Prompt:
Format: As with the first paper, the assignment is to be 5-7 double-spaced pages in length and should be treated as a concise but in-depth presentation of a research topic. Please remember that this paper is NOT an occasion for you to expound upon your personal beliefs regarding the perceived merits or deficiencies of a religious tradition, individual, idea, or theme. You will instead concentrate on formulating a crisp and cogent thesis, fashioning this into a clear argument, and supporting your writing with appropriate documentation. Any style questions can be answered by me or by consulting either the MLA Handbook or The Chicago Manual of Style.
You must work closely with the texts you choose to consult. For this assignment, you’ll have to be especially careful about using online resources, due to the large amount of misinformation and useless, non-credentialed opinion out there. The internet is, at best, only a partially valid tool for research (and is generally only of use once one has mastered traditional forms of research and can distinguish a legitimate source from the dreck usually found online). Usually newspaper websites, journals, or online encyclopedia hosted by universities will be okay. Additionally, primary sources (a tradition’s website, for example) will be fine as well, as long as you engage them from an analytical perspective.
Assignment: You are to make an analytical and historical case – based on diligent research – for a specific subject’s importance to the study of NRMs. (Think in terms of recommending a course change to be me, but don’t write from this perspective.) That is, what new way of understanding course content does your chosen topic provide? Your topic can take a number of forms: 1) a new text that should be included, 2) a film or artistic expression that should be considered (a symphony, a series of paintings, etc.), 3) a theme that needs to be foregrounded (e.g. superhero stories as alternate religious imagination), 4) a figure or movement that should be discussed, or 5) a new WAY of looking at something we already cover. You must draw on the historical knowledge you’ve acquired thus far, justify the topic’s merit with reference to the readings we’ve done, and use appropriate additional research to make your case. Most importantly, this is your chance to be creative and (I hope) have some fun.
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Just for reference here is what we have touched on in class:
PART I. ORIENTATIONS.
Tuesday January 9: Introductions and Gameplan
Thursday January 11: What is Religion? What is a “Cult”?
Reading:
Tara Isabella Burton, “What is a Cult?”: https://aeon.co/essays/theres-no-sharp-distinction-between-cult-and-regular-religion.
Tuesday January 16: America the Weird.
Reading:
Clifford Geertz, “Religion as a Cultural System”: http://nideffer.net/classes/GCT_RPI_S14/readings/Geertz_Religon_as_a_Cultural_System_.pdf.
Thursday January 18: New religions in the American grain
Reading:
CN chapter 4: https://catalog.lib.ncsu.edu/catalog/NCSU4928568.
Greil Marcus, “The Old Weird America” (excerpt): https://genius.com/Greil-marcus-the-old-weird-america-excerpt-annotated.
Tuesday January 23: Finding an Audience, Constructing an “Other”
Reading:
Sean McCloud, “Introduction” to Making the Religious Fringe, available at: https://flexpub.com/preview/making-the-american-religious-fringe.
Rebecca Moore, “The Brainwashing Myth”: https://theconversation.com/the-brainwashing-myth-99272.
Urban Introduction: https://catalog.lib.ncsu.edu/catalog/NCSU4290574.
PART II. OLD NEW RELIGIONS
Thursday January 25: Evangelicalism and Pentecostalism
Reading:
Grant Wacker, “Awakeners of the Heart” in Religion in American Life: https://catalog.lib.ncsu.edu/catalog/NCSU4311931.
Marne L. Campbell, “They Were All Filled with the Holy Ghost!” in:
https://catalog.lib.ncsu.edu/catalog/NCSU4935060.
Tuesday January 30: Snakes and the Lure of Outsiderdom
Reading:
Fred Brown and Jeanne McDonald, The Serpent Handlers, pp. 1-36: https://catalog.lib.ncsu.edu/catalog/NCSU3761167.
Thursday February 1: Communitarianism
Reading:
Robert Owen, “Oration Containing a Declaration of Mental Independence”: https://kdhist.sitehost.iu.edu/H105-documents-web/week11/Owen1826.html.
Peter von Ziegesar, “Reinventing Sex”: https://www.laphamsquarterly.org/flesh/reinventing-sex.
Tuesday February 6: Mormonism and Christian Science
Reading:
Mary Baker Eddy, “Medicine”
Urban chapter 3: https://catalog.lib.ncsu.edu/catalog/NCSU4290574.
PART III. MILLENNIALISM
Thursday February 8: 19th Century Millennialism
Reading:
William Miller, “A Scene of the Last Day”: https://adventistdigitallibrary.org/islandora/object/adl%3A22250397 (pp. 107-114).
Charles Taze Russell, “The Finished Mystery”:
https://www.gutenberg.org/files/46016/46016-pdf.pdf (pp. 244-257).
Tuesday February 13: NO CLASS – WELLNESS DAY
Thursday February 15: Contemporary Apocalypticism
Reading:
Michael Joseph Gross, “The Trials of Tribulation.” https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2000/01/the-trials-of-the-tribulation/377980/.
Hal Lindsey, “World War III.”
PAPER ONE DUE
Tuesday February 20: Branch Davidians
Reading:
David Koresh, “The Decoded Message of the Seven Seals of the Book of Revelation.”
Urban chapter 13: https://catalog.lib.ncsu.edu/catalog/NCSU4290574.
