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 Our goal in the Religion department at Wesleyan is to figure out religion.
Religion departments, including those with Wesleyan's distinctive approach, are
not in the business of making students religious. Today, our goal is more
demanding because of the so-called "return of religion," especially in Africa,
Asia, Latin America, and the Middle East. This growth has not always been
welcomed in University circles, which have invested much in European theories of
secularization that envision the disappearance of religion. However, the
pluralistic United States is more than a setting of thriving religious
competition; it has become a chief site of the academic study of religion. This
site is well occupied by liberal arts departments of religion, which are
redefining the field. In this context, the Wesleyan Religion department is
deliberately interdisciplinary. We figure out religion by practicing historical,
social-scientific, textual, and theological methodologies. The two
anthropologists of religion in the department contribute to our
cross-disciplinary approach.
Our majors are required to take a Colloquium
on theories and methods in these method and theory courses. At a more
elementary level, majors and non-majors are introduced to the field through the
disciplines we relate. Our pioneering Introduction to Religion is no grand tour
of world religions; it wrestles with what is religious about rituals,
spirituality, sacred traditions, stories, and societies. Besides the
Introduction, three of our general courses--on Buddhism, Judaism, and the New
Testament, respectively--all seek to integrate the interdisciplinary study of
religion. Such study, sometimes uncomfortably critical, is the first distinctive
feature of our department. The second feature is the emphasis we place on the
study of thematic approach. We seek to figure out religion when and
where it takes place, whether it is subversive or transformative. The
department's thematic approach component enhances our long standing
cross-cultural approach and highlights how thoroughly international our program
has become.
Our teaching and research spans American and African American
religions in the U.S. and the Caribbean; Buddhism in India and Tibet;
Christianity from its beginnings through modern Europe and southern Africa; and Judaism in the Middle East throughout the diaspora,
South Asia, particularly on Muslims and Hindus in contemporary rural India,
intersections of continental philosophy and Christian theology, and in North
America. Our faculty pursues field research in Alabama, Haiti, Nepal, Jerusalem,
and India. Many of our majors undertake research and field
studies abroad--in Europe, Asia, Africa, the Americas, as well as in our own
Program in Israel. Novel combinations of fieldwork in religion and disciplined
textual interpretation are a vital part of our program.
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