The Department of Religion is thrilled to announce the addition of two new assistant professors. These new members of our community continue the department’s long-standing commitment to excellence in research and teaching and bring exciting new areas of expertise to our campus.
Dr. Stephanie Mota Thurston
Dr. Thurston’s research and teaching interests include...
Recent Award Winners
Career Paths in Religion
REL 199This course re-examines the lives and legacies of Martin Luther King Jr. and Malcolm X. Through their speeches, essays and biographical writing, we will explore the origins of their religious and political philosophies, and consider how their memory is deployed in current day movements for social...
REL 335Examines the religious dynamics of the twenty-first century United States. Tasks will be to map the religious landscape of contemporary America, to learn something of the history of the many traditions being practiced and lived in our communities, and then to study a series of salient issues...
REL 511The criminal-penal system in the United States is a complex web of mutually rein-forcing institutions, practices, & moral val-ues. This course focuses on the religious concepts that have informed our moral imaginations, which in turn, inform the so-cial practices we enact and the institutions...
REL 416This seminar course, taught by Dov Weiss, will familiarize students with the foundational texts of Judaism – the Midrash and Talmud (3rd c. -8th c. C.E.). Our themes for the semester will be God, Torah, Jesus/Christianity, Heresy, Heaven and Hell, and Mysticism and more. Texts will be studied in in...
REL 494The course, put together in collaboration with the Rietberg Museum, Zurich (Switzerland), is a tribute to the recent exhibition Being Jain: Art and Culture of an Indian Religion held at the Museum Rietberg in Zurich (Switzerland) from November 2022 to April 2023 (...
REL 199Few Black leaders are held in as high esteem as Martin Luther King Jr. and Malcolm X. Yet public media habitually represents these ministers as rivals, even adversaries—one the nonviolent hero of the Civil Rights Era, the other a violent revolutionary. While their rhetoric and protest strategies...
REL 231What does it mean to live well, to live a good or meaningful life? Are the answers to this question timeless, or are they determined by our social location? What resources do the Western philosophical and Christian religious traditions offer in response to this question? And what considerations do...
REL 511The term “apocalypse” refers to a “removal of the veil”—the veil, that is, that hides the secrets of the cosmos from most people and that is pulled back for only a chosen few. “Apocalyptic” more commonly refers to visions of the end time and to the movements that shape themselves in response to...
REL 510Introduction for first semester graduate students to selected methods and techniques for conducting research in the area of Religion. Students will receive general guidance on strategies for conducting bibliographic research and designing research projects. Includes study of some currently salient...
REL 332This course is designed for students seeking the Certificate in Interaith Studies though other students may enroll if there is space. The syllabus is available...
