2025-2026 Course Descriptions
Courses primarily for:
Courses Primarily for Undergraduate Students
REL 101-7-20 – First-Year Writing Seminar: The Incredibly True Adventures of Horse Girls
(Fall 2026, Professor Sarah Taylor)Marking the Year of the Horse, this seminar explores the cultural and mythic figure of the “horse girl” from ancient religion to contemporary media. Across societies, horses appear as companions in girls’ sacred quests for courage, belonging, and self-discovery. We examine “horse girls” in mythology, religion, folklore, literature, and media. Topics include: horse goddesses, Amazons, Valkyries; figures such as Joan of Arc and Lady Godiva; Mongolian mounted archers; Mexican escaramuzas, cowgirls, and iconic fictional horse-girl heroines. The seminar also explores contemporary equestrian aesthetics and the renewed cross-cultural fascination with horses. In an era of pervasive screens, fragmentation, isolation, and social media distortion, horses evoke possibility, freedom, imagination, creaturely companionship, and the search for purpose. Readings span memoir, ethnography, history, and mythology. Through analytical writing, students investigate how horses have inspired generations of girls and women to imagine courage, meaning, and deeper forms of spiritual connection to the more-than-human world.
REL 101-8-21 – First-Year Writing Seminar: Living in Apocalyptic Times
(Winter 2027, Professor Robert Orsi)References to the end of time—to the end of the times we live in and to the end of time itself—have become so ubiquitous nowadays and so casual as to be almost banal. Yet they point towards something real. Suddenly, we are living in the subjunctive. Allusions to the future are hedged with contingency and uncertainty.
The question for this course is not how ought people live in this time, but how are they living. How are humans in their relations with each other and with non-humans making their way through a such a deeply disturbing and dangerous period in human history, when the horizon of the future itself seems to be vanishing? How does living in this time shape decisions? What becomes of memory and hope? How are humans to live responsibly and lovingly in this context?
We ask these questions in relation to the climate crisis; the development of AI; the decline of democracies and rise of religious authoritarianism around the globe, and other challenges. At the very end of the course, we will think critically and deeply about the possibilities for hope.
As a course in the humanities, we will be concerned with the questions traditionally taken up by the disciplines organized under this heading. How do we read in this time? How do we create? What becomes of the human imagination when the horizon of the future is so clouded?
REL 101-8-22 – First-Year Writing Seminar: Hollywood Be Thy Name: Race, Religion, and Belonging Through Film
(Winter 2027, Professor KB Dennis Meade)In this seminar students will explore constructions of race, religion, and belonging in the U.S. through popular films and television. This course will center representations of Black religions and spirituality as case studies. Along with written sources, students will “read” moving images as texts that consists of an argument, evidence, and analysis. Through close reading and exploratory exercises students will develop analytical essays that follow the writing process — from brainstorming and outlining, to drafting and revision. Students will also learn how to conduct peer reviews and translate their work into multimedia project.
REL 101-8-23 – First-Year Writing Seminar
(Spring 2027, Professor Usman Hamid)REL 170-20 – Introduction to the Study of Religion
(Fall 2026, Professor James Bielo)
This course will guide students through a series of case studies that highlight the practical, ethical, and material dimensions of religions around the world. These case studies dramatize how religions are lived with and against the grain of established doctrine, so that students will gain a richer understanding of the ways religious customs have shaped the world around them. The course also serves to introduce students to the basic methods scholars employ to study religion, including history, ethnography, textual analysis, ritual theory, phenomenology, and comparison—tools through which students will formulate their own accounts of religious phenomena.
REL 172-20 – Introduction to Religion, Media, and Culture
(Spring 2027, Professor Sarah Taylor)
Dive into one of today’s most exciting and rapidly growing areas of scholarship – the intriguing entanglements of religion and media in society and culture. This course draws from an array of sources, such as television, film, and radio, digital gaming worlds, billboards, advertisements and media campaigns, popular music, streaming video, social media, and even tattoos, body art, and graffiti. Study media while getting to make your own media for course projects!
REL 173-20 – Religion, Medicine & Suffering in the West (RHM)
(Winter 2027, Professor Robert Orsi)
This course explores what religion(s), primarily Catholicism (although I will make references to other religious traditions as we go along), have made of the body-in-pain, what religion may offer to people in pain to assist them in understanding and living with their illness, and how religious people have used physical pain for specific ends, religious, social, and political. Central to the work of the course is understanding pain itself as a phenomenon and thinking about how culture generally, religion in particular, shapes the pain experience. The course counts toward Religion, Health and Medicine (RHM) religious studies major concentrations. The enrollment is restricted to religious studies majors and minors, or by instructor consent.
