HISTORY 5308:
HISTORICAL STUDIES OF RELIGION
Fall 2008, Tuesday at 7:00pm
Holden Hall 151
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HISTORY 5308:
HISTORICAL STUDIES OF RELIGION
Fall 2008, Tuesday at 7:00pm
Holden Hall 151
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TEACHER
John Howe Office Hours: TuTh 9:30-10:15 am;
Office: 143 Holden Hall Tu 9:30-10:15 pm;
Telephone: 742‑1004 ext. 233 W 8:30-9:15 am; and by appointment
E‑Mail: john.howe @ttu.edu
Web:
http://www2.tltc.ttu.edu/howe
(the best way to access this syllabus)
PURPOSES OF THE COURSE
To acquire a general knowledge of historiographical traditions concerning religion. To introduce problems involved in the comparative study of religions. To provide a general framework to help orient student work on particular historical problems related to religion.
Expected Learning Outcomes
Upon successful completion of this class, students will be able to:
1. Describe major events and individuals associated with the development of academic studies of religion;
2. Recognize ways in which the study of religion reflects and reacts against contemporary trends in Western intellectual history;
3. Appreciate human behavior and ideas in greater depth by critically analyzing theoretical and ideological positions; and
5. Achieve greater proficiency in the following genres of historical writing: summary essay, research proposal, book review, and short essay quiz.
Methods for Assessing the Expected Learning Outcomes
The Expected Learning Outcomes of the course will be assessed through a summary essay, a research proposal, book reviews, short in-class essay quizzes, class discussions, and miscellaneous classroom assessment activities.
COURSE REQUIREMENTS
Required Texts
Walter Capps. Religious Studies: The Making of a Discipline. Minneapolis: Fortress Press, 1995.
Rudolph Otto. The Idea of the Holy [any edition].
Max Weber. From Max Weber: Essays in Sociology. Translated and edited by H. H. Gerth and C. Wright Mills. Routledge Essays in Sociology. New York: Routledge, 2007. [Earlier Oxford editions of this work would be equally serviceable.]
Miscellaneous documents and articles posted on the Web.
Required Reading
This graduate topics class is primarily a readings class. There will be specific assignments for each class, either from the required text books, from the Web, or from reading lists that will be provided. The "Reading and Class Schedule" indicates how the course will proceed. Since student participation is a major part of the course, it is important to have all assignments completed as scheduled.
Book Reviews
Over the course of the semester, each student will write five book reviews. Each review should not be much longer than two double‑spaced typed pages. Students should be prepared to report orally in class on the works they review.
Research Proposal
Each student will, over the course of the semester, prepare a two to four page summary description (about 800‑1500 words) of a specific historical research project related to religious studies. This description should indicate why the problem deserves investigation, offer a thesis relating to it which requires testing, and present a procedure for testing it (noting the types of sources to be used and where they would be found). The aim of this assignment is to stimulate thought about how to conduct historical research on a religious topic. This proposal must be received by Nov 25, but it can be submitted at any time over the course of the semester: early submission is strongly encouraged, since problems could be fixed and the proposal resubmitted up until Dec 9.
Class Summary Examination
Two thirds of the way through the course, on Tuesday November 11, students will write an in-class examination on religious theorists and their models. The examination will feature multiple types of questions, including multiple-choice, identification, and essay.
Summary Essay
In the ancient world, when triumphant Christianity attempted to orient itself in history, two approaches emerged. The long dominant tradition, established by Eusebius and continued by Augustine's pupil Orosius, interpreted history as a record of God's salvific action, and thus, to a considerable extent, turned history into a sort of historical theology. Augustine questioned this approach, arguing in The City of God that human beings on earth cannot really know salvation history inasmuch as it is the story of an invisible community of angels, saints, and good men who proceed as pilgrims through a fallen world. According to Augustine, that world's empires and other institutions were to some extent morally neutral, following their own laws of institutional development and inertia. Citizens of the "City of God" might help keep this world running and can even leaven it slightly by their good actions but ultimately they are pilgrims on their way to a different cosmic order.
