I do no speak or read French. Many years ago, however, in undergraduate school, I had a professor of English literature who was inordinately fond of the French phrase épater les bourgeoise—as he would translate it on a regular basis, “to shock the ordinary human being out of his [or her] lethargy.” That is, there are those works, persons, events to which ordinary human beings, most of us, can only react in shock, sometimes in dismay; other times in paralysis. […]
Category: Religion in Culture
Posts in this category discuss how those aspects of culture known as religion can be studied in a way comparable to all other cultural practices.
7 Things I Learned at HILT for the Digital Study of Religion
Prof. Nathan Loewen specializes in the philosophy of religion and digital humanities among other things. This summer his research interests are taking him in a new direction at their intersection. Last week, I travelled to the 2019 Humanities Intensive Learning and Teaching event to learn about text analysis from Katie Rawson. Here are just a few outcomes from those five days. […]
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Power and Perfect Pictures
This post is part of a series that originated out of a photo essay assignment in Dr. Simmons’s Interim “Religion and Pop Culture” course that asked students to apply discussion themes to everyday objects or experiences. When I was younger and more naive, I thought the future would have flying cars, cured diseases, and immortal people. Today popular culture more often utilizes trends of a dystopian future, such as the ones in The Hunger Games and Divergent. In these stories, […]
The Performances We Give Every Day
This post is part of a series that originated out of a photo essay assignment in Dr. Simmons’s Interim “Religion and Pop Culture” course that asked students to apply discussion themes to everyday objects or experiences. The time is Halloween 2018, and my nephews—ages nine and seven—are focused on one thing. They eat, sleep, and breathe Power Rangers. For them, these action heroes make the world go round. So naturally, at Halloween, the only costuming option as far as they […]
Defending Non-“Real” Music
This post is part of a series that originated out of a photo essay assignment in Dr. Simmons’s Interim “Religion and Pop Culture” course that asked students to apply discussion themes to everyday objects or experiences. I think there’s a power in not caring about the opinions of others. If we place enough value on something, then no matter what the opinions of others are, we can still look at it with a sense of pride. Taking away the “unfortunate […]
Reading, Writing and… R: How I Began to Study the Philosophy of Religion with Digital Tools
Prof. Nathan Loewen specializes in the philosophy of religion and digital humanities among other things. This summer his research interests are taking him in a new direction at their intersection. In Fall 2018, I took my research in a new direction. I began learning how to study the philosophy of religion with digital tools. The objective is to determine how to quantitatively test my qualitative argument that the field is historically structured by commitments to theism in ways that challenge its […]
Power Always Changes
This post is part of a series that originated out of a photo essay assignment in Dr.Simmons’s Interim “Religion and Pop Culture” course that asked students to apply discussion themes to everyday objects or experiences. As I was sitting at work the other day at Bryant Denny Stadium, the doorbell buzzed turning on the camera to let me know someone was outside. Using the speaker, they explained to me why they were there. This is part of my job. People […]
The Incongruity Is What It’s All About
I got an email the other day from a student elsewhere in the US who was working on a paper on religion and film. I’m not sure how the paper will turn out, but when we later connected by phone I tried to prompt the student to think about this common genre — religion and film — not in terms of the data but in terms of something else. […]
“People imagine and people believe: and it is that belief, that rock-solid belief, that makes things happen”
I remarked over on Twitter the other day that there’s a curious correspondence between two shows that are now streaming online. For both “Happy” and “American Gods” are about non-obvious beings who exist solely because people believe in them — cease believing in them, whether a child’s imaginary friend or a god, and they are no more. While the former is about a fallen police detective who discovers he not only has a daughter who has been kidnapped but that […]
(Just Like) Starting Over Pt. 4
Ellie Cochran is a senior at UA, majoring in Religious Studies and Interdisciplinary Studies with a depth study in Environmental Management. She will be graduating this May and plans to pursue a Master of Science in Family Financial Planning & Counseling. She’s been blogging her reflections on her time in the Department of Religious Studies. You can read parts 1, 2, and 3 in this series here. Mere days before I am to graduate from the University of Alabama, I find myself considering […]