REL 200-20 – Introduction to Hinduism
(Fall 2026, Professor Mark McClish)
One of the largest and most ancient of all religions, Hinduism comprises a family of related traditions. Over the last 5000 years, the Hindu traditions of South Asia have developed a remarkable diversity of rituals, beliefs, and spiritual practices and a pantheon of hundreds and thousands of gods and goddesses, from the elephant headed Ganeṣa to the fierce goddess Kālī as well as many local deities. This course will examine the breadth of the Hindu traditions as they have developed over time, highlighting the major elements that characterize them collectively, such as ritual sacrifice (yajña), world renunciation (saṃnyāsa), law (dharma), spiritual discipline (yoga), devotion (bhakti), worship (pūjā), and theology. During the course we will explore both the scriptures of Hinduism as well as its practices. We will pay particular attention to how these traditions have contributed to the development of modern Hinduism.
REL 210-20 – Introduction to Buddhism
(Winter 2027, Dr. Dhondup T. Rekjong)
The Buddha's life and teachings, traditions that developed from these teachings, and systems of meditation, rituals, and ethics.
REL 220-1 / JWSH_ST 220-1 – Introduction to Hebrew Bible
(Spring 2027, Professor Barry Wimpfheimer)
There is no understating the significance of the Hebrew Bible/Old Testament in Western Culture. The Bible is a text that has been repeatedly turned to for spiritual guidance, for explanations of mankind's origins and as the basis of both classical art and contemporary cinema. English idiom is peppered with phrases that originate in the Hebrew Bible and many a modern political clash can be understood as a conflict over what the Bible's messages and their implications. This course introduces students to the Hebrew Bible by reading sections of most of the Bible's books. But reading is itself a complicated enterprise. The Bible has been put to many different uses; even within the world of academic scholarship, the Bible is sometimes a source of history, sometimes a religious manual, sometimes a primitive legal code and sometimes a work of classical literature. This course will introduce students to the various challenges that present themselves within the study of the Hebrew Bible and the varied approaches scholars take when reading the Hebrew Bible. This course is a critical introduction to the Hebrew Bible.
REL 230-20 – Introduction to Judaism
(Fall 2026, Professor Barry Wimpfheimer)This course attempts to answer the questions "What is Judaism?" and "Who is a Jew?" by surveying the broad arc of Jewish history, reviewing the practices and beliefs that have defined and continue to define Judaism as a religion, sampling the vast treasure of Jewish literatures, and analyzing the unique social conditions that have made the cultural experience of Jewishness so significant. The class will employ a historical structure to trace the evolutions of Jewish literature, religion, and culture through the ages.
REL 250-20 / MENA 290-5-1 – Introduction to Islam
(Fall 2026, Professor Usman Hamid)
One in four people living today are Muslim, making Islam the second most widely practice religious tradition in the contemporary world. How do we make sense of a religious tradition that spans multiple continents, languages, centuries, and communities? In this course we explore what it means to be Muslim, how particular ideas and practices come to be seen as Islamic and what the study of Islam can teach us about religious embodiment, emotions, ethics, rituals, devotion, and law. Over the course of this class, students will be introduced to theories and critical terminology from the study of religion.
REL 261-20 – Cultivating Environmental Consciousness
(Fall 2026, Professor Mark McClish)This course is an experimental, constructive, student-led inquiry into the idea of environmental consciousness, a term recently used by philosopher Michael Bonnett to posit an intrinsic relationship between consciousness and nature. He argues that education should be ecologized by aiming to help students develop environmental consciousness as a responsive receptivity to nature.
In this course we will explore the idea of environmental consciousness by developing and carrying out nature-based practices meant to help us understand its feasibility as a basis for education. Students will collectively design, undertake, and assess these practices. In doing so we will reflect on our relationship with nature and the environment, the goals of education, conceptions of learning and assessment, the putative distinction between the secular and religious, and the relationship between educational practices and climate catastrophe.
REL 262-20 / BLK_ST 262-20 – Introduction to Black Religions: The North American Experience
(Winter 2027, Professor KB Dennis Meade)
In this course students will be introduced to the variety of Black religions in the United States from the early 19th century to the present. We will examine the historical and political dynamics that shaped these traditions from their origins in Africa to the formation of new religions that emerged in urban cities on the East Coast and in the Midwest. We will use written and multimedia sources to explore topics such as gender, migration, the movement for civil rights, and Black religious technologies in the 21st century.
