SYLLABUS
AS.070.325
The Anthropology of Belief: Religious Experience, Publics, and Personhood
AS.070.325
The Anthropology of Belief: Religious Experience, Publics, and Personhood
Marieke Wilson
marieke@jhu.edu (443) 691-4666
marieke@jhu.edu (443) 691-4666
MWF 11-11:50am
*SUBJECT TO CHANGE*
INSTRUCTIONAL GOALS
*SUBJECT TO CHANGE*
INSTRUCTIONAL GOALS
Office Hours by appointment and Wednesday 12-3 pm
The aim of this course is to enable you to ask intelligent questions about the ways individuals are
called upon as “religious”, and more specifically, to allow to you to engage in a reflection on the
publics of which they are a part, and the means by which they come to cultivate a sense of
personhood. Closely reading theory, ethnography, and literature in relation to each other, we will
try to develop a nuanced understanding of the many ways in which human beings have imagined
and conducted themselves as religious persons. How do ideas of imagination, habit, desire, and the
senses play into our understanding of cultures of faith?
The readings assigned underscore the need to address three major themes in an increasingly religious and politically fraught world: 1) the meaning of particular rituals and practices of faith and belief in the context of the larger culture; 2) the structure and make-up of the “publics”, whether secular or religious or both, which individuals claim to belong to or are “claimed” by; 3) and finally, the ways in which individuals engage in practices which shape their identities and help cultivate a sense of self in relation to these. Readings will not be limited to any specific region or religion; rather, they will span different areas of the globe in an attempt to purvey a more comprehensive understanding of larger structures of belief in relation to historical-political landscapes. We will also attempt to address differences in religio-cultural concepts of personal trajectories in "life" in a way that will allow you to examine your own knowledge and experience, and the possibly varied ways in which our daily ethics are referential to bigger principles- this is further described in the final project below under “Policies and Procedures”. I hope to draw you into a profound conversation about faith and identity which will also help you better understand the underpinnings and potential outcomes of contemporary religious and political movements which affect the world we live in everyday and change the ways in which we relate to each other as human beings. I believe this kind of mental labor can be accomplished in part by the examination of the historical and contemporary anthropological perspectives I am proposing we survey.
The readings assigned underscore the need to address three major themes in an increasingly religious and politically fraught world: 1) the meaning of particular rituals and practices of faith and belief in the context of the larger culture; 2) the structure and make-up of the “publics”, whether secular or religious or both, which individuals claim to belong to or are “claimed” by; 3) and finally, the ways in which individuals engage in practices which shape their identities and help cultivate a sense of self in relation to these. Readings will not be limited to any specific region or religion; rather, they will span different areas of the globe in an attempt to purvey a more comprehensive understanding of larger structures of belief in relation to historical-political landscapes. We will also attempt to address differences in religio-cultural concepts of personal trajectories in "life" in a way that will allow you to examine your own knowledge and experience, and the possibly varied ways in which our daily ethics are referential to bigger principles- this is further described in the final project below under “Policies and Procedures”. I hope to draw you into a profound conversation about faith and identity which will also help you better understand the underpinnings and potential outcomes of contemporary religious and political movements which affect the world we live in everyday and change the ways in which we relate to each other as human beings. I believe this kind of mental labor can be accomplished in part by the examination of the historical and contemporary anthropological perspectives I am proposing we survey.
COURSE SCHEDULE*
*NB: While the readings below may appear copious, please keep in mind that we will be reading very short passages from each text relevant to the week’s theme.
Week One: Introduction to the Anthropology of Religion
Robbins, Joel. Becoming Sinners: Christianity and Moral Torment in a Papua New Guinea Society. Durkheim, Emile. The Elementary Forms of the Religious Life, a Study in Religious Sociology. Berlinski, Mischa. Fieldwork.
Week Two: Adventures in the Cultivation of the Spiritual Self
Ivy, Marilyn. Discourses of the Vanishing: Modernity, Phantasm, Japan.
Pierre Hadot, “Spiritual Exercises” and “Reflections on the Idea of ‘The Cultivation of the Self’”. Silber, Joan. Ideas of Heaven: A Ring of Stories.
Week Three: Forms of Religious Adherence
Hirschkind, Charles. The Ethical Soundscape: Cassette Sermons and Islamic Counterpublics.
Pierre Bourdieu, “Structures, Habitus, Practices”. Rushdie, Salman. The Satanic Verses.
