Tag: Humanities


On the Value of the Humanities and Religious Studies

Susan Henking is President of Shimer College, an unconventional great books college in Chicago, Illinois. She got there by going to college as a first generation college goer, majoring in Religion and in Sociology at Duke University and then pursuing a Ph.D. at the University of Chicago in Religion and Psychological Studies. While there, she fell in love with undergraduate liberal education. Her scholarly work includes co-editing two books, Que(e)rying Religion (1997) and Mourning Religion (2008) as well as many […]

Read More from On the Value of the Humanities and Religious Studies

What Remain Constant

Whatever job you take, the specific subjects you studied in college will probably prove somewhat irrelevant to the day-to-day work you will do soon after you graduate. And even if they are relevant, that will change. People who learned to write code for computers just ten years ago now confront a new world of apps and mobile devices. What remain constant are the skills you acquire and the methods you learn to approach problems. – Fareed Zakaria In Defense of […]

Read More from What Remain Constant

All Systems Normal

Yesterday we had our second annual undergraduate research symposium, which featured the work of four current students — many of whom are double majors — and a grad of our Department. We instituted this event last year and held it at the university club at the same time as our senior seminar took place, inviting those students as the audience. But this year we decided to try holding it in a much larger venue and to advertise it among all […]

Read More from All Systems Normal

An Interview with Ann Taves

An interview with Prof. Ann Taves has just been posted — she is a former President of the American Academy of Religion and is well known for her work on religious experience as well as her interest in applying the finding from cognitive psychology to the study of religion. She’s  now at work on a new book, Revelatory Events: Unusual Experiences and New Spiritual Paths, and supervising the interdisciplinary Religion, Experience, and Mind (REM) Lab Group at the University of […]

Read More from An Interview with Ann Taves

What Would I Ever Do with a Humanities Degree?

Catie Stewart is a sophomore at the University of Alabama from Madison, Mississippi. She is double majoring in English and Religious Studies. Entering into my first year at the University of Alabama, I declared a chemical engineering major. I had always excelled in science and math in high school and had seemingly enjoyed the two catch-all chemistry classes I took my sophomore and senior years, so, to me and everyone advising me, it only made sense that I go into the field […]

Read More from What Would I Ever Do with a Humanities Degree?