REL 270-20 – Introduction to Theology
(Spring 2027, Professor Christine Helmer)
Theology is an academic discipline that, like philosophy, has to do with the big questions of life: What does God have to do with the world? Why is evil so pernicious? How does one consider life in this world from God's perspective? We explore how theologians ask questions, what topics fascinate them, and how they bring their experiences to their work. Our work focuses on Christian theologians from past and present whose contributions help us to think in critical and constructive ways about our world today, such as Augustine, Calvin, Luther, Schleiermacher, McCord Adams, and Helmer.
REL 278-22 / AMER_ST 310 – Religion and the Arts
(Fall 2026, Professor James Bielo)
Religion and the Arts is a variable-topics course that explores the dynamic relationship between religious traditions and artistic expression across cultures, historical periods, and mediums. The courses will examine how religious traditions, practices, materials, and communities have shaped, and been shaped by, the arts, including visual culture, architecture, literature, theatre, ritual performance, museum curation, and other expressive forms.
REL 278-22 / AMER_ST 310 – Exhibiting Religion
(Winter 2026, Professor James Bielo)
In this course students will explore diverse representations of religion in museum settings and other contexts of public display. Student research will include engagement with Chicago area museums, and the opportunity to design their own exhibit.
REL 278-1 / SLAVIC 278-1 / COMP_LIT 211-1 – Icons
(Spring 2027, Professor Gurianova)"Visual Art in the Context of Russian Culture: Icons"
This year we focus on the phenomena of Christian Orthodox icons, from Byzantine through contemporary era, in the dual contexts of Russian and European cultures; topics directly related to iconography and iconology, as well as interconnections among visual arts, literature, religion, and political history.
REL 278-23 / HUM 310 – Kaplan Global Lab Course
(Spring 2027, Professor Michelle Molina)
REL 314-20 – Buddhism in the Contemporary World (RHM)
(Winter 2027, Professor Sarah Jacoby)
Why does Buddhism receive a pass more often than other religions by the “spiritual but not religious” crowd? Can Buddhism be secular? In what ways is Buddhism compatible with science, and can Buddhist practices be proven effective using scientific methods? Can paying better attention by means of Buddhist meditation practices liberate us from suffering caused by digital distraction? In what ways can Buddhist articulations of interdependence, no self, and compassion be resources for addressing racial and structural injustice, even as sexual abuse, racism, and trans/homophobia continue to traumatize members of some Buddhist communities? These are some of the many questions we will consider through readings by some of the most creative Buddhist leaders and critics of our time. Counts towards Religion, Health and Medicine (RHM) religious studies major concentration.
REL 318-20 – Buddhist Literature in Translation
(Fall 2026, Professor Antonio Terrone)In this course, students will read writings from Buddhist canonical and non-canonical literature on a variety of subjects to gain an introduction to the variety of literary genres used in Buddhist works, as well as to consider the central tenets of the Buddhist literary tradition these works convey. Who was the Buddha? What did he preach? Why do we suffer and how do we realize enlightenment? How should one follow the Buddhist path? What metaphors and parables have Buddhists used to convey these insights over the centuries? Students will be able to explore these and other questions through a selection of English translations of original texts in Sanskrit, Pali, Chinese, and Tibetan including the life of the Buddha, his sayings, Buddhist sutras, and Buddhist autobiographies. As this course is an introduction to Buddhist literature, there are no prerequisites, and students will gain familiarity with Buddhist teachings through engaging directly with primary sources in translation.