Week Four: Mediatization and the Religious Self
Meyer, Birgit and Moors, Annelies. Religion, Media, and the Public Sphere. DeVries, Weber, eds. Religion and Media (Cultural Memory in the Present). Orwell, George. 1984.
Week Five: Religious Pilgrimages, Sacrifice, and Myth
Burkert, Walter. Homo Necans: The Anthropology of Ancient Greek Sacrificial Ritual and Myth. Asad, Talal. Formations of the Secular: Christianity, Islam, Modernity.
Homer. Ulysses.
Faulkner, William. As I Lay Dying.
Week Six: Being Defined
Mahmood, Saba. The Politics of Piety: The Islamic Revival and the Feminist Subject. MacIntyre, Alasdair. After Virtue.
Mohsin, Hamid. The Reluctant Fundamentalist.
Week Seven: Sacrifice and Faith
James Laidlaw, “A Life Worth Leaving: Fasting to Death as Telos of a Jain Religious Life” Brian Massumi, “The Autonomy of Affect”.
McArthy, Cormac. Suttree.
Week Eight: Encountering Religious Others
Keene, Webb. Christian Moderns: Freedom and Fetish in the Mission Encounter.
Maurice Merleau-Ponty, Phenomenology of Perception, selections. Kingsolver, Barbara. The Poisonwood Bible.
*NB: While the readings below may appear copious, please keep in mind that we will be reading very short passages from each text relevant to the week’s theme.
Week One: Introduction to the Anthropology of Religion
Robbins, Joel. Becoming Sinners: Christianity and Moral Torment in a Papua New Guinea Society. Durkheim, Emile. The Elementary Forms of the Religious Life, a Study in Religious Sociology. Berlinski, Mischa. Fieldwork.
Week Two: Adventures in the Cultivation of the Spiritual Self
Ivy, Marilyn. Discourses of the Vanishing: Modernity, Phantasm, Japan.
Pierre Hadot, “Spiritual Exercises” and “Reflections on the Idea of ‘The Cultivation of the Self’”. Silber, Joan. Ideas of Heaven: A Ring of Stories.
Week Three: Forms of Religious Adherence
Hirschkind, Charles. The Ethical Soundscape: Cassette Sermons and Islamic Counterpublics.
Pierre Bourdieu, “Structures, Habitus, Practices”. Rushdie, Salman. The Satanic Verses.
Week Four: Mediatization and the Religious Self
Meyer, Birgit and Moors, Annelies. Religion, Media, and the Public Sphere. DeVries, Weber, eds. Religion and Media (Cultural Memory in the Present). Orwell, George. 1984.
Week Five: Religious Pilgrimages, Sacrifice, and Myth
Burkert, Walter. Homo Necans: The Anthropology of Ancient Greek Sacrificial Ritual and Myth. Asad, Talal. Formations of the Secular: Christianity, Islam, Modernity.
Homer. Ulysses.
Faulkner, William. As I Lay Dying.
Week Six: Being Defined
Mahmood, Saba. The Politics of Piety: The Islamic Revival and the Feminist Subject. MacIntyre, Alasdair. After Virtue.
Mohsin, Hamid. The Reluctant Fundamentalist.
Week Seven: Sacrifice and Faith
James Laidlaw, “A Life Worth Leaving: Fasting to Death as Telos of a Jain Religious Life” Brian Massumi, “The Autonomy of Affect”.
McArthy, Cormac. Suttree.
Week Eight: Encountering Religious Others
Keene, Webb. Christian Moderns: Freedom and Fetish in the Mission Encounter.
Maurice Merleau-Ponty, Phenomenology of Perception, selections. Kingsolver, Barbara. The Poisonwood Bible.
Week Nine: Imagination and Creativity in the Cultivation of a Religious Self
Crapanzano, Vincent. Tuhami: Portrait of a Moroccan.
Pandolfo, Stefania. The Impasse of Angels: Scenes from a Moroccan Space of Memory. Friedrich Nietzsche, On the Genealogy of Morals, Preface and Essay II.
Camus, Albert. The First Man.
Week Ten: Personal and Pubic Religious Practice
Warner, Michael. Publics and Counterpublics.
Warner, Michael, VanAntwerpen, Jonathan, eds. Varieties of Secularism in a Secular Age. Butler, Judith. The Power of Religion in the Public Sphere.
Barry, Sebastian. The Secret Scripture: A Novel.