Starting in the Enlightenment many western scholars moved away from salvation history and began to try to separate the study the history of religion from theology. Like Augustine, who had seen empires as human institutions following their own laws of "political science," these scholars would see religious systems too as subject to their own laws of development. They have hoped to be able to increase our understanding of religion by attempting to analyze the essential character of religious systems, their origins, their components, and their functions.
Write an essay of around 2000 words summarizing the "high points" of the endeavor to create an independent history of religions-- and pass at least a tentative judgment on whether, and, if so, in what ways, this intellectual project has actually succeeded in increasing human understanding of religious phenomena.
Class Attendance
Successful completion of the course requires regular attendance. Students who will need to miss more than three classes should not be enrolled because they will not be able to do their best work and fully demonstrate their knowledge.
GRADING
The course grade will be computed as follows: 25% from five book reviews (i.e., 5% from each); 25% from the class summary examination; 20% from the research proposal; 20% from the course summary essay; and 10% from class participation.
The class
participation grade is computed on the basis of attendance, class preparation,
and class contributions by dividing students up at the end of the semester into
three groups: 1) outstanding; 2) generally average; and 3) significantly below
acceptable standards. In computing the course grade, the first group gets the
class participation component credited as an `A'; the second group has these
points dropped out (so they neither help nor hurt); and the third group has them
credited as an `F'.
UNIVERSITY NOTES
Necessary Accommodations: Any student who, because of a disabling condition, may require some special arrangements in order to meet course requirements should contact the instructor as soon as possible so that the necessary accommodations can be made.
Observance of a Religious Holy Day: Texas House Bill 256 requires institutions of higher education to excuse a student from attending classes or other required activities, including examinations, for the observance of a religious holy day. The student shall also be excused for time necessary to travel. An institution may not penalize the student for the absence and allows for the student to take an exam or complete an assignment from which the student is excused. No prior notification of the instructor is required.
Plagiarism: "It is the aim of the faculty of Texas Tech University to foster a spirit of complete honesty and a high standard of integrity. The attempt of students to present as their own any work that they have not honestly performed is regarded by the faculty and administration as a serious offense and renders the offenders liable to serious consequences, possibly suspension." -- Texas Tech University Catalog.
READING AND LECTURE SCHEDULE
Tu Aug 26 Introductions / Historical Studies of Religion
Capps xiii‑xxiii, 1‑20; Descartes: Discourse; Kant: Religion;
Kant: What Is Enlightenment?; Schleiermacher: On Religion
[Th Aug 28 Last day for student‑initiated Drop/Add Refund]
[M Sept 1 Labor Day University Holiday]
Tu Sept 2 How Religion Can Be "Known"? Where to Look for Its Essence?
[W Sept 10 Last Day to drop course and receive a refund]
Capps 20-35; Otto, The Idea of the Holy ; Otto's Vocabulary; Ratzinger
Tu Sept 9 The “Holy” as the Essence of Religion
Capps 35-52; Marx: Contribution; Freud: Civilization & Weltanschauung ;
William James' Varieties of Religious Experiences (read the Table of Contents and
[M Sept 22 Last Day to withdraw from the University and Receive a Partial Refund]
Tu Sept 16 "Illusion" as the Essence of Religion
Capps 53-104; Comte: General View of Positivism; Comte: Course; N. J. Girardot, "Max Muller's
"Sacred Books" and the Nineteenth-Century Production of the Comparative Science of Religions,”
History of Religions, 41 (2002), 213-250 [JSTOR]; Max Müller: "Preface" to Sacred Books of the
East; Volkhard Krech, “From Historicism to Functionalism: The Rise of Scientific Approaches to
Religions around 1900 and Their Socio-Cultural Context," Numen, 47 [Special Issue: Religions in
the Disenchanted World] (2000), 244-265 [JSTOR]
Tu Sept 23 The Quest to Discover the Origin of Religion
Capps 105-56; Husserl ; Mircea Eliade ; Evan M. Zuesse, "The Role of Intentionality in the
Phenomenology of Religion," Journal of the American Academy of Religion, 53 (1985), 51-73
[JSTOR]; Reading List #1: Eliade
Tu Sept 30 Description of Religion: Phenomenology
Capps 157-68; Durkheim; Sacred vs. Holy; Weber, From Max Weber: Essays ...