Reading Materials:
- The Life of the Buddha (Penguin Classics 2015 - by Tenzin Chogyel and Kurtis R. Schaeffer. 978-0143107200
- The Dhammapada (Penguin Classics) Paperback – 2010 by Valerie Roebuck (Editor, Translator, Introduction) ISBN 978-0140449419
- The Platform Sutra: The Zen Teaching of Hui-neng, by Red Pine, Counterpoint 2008, ISBN 978-1593761776
- Himalayan Hermitess: The Life of a Tibetan Buddhist Nun 1st Edition, by Kurtis R. Schaeffer, Oxford University Press, 2004 – ISBN 978-0195152999
REL 318-22 – Religion and Culture in the People's Republic of China (RLP)
(Spring 2027, Professor Antonio Terrone)This course will examine the role of religion in post-1980’s China with an emphasis on the political implications of the practice of religion in the People’s Republic of China. Students will read various forms of literature and policy documents to assess the extent to which Marxist theory is central to the interpretation of “religion” in Communist China. Primary sources will include Chinese constitutional articles, white papers, and editorials in English translation. Secondary sources will cover a wide range of interpretations and perspectives on the position of religious institutions and religious practices in the PRC. The first part of this course will investigate the expression of religiosity under Communism in China; the rehabilitation of Confucian values; the constitutional protection of religion and religious belief in China; the relationship between ethnicity and religious policies; the Sinicization of religion; and the administration of the five officially accepted religious traditions in the People’s Republic of China (Catholicism, Protestantism, Buddhism, Daoism, and Islam). The second part of the course will focus on the recent cases related to the Muslim Uyghurs of Xinjiang and the Tibetan Buddhists of Western China. The class will explore some of the most controversial issues related to these two ethnic minorities including terrorism, religious violence, nationalism, assimilation, foreign influence, and soft power. The course format will consist of both lectures and discussions, during which students will be encouraged to exercise critical thinking and lead in-class presentations. Students will analyze various types of documents, critically evaluate content and concepts, and endeavor to synthesize the information and communicate it effectively and thoroughly. The course counts towards the Religion, Law, and Politics (RLP) major concentration.
REL 319-20 – Buddhism, Science, and Mindfulness
(Fall 2026, Dr. Dhondup T. Rekjong)This course centers the Dalai Lama’s book The Universe in a Single Atom: The Convergence of Science and Spirituality, accompanied by other essential readings, to explore the intersection of Buddhism, science, and mindfulness, aiming to deepen and enrich students' understanding of Buddhism in the contemporary world. It moves beyond traditional Buddhist teachings to offer undergraduates a unique opportunity to challenge common perceptions of Buddhism, often viewed solely as a religion. Throughout the course, we will examine the historical interactions between Buddhism, science, and mindfulness, engage with recent debates through dialogues, discussions, and workshops, and consider the uncertain futures of the disciplines. By doing so, we will gain insights into scientific developments while rethinking the relevance and role of Buddhism within a broader secular context.
REL 319-21 – Queerness, Spirits, and Ghosts: Buddhism in Southeast Asia (RSG)
(Winter 2027, Ray Buckner)*Counts toward Religion, Sexuality and Gender (RSG) religious studies major concentrations.
REL 349-21 – Eastern Christian Missions and Missionaries
(Winter 2027, Professor Sergey Ivanov)
REL 349-22 – Christianity, Identity, and Violence: Martyrdom in Antiquity and Beyond
(Winter 2027, Professor Virginia Burrus)
REL 351-20 / MENA 390-5-1 – Islamic Law (RLP)
(Winter 2027, Professor Brannon Ingram)
Islamic law – the sacred law of Islam grounded in the Qur’an, the practice of the Prophet Muhammad, and the writings of Muslim scholars and jurists – stretches back nearly 1400 years. This course offers, first, an overview of the origins and evolution of Islamic law from the life of Muhammad to end of the classical era. We then seek, secondly, to understand how colonialism and the modern nation-state affected the conceptualization and implementation of Islamic law in the modern period. To these ends, we will look in some depth at two specific areas of law – marriage and divorce, and criminal law – in a number of comparative contexts, including the Ottoman empire, colonial India, and contemporary Pakistan. Counts toward Religion, Law, and Politics (RLP) religious studies major concentration.
REL 360-20 – Race, Religion, & Digital Humanities (MTJR)
(Fall 2026, Professor KB Dennis Meade)
Black and Caribbean Studies are vibrant fields in the digital humanities. The study of religion in the digital humanities, however, remains an emergent field. This course is an ambitious attempt at interdisciplinarity, or more aptly what Tracy Hucks and Dianne Stewart refer to as transdisciplinarity--inquiry driven research that transcends disciplinary silos. This course centers religion as the primary lens to excavate and recover representations of Afro-Caribbean religions and their North American cognates using archival sources, fiction, film, and art. Religion will serve as the framework to interrogate what counts as data, the sources in which we can locate this data, its deployment and (re)presentation. Our aim is to gain a landscape view of Caribbean
religious history through key moments and themes from the period of enslavement and what Rinaldo Walcott refers to as the long emancipation. The course will provide students the opportunity to explore current digital projects and learn digital tools to generate their own inquiries. Counts toward the Media, Technology, Journalism and Religion (MTJR) religious studies major concentration.
