Academic Program

A Transdisciplinary Program in the School of Politics and Economics and the School of Religion

The School of Politics and Economics and the School of Religion offer a formal interfield MA degree in Religion and American Politics beginning in the Fall of 2010. The aim of the program is to combine the resources of the two schools to facilitate study in a field with growing relevance in the modern world.

Religion is a powerful force in the formation of individual, ethnic, and national identities and in the organization of communal, social and political orders globally. Politics is increasingly taking account of religion as a determinative cultural and social phenomenon in the mobilizing and ordering of relations between societies. Professionals from politicians and academics to journalists and leaders of humanitarian organizations confront the constant interplay of the two realms. No area of human life is more freighted with passion, danger, and relevance and thus more in need of academic investigation.

Scholars will need training in both politics and religion to analyze the web of relations between religion, politics, and society. Fortuitously, the traditional methodologies of political science and religious studies are beginning to merge. Students of politics are taking into account the power of religious identity, and scholars of religion are employing the statistical methods of social scientists.

The MA in religion and american politics seek to train students in both approaches as well as to expose them to key areas where politics and religion intersect, particularly in America.

 

Degree Requirements

Students complete 48 units of credit (12 courses) over four semesters. Specific requirements include

 

Required Tools

PP 481     Quantitative Research Methods
 

Rel 362    Theories of Religion

 

Advanced Tools

One of the following:

PP 482     Advanced Quantitative Methods
 

PP 484     Experimental and Qualitative Methods

PP 483     Legal Research Methods
 

 

Required Core Course

PP 363      Introduction to Religion and Politics

 

Research Paper

All students are to write at least one substantial course research paper dealing with religion and politics to be reviewed by the Program Committee as part of the application for graduation.

 

Representative Elective Courses (offerings will differ from year to year)

PP 301      American Political Development

PP 326      American Constitutional Law I: Civil Liberties

PP 327      American Constitutional Law II: National Powers

PP 302      American Political Behavior

PP 308      Political Psychology

PP 323      Racial, Ethnic & Social Minorities in American Politics

Rel 462     History of American Religion from First Contact to the Civil War

Rel 466     History of American Religion from the Civil War to the Present

Rel 472     Race and Religion in America

Rel 320     American Scriptures

Rel 337     Feminist Theologies in North America

Rel 405     Religion, Power, and Resistance

Rel 410     Islamic Ethics

Rel 426     Theology of Globalization

Rel 452     Gender, Violence, and Religion

Rel 453     Women in the Book of Genesis

Rel 455     Liberation Theology

Note: Courses in CST and the colleges to be added

 

Faculty

 

Political Science

Jean Schroedel

Michael Uhlmann

Jennifer Merolla

Ken Blickenstaff

 

Religion

Richard Bushman

Vincent Wimbush

Hamid Mavani

Anselm Min

Tammi Schneider

Karen Torjesen

Rosemary Reuther 

 

CST

Helene Slessarev Jamir

Others as relationships are worked out