In the news this past week was the FBI’s classification of the fans — the so-called Juggalos — of the hip hop duo, Insane Clown Posse (ICP), as members of a gang (a classification that allows law enforcement greater freedoms). The group is now suing the FBI. […]
“Firm Religious Beliefs”
Did you catch the story, the other day, of the Canadian University in which religious identity and gender-inclusion ran straight into each other and the former seems to have prevailed? As reported in the newspaper, The Toronto Star, the story opens: A York University student who refused to do group work with women for religious reasons has sparked a human rights tug-of-war between a professor and campus administration. While the professor wanted to deny the student’s request, a university dean […]
It Was Just My Imagination
I just saw this New York Times blog post, thanks to The Religious Studies Project’s post on its Facebook wall. The photographer, Jim Estrin, is quoted as follows: “The challenge for me is capturing the essence of an invisible event”… […]
The Challenge of the Humanities
An article in the Wall Street Journal last week decrying the shift in English departments away from the classics reflects the challenge that the Humanities faces because Humanities research often creates discomfort. The article specifically used UCLA’s 2011 curriculum change, which no longer requires semester-long courses on Shakespeare, Milton, and Chaucer, favoring courses that focus on issues of gender, class, race, etc., as a symbol of a focus in critical theory on everyone being victims. Her characterization of these courses […]
On Skepticism
“Maybe those moments of persistence, guidance, motivation, and continuity are actually the moments where religion itself gets constructed. Maybe it’s shape-shifting because it is constantly being rebuilt. But by who? And to what end? These were the questions driving my skepticism.” Seen Prof. Michael Altman‘s latest blog post on the Religion in American History blog? Read more here… […]
Theory in Practice
Several Facebook friends have recently re-posted this Guardian article, “Why Non-Believers Need Rituals Too.” Its argument is that humanists or atheists or agnostics — or whatever else we name this loosely (if at all) identified group, a group likely comprised by our very talking about it — need to give more attention to the aesthetics of their collective practices. Why? … because it is through ritual that we remake and strengthen our social bonds. […]
A New Year’s Coincidence?
Did you know that January 1st is also the beginning of the new year in Japanese Shinto, marked by celebrating the holiday known as Gantan-sai? Calendrical coincidence? Hardly. […]
Do You Eat Them for Dessert?
File this story under “Classification Matters”: is a tomato a fruit or a vegetable? I’ve used the Nix v. Hedden 1893 US Supreme Court decision in intro classes for quite some time, to illustrate the point that identity is the product of negotiations within practical conditions. Such as winning the right to count carrot marmalade as “fruit” for the purposes of trade within the European Union, perhaps? (Search for “carrot” in the following PDF document.) Even when it comes to […]
Your Authentic is Illusory, of Course
Listening to a radio story this morning, on a church in Denver that prides itself on being diverse and on the social/political edge — one that, predictably, aims to “create an authentic Christian experience without the pretension that can come with church” — it occurred to me just how deeply reductionist, materialist theories of religion have seeped into daily life. For, despite how dangerous these theories are seen to be by some (when they’re applied to their own lives, that […]
Going, Going, Gone
Did you catch this news story a couple weeks ago? It read: […]