201 - 210 of 240 results for: RELIGST

Required of graduate students in Religious Studies. Approaches to the study of religion. Prerequisite: consent of instructor.

A wide-ranging engagement with Islamic perspectives on fundamental human preoccupations. We will utilize religious and literary sources spanning Islamic history to discuss topics such as: the ends of human life in the material world: pleasures and pains of love for God and human beings; death and dying; eschatology and resurrection; and skepticism regarding religious claims. Emphasis on original sources in translation considered in relation to theoretical perspectives in the humanities.

Japanese religion and culture, including Buddhism, Shinto, popular religion, and new religions, through the medium of film.

This seminar is designed to expose students to issues relating to discourse and subjectivity within the textual constructions of Oriental religions in the colonial era. We will begin with Edward W. Said¿s provocative work on notions of representation and power embedded in the discourse on the Orient that established, produced, and, ultimately, perpetuated western knowledge about the Other. We will then discuss the impact of the Oriental Renaissance and the vital role that Eastern wisdom played in constructing the field of Comparative Religious Studies. In addition, students will also read ethnographies, fables, and travelogues that both support and undermine Said¿s thesis of an active West constructing a largely passive East.

Modern Zoroastrian experience¿as race, religion, and ethnic identity. Some 60,000 Zoroastrians now live in India and have resided there for a millennium. In the 19th century, these peoples from Persia¿Parsis¿became colonial elites yet were acutely aware that they were not quite Indian, British, or Persian. Diverse ways this experience of dislocation has served as a defining characteristic in Parsi communal identity and contrast these South Asian experiences with the minority socio-politics of those who remained in Iran. Survey the colonial and post-colonial communities in England, East Africa, Hong Kong, Australia, and North America and examine the expression of these global diasporic experiences in literature and the arts.

In the past three decades Parsi fiction has rapidly emerged as a unique and creative voice in modern Anglophone literature from South Asia. From Bapsi Sidhwa to Thrity Umrigar to Rohinton Mistry, Parsi novelists address the most poignant concerns of Zoroastrians living in an era of rapid social, political, and religious transformation. The erosion of tradition; the breakdown of the Parsi family; the demise of religion among the young; and the cultural losses and gains of living in diaspora are common themes in their works. The unique vantage point of the Parsis; neither Hindu nor Muslim, neither quite Indian nor quite British; will serve as a lens for examining the inherent tensions in multicultural societies both East and West.

Taught in conjunction with a major exhibition of modern Islamic art at the Cantor Museum. We will consider theoretical discussions regarding art and modern Muslim identities and examine the use of Islamic motifs in art and architecture in detail.

Research methods and materials for the study of Buddhism. May be repeated for credit. Prerequisite: reading knowledge of Chinese or Japanese.

This course will take an interdisciplinary approach to the question of how American Jews negotiate the desire to retain a unique ethnic sensibility without excluding themselves from American culture more broadly. Students will examine the various ways in which people debate, deliberate, and determine what it means to be an "American Jew". This includes an investigation of how American Jewish relationships to formal and informal educational encounters through school, popular culture, religious ritual, and politics.