Introduction to the contemporary Russian language, presenting the fundamentals of Russian grammar and syntax. The course helps the student make balanced progress in listening comprehension, speaking, reading, writing, and cultural competence. Five meetings per week.
Limited to 12 students. Fall semester. Senior Lecturer Babyonyshev.
How to handle overenrollment: Amherst students will be given priority consideration.
Introduction to the contemporary Russian language, presenting the fundamentals of Russian grammar and syntax. The course helps the student make balanced progress in listening comprehension, speaking, reading, writing, and cultural competence. Five meetings per week.
Limited to 12 students. Fall semester. Senior Lecturer Babyonyshev.
How to handle overenrollment: Amherst students will be given priority consideration.
Required of candidates for Honors in Religion. Preparation and oral defense of a scholarly essay on a topic approved by the Department. Detailed outline of thesis and adequate bibliography for project required before Thanksgiving; preliminary version of substantial portion of thesis by end of the semester.
Open to seniors with consent of the instructors. Fall semester. The Department.
How to handle overenrollment: null
Independent Reading Course. Reading in an area selected by the student and approved in advance by a member of the Department.
Fall and spring semesters. The Department.
How to handle overenrollment: null
Students who enroll in this course will likely encounter and be expected to engage in the following intellectual skills, modes of learning, and assessment: in-depth independent student research and substantial written work
For the Rabbis of post-biblical Judaism, the Hebrew Bible was a sacred resource to be mined, interpreted, developed, and reapplied. This course explores the rich corpus produced in classical Judaism of the post-biblical period.
A growing sense of alienation and a fear of disaster affect our daily lives as extreme weather events, superbugs, and political upheaval increasingly become part of experienced, perceived, or dreaded reality. We seem to inhabit a world turned upside-down. Among Jews, the period from the sixth century B.C.E. to the first century of the Common Era was comparable to our own in terms of mood and the range human responses.
How do ideas about Hell and the possibility of eternal punishment shape attitudes toward death, influence understandings of morality, and reflect lived realities? Focusing on the history of Christian formulations of Hell, this course explores the variety of ways people have imagined what happens to them after death, how those ideas have developed, and what those ideas can tell us about the people who wrote, read, and talked about Hell.
This course introduces students to the academic study of religion by exploring the practices and material culture of Christianity during its first six centuries. We will consider how the lived experience of Christianity shaped religious subjectivities and how it intersected with the practices of Roman imperialism and hierarchies of gender, class, and ethnicity. Our examinations will include ritual practices, material culture, architectural spaces, relics and pilgrimage, music, olfaction, food cultures, and magic.
(Offered as RELI 134 and AMST 246) This course offers a historical introduction to several of the major religious traditions in America. To unpack the vast diversity of “religious traditions” in America, this course will take two approaches. First it will map out the roots and routes of “communities” including, but not limited to, Jews, Catholics, Buddhists, Protestants, Muslims, and various “American Originals” such as Jehovah's Witnesses, Seventh Day Adventists, Latter Day Saints (Mormons), and Pentecostals.
This course will explore the meaning, significance, and role of mysticism in two different religious traditions. It has been argued that mysticism is the highest manifestation of religion, and that mystical awareness or experience is the ultimate human goal. Our deeper study of this manifestation, awareness, and experience promises to illuminate the ideals and practices which are subsumed under the category of mysticism. Our engagement will be comparative in nature, focusing on African Religious Traditions and Islam.
