Posts in this category discuss the wider relevance of those tools, methods, and disciplines often grouped together and called the Humanities.
Remember when Academic Twitter was a thing? Years ago a tweet popped up in my thread that really harshed my mellow. It was from a snarky account that took shots at the idiosyncracies of scholarly publications across disciplines. One day the academic study of religion became the target. Our “colleague” went all in, blasting how much of a hodge-podge our field is when browsing the table of contents of one of our major journals. The account was an adventure in […]
Dr. Cara Burnidge impressed upon the REL Strategy Group the importance of proactively assessing one’s own program to help get them MOVING.
The REL Strategy Group is becoming a vital meeting space for colleagues to share what they they’re seeing in their instiutional contexts. Its monthly consultation meetings are also a space to ask questions about how things are being done elsewhere. Continuing the ISOMER series, we look back on our February session on ORGANIZATION and look forward to our sesssion, this Friday, on MOBILIZATION.
The REL Digital Lab is a space where the department brings social theory and computational methods together for innovative results. Our faculty are modeling and mentoring students in an innovative approach to the academic study of religion. Our most recent example of this is a project called Decoding Diaspora. Initiated and led by Professor Richard Newton, the project is a dataset for experimenting with cultural analytic tools. I sat down with Professor Newton to discuss his project and what he hopes […]
Read More from Decoding Diaspora and the Use of Digital Tools in Religious Studies
If you’ve been in HigherEd for any length of time, then you’ve probably shaken your fist about the wrongness of an impactful decision made somewhere above your pay grade. Be frustrated! You know your experience… But how do we take that frustration and come to grips with the terms used to spell the fate of our units? That’s what we discussed in our December consultation in the REL Strategy Group: Information–the first part of our six-part series for the Spring […]
No matter what carreer path people pursue after they graduate UA, the ability to think critically about problems in their broader context and find a wholistic solution is invaluable, and it’s a skill that many REL majors nurture as undergrads, such as Jade Kelso-Teel, an REL alumnus now working in IT. His experiences in REL helped him develop skills to analyze the larger context, enabling him to start building solutions to tech issues rather than simply troubleshooting the immediate problem. […]
by Lynn Davis I read with interest an article from The Chronicle of Higher Education entitled “Why Religious Studies is in Trouble” that featured one of this department’s faculty members as someone trying to find ways to preserve religious studies classes so that they are available to non-majors. I am hoping that sharing my own experiences and those of my adult children may be helpful. I graduated from Claremont McKenna College as a Math major (mcl) in 1977 and earned an […]
Read More from A Little Religious Studies Brings a Huge Life Impact
Learn what’s next for the REL Strategy Group since they had their first meeting with department, unit, and program leaders on building a more resilient US field.
Read More from The Physics and Work of the REL Strategy Group
Religious Studies helped prepare him to be a software trainer, managing multiple clients with project management and soft skills
Read More from From Religious Studies to Software Trainer: The Value of Multiple Skills
Equipping leaders of Religious Studies departments and programs to face today’s challenges in HigherEd.
