Teaching Statement

2021

The proposed paper describes the University of Denver's first course explicitly on lived religions and the instructor's conception of it, in addition to her discoveries about the congeries of studies under the umbrella of lived religions. The paper argues that the label's indeterminateness makes it useful for introducing undergraduates to the study of religion, including the exploration of what "religion" might be. Specifying what "lived religions" is in order to teach it, one confronts religious studies from various angles, such as sociology, anthropology, practical theology, and history. The course could therefore discuss epistemologies, change over time, methods, intriguing practices, secularization, and the spiritual-religious distinction and its problems, among other topics. In the course offered at DU, the readings moved from an old approach, that of Joachim Wach seeing religion in action as ritual and morals, to studies designated "lived religions," especially their inclusion of practices like gardening that are often not considered religious. The paper proceeds from a review of the field by Nancy Ammerman, one of its leading lights, to the practical questions of what undergraduates need and want in a course, to the materials available for such a course, and to the resolution of pedagogical issues, including experiential learning, in the course at DU. The paper contributes to the field by clarifying the range of the term "lived religions" for people who find it attractive but began their scholarly work under different categories. The paper also can help teacher-scholars reflect on how to teach religious studies to students who frequently want to know what religion is and who come to our classes thoroughly drenched in institutional religion, or never having set foot in a building made for religious practice, or somewhere in between. Finally, the paper invites discussion of the design of courses on lived religions. When I designed the undergraduate, general education course "Lived Religions," I assumed the conceptual landscape of the topic "lived religions" would be "wide open," as my title suggests. It was, as one of my colleagues said, "religion that's not in books." On the other hand, I knew scholars were at work on it, so surely some fencing would demarcate at least a couple of very large intellectual ranches. I just had to find a few major reviews mapping the field and the field's contours would readily appear. Well, yes and no.

Issues: Understanding Controversy and Society, 2023

Buck, Christopher. “Public Schools May ‘Teach about Religion’—Not ‘Teach Religion’.” In Issues: Understanding Controversy and Society, ABC-CLIO, 2023. Entry ID: 2045124. https://issues2.abc-clio.com/Search/Display/2045124. [ABC-CLIO database subscription required.] Originally published in 2012 in ABC-CLIO’s “World Religions: Belief, Culture, and Controversy” database. • Invited essay, intended as model “argument essay” for undergraduate students. • Introduces Christopher Buck’s “CLEAR Argument Paradigm,” a generative model (based on British philosopher Stephen Toulmin’s paradigm for analyzing arguments) to assist students in writing argument essays: (1) “Claim” (Opinion, Stance, Thesis); (2) “Limits” (Qualifier); (3) “Evidence” (Reasons, Grounds); (4) “Assumptions” (Warrants and Backing); and (5) “Rebuttal” (advance responses to foreseeable objections). • Also introduces Buck’s “DREAMS Paradigm.” “DREAMS” is a mnemonic acronym for the following six dimensions of religion: (1) “Doctrinal”; (2) “Ritual”; (3) “Ethical”; (4) “Artistic”; (5) “Mystical”; and (6) “Social.” Based on the model originally proposed by Scottish scholar (and founder of the academic study of religion in Britain), Ninian Smart (1927–2001), in Worldviews: Crosscultural Explorations of Human Beliefs (1983, six “dimensions”) and Dimensions of the Sacred (1996, seven “dimensions”), but further refined by adding four subcategories within each “dimension” of religion. (See Buck, “Ninian Smart (1927–2001).” British Writers. Supplement XXIV (2018).) Developed as a classroom tool (for university students) for formally comparing world religions (where Smart’s “Materialistic” dimension is subsumed in Buck’s “Artistic” dimension): DREAMS Paradigm Doctrinal Dimension (metaphysics, philosophy of religion) [Acronym: CASE.] • Cosmology (cosmogony/theodicy). • Anthropology (soul/consciousness/purpose). • Soteriology (predicament/salvation). • Eschatology (afterlife/apocalypse). Ritual Dimension (anthropology of religion) [Acronym: CROW.] • Calendar (type/special features). • Rites of Passage (rites of life/life-crisis rites/rites of faith). • Observances (festivals and fasts/pilgrimages). • Worship (communal/domestic). Ethical Dimension (philosophy of religion) [Acronym: LIVE.] • Laws (prescriptions/proscriptions). • Intentions (motives/reactions). • Virtues (saints/saintliness). • Ethics (moral principles/social principles). Artistic Dimension (art history, iconography) [Acronym: MAPS.] • Music (liturgical/devotional). • Art & Architecture (visual arts, temples, shrines, pilgrimage sites/assembly halls). • Performance (dance/drama). • Symbols (literary/concrete). Mystical Dimension (psychology of religion) [Acronym: GASP.] • Goal of Attainment (quest/preparation). • Activities (spiritual exercises/mystical orders). • Stages (path/progress). • Peak Experiences (visions, auditions/transformations). Social Dimension (sociology of religion) [Acronym: DORM.] • Distribution (heartland/diaspora). • Organization (hierarchy/community). • Relations (church/state relations/interfaith relations). • Missions (domestic/foreign).

