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Regular version of the site
Master 2020/2021

Аnthropology of Religion

Category 'Best Course for New Knowledge and Skills'
Type: Compulsory course (Global and Regional History)
Area of studies: History
Delivered by: Department of History
When: 1 year, 1, 2 module
Mode of studies: offline
Instructors: Vladimir Bobrovnikov, Jeanne Kormina
Master’s programme: Global and Regional History
Language: English
ECTS credits: 4
Contact hours: 32

Course Syllabus

Abstract

Questions of religion have been central to anthropology from its beginnings and remain so today when religion (re)emerges as a global force. While the early scholarship perceived religious phenomena through the skeptical lens of secular science, recent critiques brought up anthropology’s own orthodoxies and the need for theoretical and methodological renewal. Every new paradigm took up the challenge to explain religion and its pervasiveness in human culture and society. The anthropology of religion emerged out of such creative tensions as a vibrant field of theoretical inquiry and impressive scholarship. The course is structured around major themes that shaped the study of religion
Learning Objectives

Learning Objectives

  • The aim of the course is to introduce students into current theoretical debates in the filed of anthropology of religion.
  • The aim of the course is to discuss anthropological approach to the study of religion
Expected Learning Outcomes

Expected Learning Outcomes

  • Students understand the genealogy of the concept f religion
  • Students know main ideas of academic debates about non-linearity of secularisation
  • Students have knowledge on variety of rationalities
  • Students know that religion can provide people with moral examples to follow
  • Students have understanding on how religion is present in the public sphere
  • Students understand that mediation is. a crucial part of religious pracrice
Course Contents

Course Contents

  • Problems of definition
    Is there such a thing as 'religion'? The first class looks at one of the most inclusive definitions of religion and its critique.
  • Varieties of Secularism
    Although classical accounts of modernity predicted secularization, the world seems to be re-enchanted again, with religion fully reemerging in politics and the public sphere. What are the historical premises of secularization? How did different political orders accommodate religious forms? What are the modes of secularism predicated today?
  • Morality, Ethics and Self-cultivation
    Religion offers ethical models and practices that shape moral selves. The anthropology of morality has for long dwelt in the Durkheimian and Weberian legacy, but the recent ethical turn in the discipline brought a deeper understanding of the relationship between morality and religion.
  • Religious Temporalities and Regimes of Historicities
    Religions are grounded on distinct temporal ontologies that shape religious beliefs and practices. Such temporalities influence perceptions of social continuity or rupture and individuals’ becoming in history.
  • Religion, Mediation and Aesthetics s of Presence
    The concept of belief, central to most definitions of religion, came under strong critique for its Christian (Protestant) foundations. The shift from meaning to practices and processes of mediation has brought together religion and media in an innovative manner.
  • Secular sensibilities in a postsecular age
    This class returns to the public role of religion to ask questions about moral expectations, religious claims and the failure of secular politics.
  • Trading with God(s)
    How belief and religious affiliation define economic rationality?
Assessment Elements

Assessment Elements

  • non-blocking homework
  • non-blocking presentation of a text at the seminar, organization of discussion in class
  • non-blocking home exam - two short essays
Interim Assessment

Interim Assessment

  • Interim assessment (2 module)
    0.5 * home exam - two short essays + 0.25 * homework + 0.25 * presentation of a text at the seminar, organization of discussion in class
Bibliography

Bibliography

Recommended Core Bibliography

  • James S Bielo. (2015). Anthropology of Religion: The Basics. Routledge.

Recommended Additional Bibliography

  • Bielo, J. S. (2016). A companion to the anthropology of religion. Social Anthropology/Anthropologie Sociale, 24(1), 103–106. https://doi.org/10.1111/1469-8676.12247