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Tag: Religion

Unexpected Paths to Intended Outcomes: Using Digital Tools in Religious Studies

by Ellie Dilworth
young man in crimson white Alabama band uniform, standing in formation in football stadium

What happens when a Criminology and Criminal Justice major takes a Religious Studies class? Well, forDrake Jones, a new major and new perspectives were in store. Drake, one of our majors expecting to graduate this fall (and a trombone player in the Million Dollar Band), came to REL for Dr. Richard Newton’s African Diaspora class in the Spring of 2023. With this class, he contributed significantly to the ongoing effort to digitize and analyze data related to the Decoding Diaspora […]

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Taylor Swift, Gameday, and Church

by Steven Ramey
Taylor Swift in green dress on stage with backup singers at Eras concert, fans in background

Taylor Swift’s concert tour has generated significant attention with heartwarming stories of supportive parents, marriage proposals, and the like, along with lots of memes. One author compared the experience with group singing in worship settings, calling the concert “The Church of Taylor Swift”. The post certainly touches on an important element within both Taylor Swift concerts and congregational worship, the experience of group singing. However, thinking critically about who creates the comparison, based on what assumptions, and for what ends […]

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Who Believes in Conspiracy Theories?

by Steven Ramey
Billboard stating "Birds Aren't Real"

  As a scholar in religious studies, my interest was piqued when a recent “The Daily” episode from the New York Times discussed community formation in Birds Aren’t Real, a movement / conspiracy theory that claims the government has replaced birds with drones to conduct widespread surveillance. The analysis of people who connect with others through Birds Aren’t Real had similarities to the ways that we discuss religions. Of course, connecting conspiracy theories and religion is not unique to me, […]

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The Ins and Outs of Archival Research

by Morgan Frick

Prof. Nathan Loewen received funding from the University of Alabama, a while back, to conduct archival research on the Derrida Papers in Irvine, California. So REL MA student, Morgan Frick, posed a few questions to him about what all that archival work entails. Morgan: What was the project and how did you hope to improve your research with this archival work? Nathan: In 2016-17, I was really fortunate to be funded by the Research Grants Committee at UA. My position at […]

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Studying The Bible in Culture: Is it Syncretism or Redaction?

by Richard Newton

In our series on studying the Bible in Culture. Religion major Will Watson ’21 shares how he studied the Bible in Culture as part of an independent study with Prof. Newton. Be sure to also check out the first and second installments of this series.  During the course of my independent study with Dr. Newton, we covered a wide range of topics that ultimately coalesced in an essay that outlined the process for understanding religion in culture that we had extrapolated throughout our semester […]

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