Tu Oct 7 Sociology of Religion: Classical
Capps 168-208; Peter L. Berger, "Reflections on the Sociology of Religion Today," Sociology of
Religion, 62 [Special Issue: Religion and Globalization at the Turn of the Millennium] (2001),
443-454 [JSTOR]; Dean R. Hoge and Thomas P. O'Connor, "Denominational Identity from Age
Sixteen to Age Thirty-Eight," Sociology of Religion, 65 (2004), 77-85 [JSTOR]; Grace Davie,
"Creating an Agenda in the Sociology of Religion: Common Sources/Different Pathways," Sociology
of Religion, 65 [Special Issue: Culture and Constraint in the Sociology of Religion] (2004), 323-
340 [JSTOR]
Tu Oct 14 Sociology of Religion: Contemporary
Nelson, "Field Statement on the Anthropology of Religion"; Geertz: "Balinese Cockfight";
Tu Oct 21 Anthropology of Religion
Capps 209-26; Cassirer; "Myth-Placed Priorities." Religious Studies Review, 32 ( 2006) 5-10
[UL]; Campbell's "Monomyth"; Wittgenstein; Reading List #2: Mythology
[M Oct 27 Last Day to Drop a Course or Declare Pass/Fail ]
Tu Oct 28 The Language of Religion: Verbal
Capps 226-65; David Frankfurter, “Ritual as Accusation and Atrocity: Satanic Ritual Abuse,
Gnostic Libertinism, and Primal Murders," History of Religions, 40 (2001), 352-380 [JSTOR];
Reading List #3: Material Religion or #4: Ritual
Tu Nov 4 The Language of Religion: Non Verbal
Capps 257-330; Jeppe Sinding Jensen, "Universals, General Terms and the Comparative Study of
Religion," Numen, 48 (2001), 238-266 [JSTOR]; Jonathan Z. Smith “Acknowledgments:
Morphology and History in Mircea Eliade's Patterns in Comparative Religion (1949-1999), Part
1: The Work and Its Contents,” and Acknowledgments: Morphology and History in Mircea
Eliade's Patterns in Comparative Religion (1949-1999), Part 2: The Texture of the Work,”
History of Religions, 39 (2000), 315-31 and 332-51 [JSTOR]. Study for test.
Tu Nov 11 Class Summary Examination / Comparison of Religion
Reading List #: 5: “Secularization"; Leigh E. Schmidt, Deborah Dash Moor. Richard T. Hughes,
and Mark Valeri, "Secularization Forum: The Years Ahead in Scholarship," Religion and
American Culture,13 (2003), 1-25 [JSTOR]
Tu Nov 18 Secularization
Thomas A. Tweed, Grant Wacker, Jon Pahl, Valarie H. Ziegler and William D. Dinges, "Forum:
Teaching the Introductory Course in American Religion," Religion and American Culture, 12
(2002), 1-30 [JSTOR]; Rousseau on Civil Religion; Robert Bellah on Civil Religion in America;
List #6: Historical Problems in U.S. Religion
Tu Nov 25 Historical Problems in U.S. Religion
Capps 331-48;“Fundamentalism Project"; Andreas Grünschloß, "When We enter into My
Father's Space Craft: Cargoistic hopes and millenarian cosmologies in new religious UFO
movements," Marburg Journal of Religion, 3 (1998), 9 electronic pages ; Quellenkritik
Tu Dec 2 The Future of Religious Studies
Complete Research Proposals
M Dec 9 Final Exam Meeting to Discuss Thesis Project Proposals [Meet at Howe's House]
7:30 to 10:00 pm