HISTORY OF ANCIENT ISRAEL & JUDAH

HIST OF ANCIENT ISRAEL &

This course surveys the history of Ancient Israel and Judah from the ancestral stories through the end of the Persian period. It offers an introduction to both the biblical narrative and the archaeological research. The focus is on history – what is known, how it is known, and who writes it – and is intended for anyone who wants an introduction to the Bible or the place of Israel and Judah in the context of the Ancient Near East. Through an examination of the epigraphical, archaeological, and biblical sources, students will become familiar with the materials that scholars use to investigate history, but more importantly, they will be encouraged to evaluate these narratives about the past for themselves.
The course consists of a lecture and a recitation. All students must be registered for and attend both. The lectures will contextualize the required readings and primary sources, and students will participate in discussions about them in recitation.

• MW 4:10 p.m.-5:25 p.m.
• Instructor: Nathanael P Shelley
  CULPA: 6 Info
• 4 points

HIST ANCT ISRAEL & JUDAH- DISCUSSION SEC

• T 9:10 a.m.-10 a.m.
• W 3:10 p.m.-4 p.m.
• Instructor: Nathanael P Shelley
  CULPA: 6 Info
• 0 points

COLLOQUIUM ON MAJOR TEXTS

Readings in translation and discussion of texts of Middle Eastern and Indian origin. Readings may include the Quran, Islamic philosophy, Sufi poetry, the Upanishads, Buddhist sutras, the Bhagavad Gita, Indian epics and drama, and Gandhis Autobiography.

• T 2:10 p.m.-4 p.m.
• W 10:10 a.m.-noon
• Instructor: Rachel McDermott
  CULPA: 37 Info
• Instructor: Nathanael P Shelley
  CULPA: 6 Info
• 4 points

COLLOQUIUM ON MAJOR TEXTS

COLLOQ ON MAJOR TEXTS: E ASIA

This course explores the core classical literature in Chinese, Japanese and Korean Humanities. The main objective of the course is to discover the meanings that these literature offer, not just for the original audience or for the respective cultures, but for us. As such, it is not a survey or a lecture-based course. Rather than being taught what meanings are to be derived from the texts, we explore meanings together, informed by in-depth reading and thorough ongoing discussion.

• W 2:10 p.m.-4 p.m.
• Instructor: David L Moerman
  CULPA: 18 Info
• 4 points

ETHNICITY, RACE, IDENTITY IN THE PRE-MOD

This seminar investigates the concepts of ethnicity, race, and identity, in both theory and practice,
through a comparative survey of several case studies from the Pre-Modern history of the Middle East.
The course focuses on symbols of identity and difference, interpreting them through a variety of
analytical tools, and evaluating the utility of each as part of an ongoing exploration of the subject. The
survey considers theories of ethnicity and race, as well as their critics, and includes cases from the
Ancient World (c. 1000 BCE) through the Old Regime (c. 1800 CE).

Students in this course will gain a familiarity with major theories of social difference and alterity, and
utilize them to interpret and analyze controversial debates about social politics and identity from the
history of the Middle East, including ancient ethnicity, historical racism, Arab identity, pluralism in the
Islamic Empire, and slavery, among others. In addition, students will spend much of the semester
developing a specialized case study of their own on a historical community of interest. All of the case
studies will be presented in a showcase at the end of the semester.

All assigned readings for the course will be in English. Primary sources will be provided in translation.
The course meets once a week and sessions are two hours long.

• T 4:10 p.m.-6 p.m.
• Instructor: Nathanael P Shelley
  CULPA: 6 Info
• 4 points

WHY DO BAD THINGS HAPPEN TO GOOD PEOPLE?

