How does a culture conceptualize its natural environment in aesthetic, political, and even religious terms, and what does a landscape “mean” in this context? This interdisciplinary course explores how Russian writers, filmmakers, and artists have represented the vast territory comprising Imperial Russia, the USSR, and the Russian Federation, from the Enlightenment to present. In addition to considering how artistic production has reflected and shaped understanding of the Russian “anthropocene,” we will compare these works with cultural production of the Western tradition.

The four-skills (listening, speaking, reading and writing) introduction to the Russian language with the focus on communicative skills development. Major structural topics include pronunciation and intonation, all six cases, all tenses and verbal aspect. By the end of the course, students are able to sustain conversation on basic topics, write short compositions, read short authentic texts, as well as develop an understanding of Russian culture through watching, discussing and writing on movies, short stories, folk tales and poems. This is a full-year course.

Same as REl 242. As devotional objects, political symbols, and art commodities, Russia’s sacred art—the icon—has been revered as sacred, vilified as reactionary, embraced in rebellion, destroyed as dangerous, and sold as masterpieces. Engaging the fields of religion, material and visual culture, and ritual studies, this course examines the life and language of this art form, and its role in shaping Russia’s turbulent history.

Same as RES 242. As devotional objects, political symbols, and art commodities, Russia’s sacred art—the icon—has been revered as sacred, vilified as reactionary, embraced in rebellion, destroyed as dangerous, and sold as masterpieces. Engaging the fields of religion, material and visual culture, and ritual studies, this course examines the life and language of this art form, and its role in shaping Russia’s turbulent history.

Topics course: The intellectual collaboration and friendship of C. S. Lewis, the literary historian, religious writer, critic, and fantasist, and J.R.R. Tolkien, the philologist and mythographer of Middle-earth. Attention given to their contributions to medieval studies, their mythopoeic fiction, moral and theological themes in their writings, and their response to war and "the Machine." Enrollment limited to 12.

In the 1970s, many Christian, Jewish, and Buddhist communities in America began ordaining women as ministers, rabbis, priests, and teachers. This change in policy provided women long-denied vocational paths, necessitated new theological self-understandings and ritual forms, and served as a proxy for larger culture war divisions in America. While focused on the last fifty years, this course provides a wider historical narrative for these developments, from the bold revivalism of colonial-era women preachers to anti-racist activism by contemporary Zen senseis.

The Qur’an, according to the majority of Muslims, is God’s word revealed to Muhammad through the angel Gabriel over a period of 22 years (610–632 C.E.). This course introduces students to Islam’s scriptural text: its content, form, structure and history. It also situates the Qur’an in the larger frame of the genre of Scripture: What does it mean for a text to be revealed? Study of the Qur’an as a seventh-century product, as well as the history of reception of this text.

Major themes addressed by Muslim thinkers since the 18th century, such as Islamic reform and revival, the encounters with colonialism and imperialism, nationalism and other modern ideologies; and Islamic discussions of modernity, liberalism, conservatism, fundamentalism and militancy. Reading of primary sources in translation.

Whether revered as the Mother of God or remembered as a single Jewish mother of an activist, Mary has both inspired and challenged generations of Christian women and men worldwide. This course focuses on key developments in the “history of Mary” since early Christian times to the present. How has her image shaped global Christianities? What does her perceived image in any given age tell us about personal and collective identities?

Critical reading and discussion of Wisdom texts in the Hebrew Bible and Apocrypha (Job, selected Psalms, Proverbs, Ecclesiastes, Sirach, Wisdom of Solomon, etc.) as well as some of the shorter narrative and poetic texts in the Writings such as Ruth, Esther and Song of Songs.