cultural, gender, and political studies. This seminar is designed for moderated majors in the Interdisciplinary Study of Religion Program, but all motivated students are welcome and there are no formal prerequisites.

Contemporary Talmud: History, Context, Culture

Professor: Shai Secunda  

Course Number: REL 340

CRN Number: 10274

Class cap: 15

Credits: 4

Schedule/Location:

 Tue      11:30 AM - 2:50 PM Olin 303

Distributional Area:

MBV  Meaning, Being, Value   

Crosslists: Jewish Studies; Middle Eastern Studies

Even more than the Bible, the Talmud – one of the world’s most intellectually challenging religious texts – has sat at the heart of the classical Jewish canon, meriting more sustained engagement than any other Jewish work. The Talmud was composed during a specific period (third- to seventh-centuries) and place (late antique Mesopotamia), yet it has been read and reread in many contexts since, from Baghdad to Brooklyn...to Bard. Each reading has engendered new texts worthy of study in their own right. Often classified as a work of law, it is perhaps best to describe the Talmud based on what it does: unrelenting, interpretive and intertextual weaving. This course will attempt to tackle the Talmud and Talmudic process by closely reading a representative sample of Talmudic passages, and then adopting lenses provided by a variety of humanistic disciplines, including philosophy, history, law, literature, anthropology, and performance studies. All texts will be provided in translation. No prior background in Jewish Studies is required, though some experience in textual analysis / hermeneutics is helpful. Class will not meet February 20, 27; March 26 and April 23.  During periods when class does not meet, students will meet individually/in small groups with instructor over Zoom to plan and produce class projects.

Ethnography of Law and Affect

Course Number: ANTH 377

CRN Number: 10343

Class cap: 15

Credits: 4

Professor:

Andrew Bush

Schedule/Location:

 Tue      5:10 PM - 7:30 PM Olin 310

Distributional Area:

SA  Social Analysis  D+J Difference and Justice

Crosslists:

Human Rights; Middle Eastern Studies; Study of Religions

Roman Religions: Paganism and Christianity

Course Number: CLAS 328

CRN Number: 10109

Class cap: 15

Credits: 4

Professor:

David Ungvary

Schedule/Location:

  Wed     3:30 PM - 5:50 PM Olin 310

Distributional Area:

MBV  Meaning, Being, Value   

Crosslists:

Latin; Medieval Studies; Study of Religions

A History of Jewish Heresy

Course Number: JS 219

CRN Number: 10319

Class cap: 16

Credits: 4

Professor:

Joshua Boettiger

Schedule/Location:

 Tue  Thurs    10:10 AM - 11:30 AM Henderson Comp. Center 106

Distributional Area:

MBV  Meaning, Being, Value   

Crosslists:

Study of Religions

Introduction to Middle Eastern Studies

Course Number: MES 100

CRN Number: 10205

Class cap: 22

Credits: 4

Professor:

Ibrahim Elhoudaiby

Schedule/Location:

Mon  Wed     8:30 AM - 9:50 AM Olin 202

Distributional Area:

MBV  Meaning, Being, Value  D+J Difference and Justice

Crosslists:

Africana Studies; Study of Religions

Introduction to Philosophy: Evil in Ethics

Course Number: PHIL 124

CRN Number: 10207

Class cap: 22

Credits: 4

Professor:

Archie Magno

Schedule/Location:

 Tue  Thurs    11:50 AM - 1:10 PM Olin 308

Distributional Area:

MBV  Meaning, Being, Value   

Crosslists:

Study of Religions

Islamic Political Thought

Course Number: PS 3020

CRN Number: 10282

Class cap: 14

Credits: 4

Professor:

Pinar Kemerli

Schedule/Location:

  Th     3:10 PM - 5:30 PM Olin 308

Distributional Area:

SA  Social Analysis  D+J Difference and Justice

Crosslists:

Middle Eastern Studies; Philosophy; Study of Religions