REL 200B- Foundational Theories of Religion-Mairaj Syed- Wednesdays- 12:10-3:00 pm
This course will survey prominent methods of analysis of religion in the humanities and social sciences. We will consider functionalism, cultural materialism, social identity, and hermeneutics and critiques of these views. We will also look at how analysis that prioritizes gender, race, and power figures in the explanation and understanding of religion. Recurring themes in this course include ultimate causation versus proximate causation, methodological individualism versus holism, insider versus outsider explanations, idealism versus materialism, and the malleability of ideas and practices versus inertia.    

REL 230B- Thematic Topics -Religion/Language - Flagg Miller - Fridays - 12:10-3:00 pm
A graduate-level course on the contributions of linguistic anthropology, linguistics, media studies and other fields to the study of religion.  Course provides graduate students with theory and methods for analyzing religious discourse in a variety of traditions.  The course focuses on issues of gender, race/ethnicity, nationalism and formations of global violence and will explore these topics through studies of ritual, semiotics, theolinguistics, language ideology, voice, authoritarianism and violence, and technological mediation.  Assigned textbooks will include Language and Religion (eds. Yelle, R. A., Handman, C., Lehrich, 2019), Valerie Hobbs’ An Introduction to Religious Language: Exploring Theolinguistics in Contemporary Contexts (forthcoming in January 2021) and a course reader.

REL 230E—Thematic Topics - Values, Ethics, and Human Rights- Inter-Group Conflict in Israel and the Middle East 

Yael Teff-Seker -yteffseker@ucdavis.edu- Mondays - 12:10-3:00 pm- required attendance synchronously.  In addition, lectures will be recorded and made available to the students. Students must have a webcam and microphone on their computers and download an app called Peacemaker.

The Arab-Israeli conflict does not exist in a void. It was, and still is, influenced by external geo-political interests and events, religious beliefs and perceptions, and other external factors such as economy, climate, and scientific-technological advances. The conflict also influences other tensions within and between Jewish, Christian, and Muslim groups, as well as other religious and ethnic minorities in the area.

The course first explains the history of the conflict, using several points of view, and allowing students to voice and discuss their own opinions and analyses of these historic events. It then invites students to understand the complexities of the current situation in the Middle East, and introduces positive examples of cooperation, peace treaties, and synergies. The course encourages students to pursue active learning through researching specific topics, cross-sections (e.g. gender, race), and case studies that are of personal or academic interest to them; as well as through participatory simulations of real-life cases, including role-playing, and using a peace-building app

Fall 2020

REL 200A- THE HISTORICAL ROOTS OF THE STUDY OF RELIGION-Allison Coudert- Tuesdays 1:10-4:00 pm

Religious Studies is a modern discipline that emerged in the 19th century West, but the historical roots that made the discipline possible extend back into the early modern period. Between 1450 and 1750 there was a revolution in the way Europeans viewed the world. As a result of the recovery of classical texts, the voyages of discovery, and the spread of print culture, people began to realize that the past was different from the present and that cultures differed dramatically in terms of customs and beliefs. The Reformation and the Scientific Revolution further undermined traditional ways of thinking by discrediting the Aristotelian-Ptolemaic worldview, which had been in place for over a thousand years, as well as the ideal of a United Christendom. As we shall see, magic, witchcraft, and esoteric thought of various kinds (alchemy, Kabbalah, Hermeticism) also played their part in challenging the conviction that Christianity offered the only valid religion for all people at all times. It was within this context that the idea of religion as a distinct and culturally conditioned aspect of human experience developed. The goal of this course is to understand how these developments laid the foundation for the secular study of religion and why these developments occurred in the West and not in other parts of the world.

REL 230A- Thematic Topics-Body and Praxis-Sexual Subjectivities: Literary, Artistic and Psychoanalytic Fantasies of Materiality -Naomi Janowitz-CANCELED

Fall 2020 courses taught in other departments

ART HISTORY 200A-Visual Theory-Heghnar Watenpaugh
Visual Theory is designed for graduate students in art history or any discipline with an interest in visual studies.
Mondays 2:00PM – 5:00PM, Everson Hall 157
CRN: 20756 

ART HISTORY 290- Special Topics in Art History-Heghnar Watenpaugh
This seminar will focus on conflicts that arise from the looting and trafficking of art objects. 
Mondays 10:00 - 12:50 PM

CULTURAL STUDIES 200A- History of Cultural Studies: Genealogies of Cultural Studies-Rana Jaleel
Histories and traditions of cultural studies internationally; multiple legacies of cultural studies as a field of inquiry in various geographical contexts; foregrounds important critical perspectives resulting from social and intellectual movements worldwide. 
M: 3:00pm - 6:00pm

HISTORY 201M-Sources and General Literature of History – Middle East:- Understanding the Transformation of Islam in the Modern Age -Baki Tezcan
T 1:10-4 @ Zoom-CRN: 36763

Course description: This course is an expanded survey of the arguments presented by Shahab Ahmed in his book What is Islam? The Importance of Being Islamic (2016). Ahmed posits a hierarchical epistemology for understanding Islam in what he calls the “Balkans-to-Bengal complex” in the late medieval and early modern period. He argues that the egalitarian epistemology of modernity, imposed on the Islamic world by colonialism, rendered this hierarchical epistemology untenable. We will read Ahmed’s book in conjunction with selected translations of primary sources and several studies with a view to assess Ahmed’s argument, and to better understand the distinguishing features of modernity globally.

This seminar will be mixed with (up to ten) undergraduate students and (up to five) graduate students. The graduate students will be assigned additional reading and expected to stay longer than the undergraduate students. Therefore, they should plan to be available until 5 pm on Tuesdays.

Required purchase: 
Shahab Ahmed, What is Islam? The Importance of Being Islamic (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2016).
Additional readings will be shared digitally.

Grading:
Five short papers (5 pages, 15% each); seminar participation and presentation (25%).