REL 369-20 – What is Christian Nationalism (RLP)
(Spring 2027, James Bielo)
In this course, students will explore the religious, social, and political dimensions of Christian nationalist movements. We will consider the U.S. case in historical and ethnographic perspective, and contextualize it amid global comparative examples. The course counts towards the Religion, Law, and Politics (RLP) religious studies major concentration.
REL 369-20 – Religion, Violence, and Nonviolence in the US (RLP)
(Winter 2027, Izzak Novak)
Scholars have noted that there has never been a generation of Americans that has not lived through an armed conflict involving the US (or the Thirteen Colonies before that). At the same time, religion has touched and shaped the lives of Americans at every point in the nation's history, whether they liked it or not. Religious Americans, then, have had to reckon with violence–and whether, when, why, and how to avoid it. This course traces religion's role in colonialism, the making of war and its avoidance, the Black civil rights movement, hunting and foodways, and more, uncovering the complex relationships religious Americans have had to violence across time and space. Counts toward Religion, Law, and Politics (RLP) religious studies major concentration.
REL 371-20 – Religion, Film, TV: The Spirit of Horses (RHM, MTJR)
(Fall 2026, Professor Sarah Taylor)
It is often said that in riding a horse “we borrow freedom.” From winged Pegasus of Greek mythology, to mystical Kelpies of Celtic lore, to the Hippogriffs in Harry Potter, horses hold a special allure for humans that transcends cultures. This course explores the power of the sacred human-horse bond as represented in art, film, TV, and social media, while teaching techniques and tools for analyzing media and making your own media! We will start by looking historically and anthropologically at the co-evolution of humans and equids, investigating how the domestication of horses and the mutually shaping human-horse relationship radically changed the world. We will also learn how religion followed the path of horses across the globe. In fact, the history of religions, their spread, comingling, and influence can be told through the prism of human-horse partnerships over space and time. We will learn about horses in mythology and sacred symbol, divine horses with supernatural powers, and how horses become a mainstay of folklore on virtually every continent. We will read and listen to reflections on the ways horses help some people to think about, know, and experience God/the divine, and/or find existential meaning. We will explore horse religions and worship (old and new), the key role played by horses in many funerary rites, and learn more about peoples who know themselves as “the people of the horse.” We will also learn about the use of horses in therapy programs for those mentally, emotionally, physically, and developmentally challenged, and the successful use of horse therapy to heal veterans and others coping with PTSD. Finally, we look at a variety of horse trainers and clinicians who approach horsemanship as a kind of sacred vocation, devotional path, and/or spiritual discipline. At the core of this course is investigating why and how it is that horses fascinate humans, capture so many hearts, and fuel our imaginations. In other words, “What is it about horses . . . ?” We learn about media by “doing media,” so this course offers the chance to design and produce two media projects based on original research and analysis, examining works that mediate horses. We will also have a class field trip to an equine therapy center. [No experience with horses necessary, though not recommended for students who are allergic to equines.] This course will include in-class writing assignments responding to the instructor’s prompts. A mid-quarter assessment will be given in class.
*The course counts toward the Religion, Health and Medicine (RHM) and the Media, Technology, Journalism and Religion (MTJR) major concentrations.
REL 378-20 – Death: Myth and Meaning (RHM)
(Winter 2027, Grace Christensen)
Ideas, beliefs, and practices pertaining to death from a variety of ancient and modern cultures. Immortality, afterlife, care for the dying, suicide, funerary rituals, transhumanism. The course counts toward the Religion, Health and Medicine (RHM) religious studies major concentration.
REL 379-20 / BLK_ST 315-1 – Religions of the Caribbean (RLP)
(Fall 2026, Prof. Dennis Meade)
The Caribbean constitutes a unique space to understand the history of resistance and social change in the Black Atlantic world. Going beyond the tropes of reggae, Rastafari, and tourism--this course provides an introduction to the diversity of religious traditions in the region, with a particular focus on Afro-Caribbean religious practices and spiritual technologies. Students will explore the cosmological features and embodied expressions that characterize these traditions. Through presentations, discussions, and writing assignments students will reflect on concepts such as belonging, migration, colonialism, race, class, and gender to understand the political and cultural implications of religion in the region. *Counts toward Religion, Law, and Politics (RLP) religious studies major concentration.