WHY BAD THINGS GOOD PEOPL

This course is an introduction to the field of inquiry called The Problem of Evil, or Theodicy – that is, the investigation of God in the face of evil and suffering in the world.  How do we justify God? How do we reconcile disaster, pain, and suffering with an all-good, all-knowing, all-compassionate God?   This question arises in all religious traditions, but here we will study only four: the Jewish, Christian, Muslim, and Hindu traditions, each of which proposes its own array of answers. Our emphasis will be on primary texts from each tradition, with introductory and interpretive secondary sources brought in as supplementary.  These primary sources will be discussed in class, but especially in required section meetings.  A sub-theme of the course is the “pastoral” dimension of answers to the Problem of Evil: to what extent are the answers we study comforting?  This course has been created with the many crises presently afflicting our world – COVID-19, climate change, and the injustice of racism, to name a few – in mind.
 

• TR 8:40 a.m.-9:55 a.m.
• Instructor: Rachel McDermott
  CULPA: 37 Info
• 4 points

CULTURE, MENTAL HEALTH, AND HEALING IN E

CULTURE,HEALTH,HEALING E.

Why do certain mental illnesses only appear in specific regions of the world? What processes of translation, adaption, and “indigenization” take place when Western psychiatric diagnostic categories, pharmaceutical regimens, and psychodynamic treatments travel to China, South Korea and Japan? How do East Asian therapeutic modalities such as Traditional Chinese Medicine and the practice of qigong destabilize biomedical assumptions about the etiology and treatment of mental illness? This course engages these and other questions through anthropological analysis of the experiences of people struggling with mental illness, the mental health practitioners who treat them, and the broader economic, social and political contexts that shape these interactions.

• TR 11:40 a.m.-12:55 p.m.
• Instructor: Nicholas A Bartlett
  CULPA: 5 Info
• 4 points

CULTR,MNTL HLTH,HLING E ASIA-DISC

CUL,MNTL HLTH,HLING E ASI

• T 3:10 p.m.-4 p.m.
• F 1:10 p.m.-2 p.m.
• M 3:10 p.m.-4 p.m.
• W 12:10 p.m.-1 p.m.
• R 4:10 p.m.-5 p.m.
• R 5:10 p.m.-6 p.m.
• T 4:10 p.m.-5 p.m.
• W 3:10 p.m.-4 p.m.
• 0 points

HELL IN EAST ASIAN CULTURE

Whereas many in the modern West may commonly associate heavens and hells with the traditions of Christianity and Islam, Buddhist Asia shares an equally extensive concern with the paradises and punishments of the afterlife. Indian Buddhist scriptures, and their translations and elaborations across Asia, celebrate an infernal cosmology that makes Dante’s opus seem like a Hallmark card by comparison. This seminar focuses particularly on hells in the East Asian imaginary with the occasional detour to Southeast Asia, India, or Tibet for purposes of comparison. Our analysis of the practices, discourses, and representations of hells in East Asia is designed to coincide with a major exhibition on Asian Hells at Asia Society NY (Sept-Dec 2020). In this seminar we will view the exhibition together and each student will discuss an object on view, which they will have selected and prepared for in advance. Each student will work on a seminar project (usually, but not necessarily, an academic research paper) throughout the second half of the seminar. Proposal, bibliography, preliminary draft(s), and presentation will be due in stages during the process and students will receive feedback at each stage before the final draft is due at the beginning of final exam period. This course is designed for graduate students and advanced undergraduates who are expected to have completed coursework in relevant areas of East Asian Studies, Religion, or Art History.

• R 2:10 p.m.-4 p.m.
• Instructor: David L Moerman
  CULPA: 18 Info
• 4 points

JAPANESE BUDDHIST VISUAL CULTR

This course explors the principal modes, media, and contexts of visual culture in Japanese Buddhist history. Through the analysis of selected case studies, the course examines of the modalities of perception, materiality, and reception that distinguish the form and function of visual media in Japanese Buddhist contexts. Students are expected to have completed preliminary coursework in relevant areas of East Asian history, religion, or art history.

• W 10:10 a.m.-noon
• Instructor: David L Moerman
  CULPA: 18 Info
• 3 points