Spring 2017

Religious Studies 001. Survey of Religion (4 units)
Wendy Terry

Lecture:
MWF 10:00-10:50A
26 Wellman Hall

Discussion Sections:

Course Description: Basic concepts introduced through readings of the primary religious literature. Discussion of central ideas (creation, history, law, prophecy, suffering, mysticism, asceticism, karma, reincarnation, moksha, etc.); readings from the Bible, Bhagavad Gita, the Koran, selections from Plato and early Buddhist writings.

Prerequisite: None.

GE credit (Old): Arts & Humanities, Diversity, and Writing Experience.
GE credit (New): American Cultures, Arts & Humanities, Domestic Diversity, Oral Literacy, Visual Literacy, and Writing Experience.

Format: Lecture - 3 hours; Discussion - 1 hour.

Textbook:

• Jeffrey Brodd, et al., Invitation to World Religions  (Oxford University Press, 2012)

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Religious Studies 010. Healthcare and Religious Belief (2 units)
Meaghan O'Keefe

MW 11:00-11:50A
3 Kleiber Hall
CRN 88455

Course Description: This course examines how various religious traditions deal with the ethical dilemmas involved in healthcare. We will study topics such as the end of life, caring for the sick, dealing with disasters with limited resources, growing up, birth, pregnancy, and conception. Rather than making judgments about what’s right and what’s wrong in a particular situation, we will investigate how different religious traditions categorize, understand, and encourage ethical actions in a given context. We will also examine how religious ideas can, at times, complicate the process of providing individual healthcare  as well the design and delivery of public health programs.

May be repeated for credit when topic changes.

Prerequisite: None.

GE credit (Old): Arts & Humanities and Writing Experience.
GE credit (New): Arts & Humanities and Writing Experience.

Format: Lecture - 2 hours.

Textbooks:

• TBA
   

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Religious Studies 030. Religions of South Asia (4 units)
Archana Venkatesan

Lecture:
TR 3:10-4:30P
1130 Hart Hall

Discussion Sections:

Course Description: This course is an examination of the religious traditions of the Indian subcontinent. Attentive to the political and social contexts in which specific religious traditions, such as Hinduism, Buddhism, Sikhism and Islam, were formed, the course will also explore the ways in which religious communities interact in South Asia. Thus, we will not only attend to the ways religion and religious ideas are articulated in a textual canon, but will also examine the lived/living dimensions of religious experience in the region.

Prerequisite: None.

GE credit (Old): Arts & Humanities, Diversity and Writing Experience.
GE credit (New): Arts & Humanities, Visual Literacy, World Cultures and Writing Experience.

Format: Lecture - 3 hours; Discussion - 1 hour.

Textbook:

• South Asian Religions: Tradition and Today, edited by Karen Pechilis and Selva J. Raj  (Routledge Press, 2012)

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Religious Studies 070. Religion and Language (4 units)
Flagg Miller

TR 10:30-11:50A
80 Social Sciences Building
CRN 91154

Course Description: How does language shape the understanding and practice of religion?  Do our own culturally specific vocabularies provide insight into the nature of the divine?  Alternatively, does religion require us to expand our linguistic repertoires, both modern and classical, in order to appreciate the rich historical legacies of spiritual thought and practice?  This course is designed to provide students with a basic toolkit for analyzing religious discourse in a variety of traditions.  Special attention will be given to the embedding of verbal form in social contexts ranging from the sacred to the mundane, the mystical to the reasonable, the wondrous to the ordinary.  Studies of ritual, symbolic practice and the use of media technologies will help us consider the relation of language to non-linguistic practice; they will also allow us to explore the complexities of religious language as a form of self-expression.  As we will discover, religious selfhood is highly mediated by hierarchies of class, ethnicity, race, and gender.  Throughout the course we will focus specifically on the legacies of Western colonialism on ideas about religious discourse and its most eloquent exponents.  Material covered will include not only canonical sacred texts but also magical spells, prayers, songs, grammar primers, legal documents, lectures at militant training camps, and collective study groups.

Prerequisite: None.

GE credit (Old): Arts & Humanities, Diversity and Writing Experience.
GE credit (New): Arts & Humanities, World Cultures and Writing Experience.

Format: Lecture/Discussion - 3 hours; Term Paper.

Textbooks:

• TBA

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Religious Studies 138. Human Rights, Gender and Sexuality (4 units)      [Cross-listed with HMR 138]
Meaghan O'Keefe

MWF 9:00-9:50A
101 Olson Hall
CRN 91157

Course Description: Gender and sexuality in the context of human rights. Topics include women's participation in the public sphere, the right to change gender, the right for family privacy, and the right to marriage.

Prerequisite: None.