REL 379-21 / CLASSICS 370 – Comparative Sacrifice: Belief and Ritual
(Fall 2026, Sarah Eisen)
How could humans forge meaningful and sustainable relationships with the gods, when the gods were believed to be infinitely more powerful than they were? This class will examine the ancient practice of offering sacrifice to the gods broadly across the Mediterranean basin, exploring a wide range of geographies, beliefs, customs, religions, and sources. The act of sacrifice, practiced in ancient Greece, Rome, the Levant, Egypt, and Mesopotamia, was practiced for a variety of reasons related to appeasing, supplicating, and currying favor with the gods. We will consider all types of sacrifice, including animal, vegetal, liquid, and even human offerings to the gods, while considering how concepts including expiation, catharsis, supplication, substitution, communion, and authority factored into the ritual. How did this ritual develop in response to changing or sustained religious beliefs? Did the gods of the ancient world eat the blood and flesh of sacrifices? What about the various minority groups in antiquity who rejected the practice of sacrifice? Throughout the class, students will examine the art historical, archaeological, and literacy evidence for this practice, while also critiquing different lenses and theoretical approaches to sacrifice.
REL 379-22 / MENA 390-5 – Mediating Religion (MTJR)
(Winter 2027, Professor Usman Hamid)
This seminar is an inquiry into how we experience religion in the world today. It takes seriously the idea of religion as mediated phenomena. We experience the religious through an engagement with multiple sensorial forms—things seen, felt, tasted, heard, and smelt. These can include a wide set of media ranging from YouTube videos of preachers to calendars with images of Hindu deities sold in bazars; mechanized prayer counters to the corporeal remains of venerated figures; food distributed in Hindu temples, Muslim shrines, Christian churches and Sikh gurdwaras to water brought back from pilgrimage to holy sites; Gregorian chants to Muslim calls to prayer; incense lit to commemorate the dead to camphor burnt before the image of the divine. The spaces in which we experience these religious phenomena are ever broadening as well. We do not experience the religious in places of worship alone but also at museums and in public buildings, on superhighways and in cyberspace.
While this seminar adopts the perspective of religious materiality, with its concern for aesthetics, presence, memory, and space, it does not require previous knowledge of specific theories or familiarity with any particular religious tradition. It invites students specializing in different traditions and frameworks to engage with scholarship on religion and media in the hope that it offers a fresh perspective on their own materials. Counts toward the Media, Technology, Journalism and Religion (MTJR) religious studies major concentration.
REL 379-23 / CLASSICS 370 – Sacred space in the ancient Mediterranean
(Spring 2027, Sarah Eisen)
Religion permeated every aspect of life in the ancient Mediterranean. Even though it was believed that one could encounter the gods anywhere, some places were more sacred than others, and over time the concept of a sanctuary formed. This course will investigate sacred spaces in the ancient Mediterranean, with a focus on Greece and Rome. We will ask: what made one place more sacred than others? What activities and rituals occurred in a sanctuary? How can we recognize a sanctuary archaeologically, and how were they discussed in ancient literature? By investigating ancient sacred spaces, students will explore the social, political, and economic realities and imaginations of religious spaces as they effected polities, empires, and interconnected cultures.
REL 379-26 / CLASSICS 370 – Magic in the Ancient Greco-Roman World
(Winter 2027, Abbe Walker)
In this course, we will examine the magicians, witches, wonderworkers, and quacks of the ancient Greco-Roman world and the techniques and devices they used to manipulate the world around them and/or to serve their clientele. We will consider magical practices both real and imagined—from curse tablets, spell books, and amulets to elaborate descriptions of sexy sorceresses and hideous hags, all in the light of theories relating to the religious, political, and social contexts in which magic was used.
REL 379-27 – Buddhism and Cinema (MTJR)
(Fall 2026, Dr. Dhondup T. Rekjong)
This course explores the relationship between Buddhism and film from three main perspectives. First, we will critically examine some of the ways contemporary movies portray Buddhism and Buddhists. Second, watching films made by Buddhists, we will consider how they address current issues, such as cross-cultural exchange, gender inequality, the search for meaning, and religious identities. Finally, we will use films to consider a “practice of seeing,” encouraging students to think creatively about how they watch and understand films and how this experience might connect to Buddhist ways of seeing and practice. Films will include Kundun (1997), The Silent Holy Stones (2006), and The Monk and the Gun (2023), among others. *The course counts toward the Media, Technology, Journalism and Religion (MTJR) major concentration.