Language and Culture : The Journal of the Institute for Language and Culture, 2017

This article provides analysis from a study of 17 students participating in a world religion course using an empathic research approach. Student written reactions and surveys were analyzed to find what worldview and beliefs were expressed pertaining to the beliefs and practices of major world religions and worldviews (Shinto, Buddhism, Hinduism, Islam, Judaism, Christianity and atheism). Inquiry was also made into how these beliefs challenged and stimulated a new way of thinking in students. Results showed students viewed religion as a part of culture and conveyed resistance to the idea of adherence to beliefs and practices that were considered uncomfortable or inconvenient. Students expressed aversion to both daily observances of religion, such as dietary restrictions, as well as moral absolutes or standards to aspire to. Conversely, participants in the course were able to challenge common narratives about religious restrictions and understand benefits in some practices, in one case seeing the restrictions as empowering. Drawing upon these results, the article briefly comments on the need for further study of religions as a way to foster critical thinking and an emphasis on global education in Japanese universities. Abstract 本論では、世界の宗教についての授業の17名の受講者の共感的研究アプローチによる分

Teaching Theology & …, 2012

Tomoko Masuzawa and a number of other contemporary scholars have recently problematized the categories of “religion” and “world religions” and, in some cases, called for its abandonment altogether as a discipline of scholarly study. In this collaborative essay, we respond to this critique by highlighting three attempts to teach world religions without teaching “world religions.” That is, we attempt to promote student engagement with the empirical study of a plurality of religious traditions without engaging in the rhetoric of pluralism or the reification of the category “religion.” The first two essays focus on topical courses taught at the undergraduate level in self-consciously Christian settings: the online course “Women and Religion” at Georgian Court University and the service-learning course “Interreligious Dialogue and Practice” at St. Michael's College, in the University of Toronto. The final essay discusses the integration of texts and traditions from diverse traditions into the graduate theology curriculum more broadly, in this case at Loyola Marymount University. Such confessional settings can, we suggest, offer particularly suitable – if somewhat counter-intuitive – contexts for bringing the otherwise covert agendas of the world religions discourse to light and subjecting them to a searching inquiry in the religion classroom.

World Religions: Belief, Culture, and Controversy

Christopher Buck, “Public Schools May ‘Teach About Religion’—Not ’Teach Religion’.” World Religions: Belief, Culture, and Controversy. (Academic Edition.) Santa Barbara, CA: ABC-CLIO, 2012. Argument essay, introducing the present writer’s “CLEAR Argument Paradigm,” a generative model (based on Stephen Toulmin’s analytical model) to assist students in writing their own arguments: Claim (Position), Limits (Qualifier), Evidence (Reasons, Grounds), Assumptions (Warrants & Backing), and Rebuttal (to objections). Introduces Buck’s “DREAMS Paradigm.” “DREAMS” is a mnemonic acronym for the Doctrinal, Ritual, Ethical, Artistic, Mystical, and Social dimensions of religion. Developed as a classroom tool (for university students) in formally comparing world religions.