GE credit (Old): Arts & Humanities.
GE credit (New): Arts & Humanities, World Cultures and Writing Experience.

Format: Lecture/Discussion - 3 hours; Term Paper.

Textbooks:

• TBA

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Religious Studies 154. The Hindu Temple (4 units)      [Cross-listed with ART 154]
Layne Little

TR 12:10-1:30P
204 Art Building
CRN 91871

Course Description: Comparative history of architecture and symbolism of the Hindu Temple in India, Southeast Asia and the United States. Attention to the temple as expression of religious knowledge, political authority, and cultural heritage through the lens of colonialism and postcolonialism.

Prerequisite: None.

GE credit (Old): Arts & Humanities or Social Sciences.
GE credit (New): Arts & Humanities or Social Sciences; Visual Literacy, World Cultures and Writing Experience.

Format: Lecture - 3 hours; Term Paper.

Textbooks:

• TBA
   

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Religious Studies 158. The Ramayana (4 units)     Cross-listed with COM 156
Archana Venkatesan

W 1:10-4:00P
1006 Geidt Hall
CRN 91158

Course Description: This course examines Ramayana story traditions with a primary focus on its many literary and oral variants.

Prerequisite: None.

GE Credits (Old): Arts & Humanities, Diversity and Writing Experience.
GE Credit (New): Arts & Humanities, World Cultures and Writing Experience.

Format: Lecture - 3 hours; Term Paper.

Textbooks:

• Valmiki, The Ramayana, translated by Arshia Sattar  (Penguin Global Press, 2010) ***
        *** Students will need to purchase the above text online
• Many Rāmāyaṇas: The Diversity of a Narrative Tradition in South Asia, edited by Paula Richman  (Oxford University Press, 1991)
• The Rāmāyaṇa Revisited, edited by Mandakranta Bose  (Oxford University Press, 2004)

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Religious Studies 161B. Modern Islam: Authority and Tradition in Process (4 units)
Flagg Miller

TR 3:10-4:30P
101 Olson Hall
CRN 91159

Course Description: This course is designed to provide you with a range of analytic perspectives on modern Islamic thought, society, and politics.  Special attention will be given to discussions on the nature of moral authority and its relation to concepts of tradition.  Through case studies of societies across the Islamic world, and especially in the Middle East, North Africa, and North America, we will develop a tool-set for analyzing how various forms of political organization draw from traditions of Muslim moral inquiry and redeploy them in contemporary life.  Special emphasis on media culture will be sustained throughout the course, and will provide a comparative framework for exploring changes in notions of political community.

Prerequisite: None.

GE credit (Old): Arts & Humanities or Social Sciences; Diversity and Writing Experience.
GE credit (New): Arts & Humanities or Social Sciences; Oral Literacy, World Cultures and Writing Experience.

Format: Lecture - 3 hours; Writing.

Textbooks:

• TBA

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Religious Studies 162. Introduction to Islamic Law (4 units) 
Mairaj Syed

TR 1:40-3:00P
212 Wellman Hall
CRN 91170

Course Description: The development of Islamic law in the formative centuries of Islam, ca. 600-1000, as well as its adaptation to changing economic, social, and political conditions in subsequent periods. Legal schools, legal theory, the Shari'a, reformist movements, human rights.

Prerequisite: None.

GE credit (Old): Arts & Humanities or Social Sciences; Diversity and Writing Experience.
GE credit (New): Arts & Humanities, World Cultures and Writing Experience.

Format: Lecture - 3 hours; Term Paper.

Textbooks:

• TBA

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Religious Studies 170. Buddhism (4 units)
Thorian Harris

MWF 12:10-1:00P
80 Social Sciences Building
CRN 91409

Course Description: Buddhism in its pan-Asian manifestations, from its beginning in India to its development in Sri Lanka and Southeast Asia, Central Asia, China and Japan; teachings and practices, socio-political and cultural impact.

Prerequisite: None.

GE credit (Old): Arts & Humanities.
GE credit (New): Arts & Humanities, Visual Literacy and World Cultures.

Format: Lecture - 3 hours; Term Paper.

Textbooks:

• TBA 

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Religious Studies 190. Breaking Bad: Rabbinic and Psychoanalytic Theories of Pathology (4 units)
Naomi Janowitz

T 6:10-9:00P
922 Sproul Hall
CRN 92405

Course Description: Allows majors to integrate their disciplined study of the field. Emphasis on current scholarly debate about the methods for analyzing and comparing diverse religious traditions.

Prerequisite: Consent of instructor (nhjanowitz@ucdavis.edu). Required of all Religious Studies majors.

GE credit (Old): None.
GE credit (New): None.

Format: Seminar - 3 hours; Term Paper.

Textbooks:

• TBA