Week Eleven: The Politics of Conviction
Harding, Susan. The Book of Jerry Falwell: Fundamentalist Language and Politics. Crapanzano, Vincent. Serving the Word: Literalism in America from the Pulpit to the Bench. Bunyan, John. The Pilgrim’s Progress.
Week Twelve: Belonging, Between Worlds
Benor, Sarah. Becoming Frum: How Newcomers Learn the Language and Culture of Orthodox Judaism.
Taylor, Charles. A Secular Age. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2007. Jacobsen, Howard. The Finkler Question.
Week Thirteen: Divination and Loss
Barber, Karen. I COULD SPEAK UNTIL TOMORROW: ORIKI, WOMEN AND THE PAST IN A YORUBA TOWN (International African Library).
Barber, Karin. The Anthropology of Texts, Persons, and Publics.
Achebe, Chinua. Things Fall Apart.
*Short Discussion about Final Projects*
POLICIES AND PROCEDURES
General Rules/Grading:
I also expect you to make one brief post to the course blog discussion site by midnight on the day before class each week. In this short post, you may either comment on what intrigues you or confuses you about the reading, or raise a question for discussion. Your participation grade for the course will be assessed based on both your in-class comments and your online postings. In addition, your written assignments for the course will be as follows. You will be expected to write three brief (three full double-spaced page) commentaries during the first three-fourths of the course, in which you may choose one of the weeks’ readings in each section of the course and compare the arguments at work in the texts at hand for that week. Your final paper will be more creative in nature. I will ask you to identify and conduct ethnographic research with one person that you may know or meet who actively practices his or her faith in order to learn and write about some aspect of their conception of religious selfhood. You will have the freedom to focus this paper as you like, drawing on written materials from both within and beyond the course. This paper should be 10-12 double-spaced pages in length. You will be graded for the course as follows: participation (30%) / commentaries (30%) / final paper (40%).
Crapanzano, Vincent. Tuhami: Portrait of a Moroccan.
Pandolfo, Stefania. The Impasse of Angels: Scenes from a Moroccan Space of Memory. Friedrich Nietzsche, On the Genealogy of Morals, Preface and Essay II.
Camus, Albert. The First Man.
Week Ten: Personal and Pubic Religious Practice
Warner, Michael. Publics and Counterpublics.
Warner, Michael, VanAntwerpen, Jonathan, eds. Varieties of Secularism in a Secular Age. Butler, Judith. The Power of Religion in the Public Sphere.
Barry, Sebastian. The Secret Scripture: A Novel.
Week Eleven: The Politics of Conviction
Harding, Susan. The Book of Jerry Falwell: Fundamentalist Language and Politics. Crapanzano, Vincent. Serving the Word: Literalism in America from the Pulpit to the Bench. Bunyan, John. The Pilgrim’s Progress.
Week Twelve: Belonging, Between Worlds
Benor, Sarah. Becoming Frum: How Newcomers Learn the Language and Culture of Orthodox Judaism.
Taylor, Charles. A Secular Age. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2007. Jacobsen, Howard. The Finkler Question.
Week Thirteen: Divination and Loss
Barber, Karen. I COULD SPEAK UNTIL TOMORROW: ORIKI, WOMEN AND THE PAST IN A YORUBA TOWN (International African Library).
Barber, Karin. The Anthropology of Texts, Persons, and Publics.
Achebe, Chinua. Things Fall Apart.
*Short Discussion about Final Projects*
POLICIES AND PROCEDURES
General Rules/Grading:
I also expect you to make one brief post to the course blog discussion site by midnight on the day before class each week. In this short post, you may either comment on what intrigues you or confuses you about the reading, or raise a question for discussion. Your participation grade for the course will be assessed based on both your in-class comments and your online postings. In addition, your written assignments for the course will be as follows. You will be expected to write three brief (three full double-spaced page) commentaries during the first three-fourths of the course, in which you may choose one of the weeks’ readings in each section of the course and compare the arguments at work in the texts at hand for that week. Your final paper will be more creative in nature. I will ask you to identify and conduct ethnographic research with one person that you may know or meet who actively practices his or her faith in order to learn and write about some aspect of their conception of religious selfhood. You will have the freedom to focus this paper as you like, drawing on written materials from both within and beyond the course. This paper should be 10-12 double-spaced pages in length. You will be graded for the course as follows: participation (30%) / commentaries (30%) / final paper (40%).
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