REL 379-28 – Political Religion in the Contemporary World
(Fall 2026, Prof.Zahra Khoshk Jan)
In the context of post-secularism and the renewed visibility of religion in the public sphere, this course examines the rise of political religion through two interrelated processes: the politicization of religion and the sacralization of political ideologies. It explores how these dynamics shape contemporary movements, organizations, and forms of fundamentalism, with particular attention to their implications for identity formation and national security. Drawing on sociological and methodological approaches, the course analyzes both monotheistic and non-monotheistic traditions to understand how religious and political domains become mutually constitutive. Students will engage with key theoretical frameworks and empirical cases to develop critical analytical skills for interpreting the role of religion in modern political life. The course emphasizes the complexity of post-secular conditions and equips students to assess how sanctified ideologies operate within diverse cultural and political contexts. *Counts toward Religion, Law, and Politics (RLP) religious studies major concentration.
REL 385-20 – Catholic ‘60s
(Spring 2027, Professor Robert Orsi)
An examination of the major social and religious transformations in American Catholicism during and after the Second Vatican Council. Topics include: changing roles of priests and nuns; innovations in Catholic ritual and devotion; radical Catholicism; and the making of a new ways of being Catholic. Readings to include primary and secondary sources, documentary film, visual art, and selections from the relevant documents of the Second Vatican Council Joseph P. Chinnici and Angelyn Dries, eds.
REL 395-20 – Theories of Religion
(Winter 2026, Professor Sarah Taylor)What counts or does not count as “religion”? How do we know? And who gets to decide? This course explores the major foundational theorists in the field of Religious Studies, while placing them into conversation with contemporary perspectives in the field. We begin by asking “What is a theory? And what does it mean to have a theory about something?” We then dig into those theories and engage with them -- “activating theory” by representing each theory we study in creative and participatory ways that actively involve the whole class. Throughout the quarter, you will be formulating your own theory of religion and then making the case for it in your final project. Have you taken theory courses in the past that are a bit dry and opaque? We take a different tack. Put on your creative and artistic thinking caps as we make theories of religion come alive in unique and innovative ways. This course involves music, art, video, podcasts, and other artistic mediums, in addition to written texts.
Graduate-level Courses Available to Undergraduates
REL 339-20 / JWSH_ST 339-2 – Jewish Texts as Media (MTJR)
(Spring 2027, Professor Shira Schwartz)This course approaches Jewish texts through the lens of media studies. The course will explore a range of classical and contemporary Jewish textual genres, as well as Jewish textual objects, from Torah scrolls and Jewish type, to digital commentary, music, and performance. Students will learn how to engage texts deeply through different hermeneutics, including through close-reading and in partnership with other students. Our approach will also pay attention to the media and materiality of Jewish transmission across different kinds of Jewish sources. All non-English language texts will be presented in translation. No prior background with Jewish sources necessary. Class time will be divided between partnered text study and group discussion, and a special site visit to Special Collections at the University Library. The course counts toward the Media, Technology, Journalism and Religion (MTJR) religious studies major concentration.
REL 339-21 / JWSH_ST 339-1 – Reading the Talmud (RLP)
(Winter 2027, Professor Barry Wimpfheimer)
The Talmud is one of the most important works of Jewish literature. For the last millennium, Talmud study has been a central part of Jewish religious and cultural practice. Despite the splintering of Judaism into different denominations, Jews the world over are unified by their commitment to studying Talmud. The Talmud is an unusual work of literature, and it has been credited as an influence on codes of law, sermons, modern works of Jewish literature, and even Seinfeld. This course will explain the Talmud’s import and durability within Jewish culture while introducing students to the rigors of legal analysis that lie at the heart of most talmudic passages. The course is ideal for those interested in religion, law, logic games and questions of textual interpretation. The course will study the Talmud entirely in English translation; there is neither a language prerequisite nor an expectation of prior experience reading the Talmud. Counts toward Religion, Law, and Politics (RLP) religious studies major concentration.
REL 339-22 – The Jewish Canon
(Spring 2027, Professor Barry Wimpfheimer)
Courses Primarily for Graduate Students
REL 440-20 / ASIAN_LC 492 – Readings in Tibetan literature
(Winter 2027, Dr. Dhondup T. Rekjong)
This course explores a variety of Tibetan-language genres of writing such as history, poetry, philosophy, doctrine, narrative literature, and more, with attention to their form and content. All course readings are in Tibetan, presuming at least an intermediate ability to read Tibetan. Students will focus on Tibetan-English translation techniques while broadening their knowledge of Tibetan literary genres. Course readings will vary depending on enrolled students' specific areas of interest.