PART IV. IMPORTED RELIGIONS AND IMPROVISATIONS
Thursday February 22: History and Legacies
Reading:
Thomas Tweed, “Walking Through Fairyland”: http://www.ahandfulofleaves.org/documents/The%20American%20Encounter%20With%20Buddhism_Tweed.pdf (pp. 78-110).
Tuesday February 27: American Improvisations on Asian Religions
Reading:
Rev. Sun Myung Moon, Divine Principle, Introduction:
https://www.discoverdp.info/introduction.html.
Urban chapter 10: https://catalog.lib.ncsu.edu/catalog/NCSU4290574.
Thursday February 29: Marketing Buddhism and Religious Appropriations
Reading:
Teresa Watanabe, “Buddhism and Basketball?”
D.T. Suzuki, “What is Zen?”: https://terebess.hu/zen/mesterek/Suzuki-DT-Introduction-Zen-Buddhism.pdf (pp. 38-47).
Just take a quick look at this “primary source”: https://psychedelicsangha.org/.
Tuesday March 5: Afro-Caribbean Imports and African-American Esotericism
Reading:
The Holy Piby, chpt. 3: https://www.sacred-texts.com/afr/piby/piby08.htm.
Zora Neale Hurston, “Hoodoo in America,” pp. 362-68: https://www.jstor.org/stable/535394.
Laine Kaplan-Levenson, “Mother Catherine Seals and the Temple of the Innocent Blood”: https://www.wwno.org/post/mother-catherine-seals-and-temple-innocent-blood.
Urban chapter 6: https://catalog.lib.ncsu.edu/catalog/NCSU4290574.
Thursday March 7: Nation of Islam
Reading:
Elijah Muhammad, “Message to the Blackman in America”: Allah is God – Who is That Mystery God? Part 2; Original Man – Know Thyself; The Black Woman; A Program for Self-Development.
https://newsyllabus.files.wordpress.com/2016/08/message-to-the-blackman-elijah-muhammad.pdf.
Urban chapter 5: https://catalog.lib.ncsu.edu/catalog/NCSU4290574.
TAKE-HOME MIDTERM DISTRIBUTED (DUE MARCH 19 by beginning of class)
Tuesday March 12 – Thursday March 14: Spring Break
Tuesday March 19: The People’s Temple
Reading:
Sikivu Hutchinson, “Why Did So Many Black Women Die?”: https://religiondispatches.org/why-did-so-many-black-women-die-jonestown-at-35/.
Jim Jones interview: https://jonestown.sdsu.edu/?page_id=14016.
People’s Temple promotional booklet: https://jonestown.sdsu.edu/wp-content/uploads/2020/01/03-pt-booklet.pdf.
Thursday March 21: NO CLASS – Bivins Travel Day
Tuesday March 26: 19th Century Metaphysics
Reading:
Annie Besant, “Meaning and Method of the Spiritual Life”: https://www.theosophical.org/files/resources/articles/Meaning_and_Method_of_the_Spiritual_Life.pdf.
Urban chapter 4: https://catalog.lib.ncsu.edu/catalog/NCSU4290574.
PART V. OTHER WORLDS
Thursday March 28: New Age
Reading:
Urban chapter 11: https://catalog.lib.ncsu.edu/catalog/NCSU4290574.
Tuesday April 2: Eco-Feminism, Neo-Paganism, Wicca
Reading:
Urban Chpt. 8: https://catalog.lib.ncsu.edu/catalog/NCSU4290574.
Zitkala-Sa, “Why I Am a Pagan”: https://classes.matthewjbrown.net/teaching-files/american/Zitkala-Sa-Pagan.md.pdf.
“W.I.T.C.H. Manifesto” at: https://www.versobooks.com/blogs/4588-witchy-bitchy.
PAPER TWO DUE
Thursday April 4: UFO Religions
Reading:
William Cromie, “Alien Abduction Claims Examined”: https://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2003/02/alien-abduction-claims-examined-2/.
Benjamin Zeller, “The Religious Worldview of Heaven’s Gate” in: https://catalog.lib.ncsu.edu/catalog/NCSU4756411.
Tuesday April 9: Bright Side
Reading: Urban Chpt. 7: https://catalog.lib.ncsu.edu/catalog/NCSU4290574.
Skim: https://www.scientologycourses.org/tools-for-life/integrity/steps/two-rules-for-happy-living.html.
Thursday April 11: Dark Side
Reading: Urban Chpt. 9: https://catalog.lib.ncsu.edu/catalog/NCSU4290574.
Listen: https://www.npr.org/2019/04/27/717863758/filmmaker-and-satanic-temple-leader-talk-new-documentary-hail-satan.
Tuesday April 16: White Supremacist Religions
Reading:
CN, pp. 168-175: https://catalog.lib.ncsu.edu/catalog/NCSU4928568.
Marc Tuters and the Open Intelligence Lab, “Esoteric Fascism Online” in: https://catalog.lib.ncsu.edu/catalog/NCSU4850064.
David Walsh, “The Bloody History of America’s Christian Identity Movement”: https://www.tabletmag.com/sections/news/articles/the-bloody-history-of-americas-christian-identity-movement.
Thursday April 18: Conspiracy Theory
Reading:
David G. Robertson, “Conspiracy Theories About Secret Religions.”
Adrienne LaFrance, “The Prophecies of Q”: https://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2020/06/qanon-nothing-can-stop-what-is-coming/610567/.
Tuesday April 23: Invented Religions and
Reading:
Carol Cusack, “Third Millennium Invented Religions.”
“Father Yod Interview.”