REL 468-20 / GER 408-1 – Graduate Seminar: Critical Theory and Religion
(Winter 2027, Professor Christine Helmer)
This course explores the central place the concept of “religion” has occupied in the development of critical theory and, in turn, the role critical theory has played in reframing “religion” in modernity and in the contemporary geopolitical moment. We take up questions of politics and capitalism in relation to religion, and we consider the contributions of “religion” to possibilities of social transformation. Readings by: Schleiermacher, Kierkegaard, Schmitt, Strauss, Fraser, Jaeggi, Gibson-Graham, Helmer, and Mariña.
REL 471-20 / HIS 405-24 / GSS 490-23 – Graduate Seminar: Embodiment, Materiality, Affect
(Fall 2026, Professor Michelle Molina)
This seminar explores theoretical approaches to the problem of body/embodiment/materiality. One aim of the course is to examine various methodological approaches to embodiment and materiality, making use of sociology and philosophy (Pierre Bourdieu, Maurice Merleau-Ponty, Baruch Spinoza, and Bruno Latour). The second and closely related aim is to situate bodies in time and place, that is, in history. Here we look to the particular circumstances that shaped the manner in which historical actors experienced their bodies in the Christian west (Peter Brown, Mary Carruthers, Michel Foucault, among others). Ultimately, we will be examining theoretical tools while we put them to work. The goal: how to use these theorists to write more dynamic, creative, interesting scholarship?
REL 471-23 – Graduate Seminar: Queer and Transgender Studies in Religion
(Spring 2027, Professor Shira E. Schwartz)This seminar introduces students to the growing subfield of queer and transgender studies in religion. Combining theoretical frameworks from religious studies and queer and transgender studies, we will study the impact of religious norms on queer/trans lives within religious communities, queer/trans forms of religion that emerge on the margins of normative religious communities, and when queerness/transness become points of religious exit. We will explore the norming systems of religion and gender/sex/sexuality together, examining how they produce both normative and non-normative forms of embodiment and desire, while interrogating the boundaries of religion/race/ethnicity. Crucial to our study will be the examination of the language and categories of “queer” “trans” and “religious” as social identities and structural subject positions. Where do these terms originate and who do they include? Do they articulate forms of identity, practice, belief, or power? And how do we trace the boundaries of normativity in a transnational, transhistorical, and comparative ethnoreligious context?
REL 476-20 / MENA-0-2 – Graduate Seminar: Art of Devotion: Islam and Aesthetics
(Fall 2026, Professor Usman Hamid)What is the relationship between aesthetics, material culture, and religious experience? In this course we explore this question by examining the aesthetic traditions of Islam, focusing on how Muslims have used literature, visual art, musical performance, and architecture as modes of religious expression and creativity. Through studying aesthetics and devotion in the Islamic tradition, we will reflect on questions of cultural appropriation and reuse, politics of representation, and the global circulation of objects, peoples, and capital. Additionally, we will consider how aesthetics might help us better understand the role of affect, senses, and embodiment in Islam.
REL 481-2-20 – Graduate Seminar: Secularities: Thinking with, through, and against “Religion”
(Winter 2027, Professor Brannon Ingram)482-20 – Graduate Seminar: Feminist Theory and the Study of Religion
(Spring 2027, Professor Sarah Jacoby)This course aims to put feminist theory and religious studies into conversation with each other in order to examine the resulting intersections, points of mutual illumination, and aporias. The course will investigate the history of feminist approaches to religious studies as well as new directions in current scholarship including black feminist andwomanist theologies, goddess feminism, postcolonial and transnational feminisms, and secular and post-secular feminisms. We will consider thefollowing questions: What does it mean to apply a gender studies lens to the study of religion? How do feminist conceptions of “liberation” reinforce or reject religious conceptions of “liberation”? How does taking religion seriously transform feminist theory? And how does taking feminist theory seriously transform research practices, subjects, archives, and methods in religious studies? In thinking through these topics, we will (re)read some feminist classics as well as focus on a selection ofsignificant recent works important for students of feminist theory andreligious studies. This course seeks to move beyond prevalent assumptions of Judeo-Christian normativity in its analysis of feministcontributions to the study of religion. It pays particular attention to feminist approaches to the study of Asian religions, but with flexibility to highlight other geographic/thematic areas of interest to graduate students enrolled in the course.