Syllabus
Syllabus for 2.402 Religion in America
Dr. Maria Erling Gettysburg Lutheran Theological
Seminary Fall, 2004
I. Rationale:
The study of the Religious history of the American
people reveals the diverse ways that communities and individuals create
and shape a religious response to their own surroundings and
experiences. America’s religious pluralism is a dynamic environment
that affects ministry in many ways, and one of the best ways to respond
is to be informed about its history.
II. Objectives:
This course aims to foster
- Awareness of the ongoing religious
experimentation among Americans, and appreciation for the ways
traditional religious institutions have adapted and responded to
change.
- Familiarity with major figures and communities
in American Religious History.
- Skills in working with the discipline of
historical study – placing individuals and actions in their
historical context - so as to discern and recognize the choices and
constraints faced by historical actors.
- Critical thinking and reflection on religious
and cultural pluralism in America.
III. Strategies
Through readings, lectures, trips, writing
exercises and discussions, students will be exposed to a variety of
interpretations of the religious experience of Americans. Students will
also gain skills in interpreting primary documents [writings of
historical participants themselves].
Because the study of history is not, as Henry Ford
quipped, “one damn fact after another,” but rather an individual’s or
the community’s construed meaning of those ‘facts,’ an important
dimension to our course will be discussion and interpretation of
historical events, material objects, and written texts generated by
historical actors. The past yields fragmentary clues that can be
understood and partially reconstructed. Interpretive work is best done
in consultation with others, thus discussion and the advancement of an
argument, or thesis, is a basic skill we will hone.
Attention to the readings, and attendance at class
sessions are required. Students will be expected and encouraged to
participate through discussion, conversation, examination, and writing.
Required reading:
Sidney Ahlstrom, A
Religious History of the American People
Jon Butler and Harry
Stout, A Reader in American Religious History
Diana Eck, A New
Religious America: How A “Christian Country” Has Become the World’s Most
Religiously Diverse Nation.
A few selections in Edwin
Gaustad, A Documentary History of Religion in America, vols 1&2,
1998, as assigned in class.
Evaluation:
Student: See attached Descriptive Report
A course committee will meet with the instructor.
1. Students will write [4] discussion papers – 2-3
pages - in response to a question focused on the readings. 1/3 of the
grade
2. Students will write a 10-12 page paper to
describe a document, artifact, or event, analyze its historic location
and role, and make a presentation to the class. 1/3 of the grade
3. Final take-home exam 1/3 of the grade
Schedule of
readings and classes:
Each session includes a presentation or lecture, as
well as discussion.
Monday Afternoon 1:30 – 4:10
September 13 Introductory presentation and
orientation to the field, including: What is Religion In America? Where
do we look?
Group discussion session: Documentary
Sources [Gaustad]: New France: pgs 73-79
Note for preparation, first day: [background
reading to complete before class]; Chapter 7, “Empire Commerce and
Religion, in Ahlstrom’s A Religious History of the American People,
and “The European Impact on the Culture of a Northeastern
Algonquian Tribe: An Ecological Interpretation,” an essay by
Calvin Martin in Butler and Stout, A Reader in American Religious
History.
September 20
The Puritan project and mission oriented settlement. Reading:
Butler and Stout; “Errand into the Wilderness,” Perry Miller; “The World
and William Penn,” Edmund Morgan.
Gaustad’s documents: on Wm
Penn, 117,119, 123.
Background:
Ahlstrom, Chapter 8, and chapter 13,
Discussion
statement: Write a 2-3 page paper, double spaced, responding to this
statement: "New England’s religious life in the colonial period is
relevant for understanding American religion today." [team 1]
September 27
Great Awakening, Colonial Pietism, and Revolutionary leadership
Reading: Debate on the Great Awakening, essays by Jon Butler and
Harry
Stout; Gaustad; vol. 1 194-200, selections on Whitefield and Outler
Background: Ahlstrom, chapters
17, and 18
Discussion statement:
"A common experience, rather than a common set of ideas, was necessary
for America to become a nation." [team 2]
October 4 Dissenting from the
Protestant Mainstream Reading: “Evangelical America and Early
Mormonism,” Gordon S. Wood; “Insiders and Outsiders in American
Historical Narrative and American History,” R. Laurence Moore; Documents
on Joseph Smith, Gaustad 349-363.
Background:
Ahlstrom, chapters 29 and 30
Discussion: "Mormonism can’t be seen as a dissenting
movement, because it basically just codified, although in a rather
imaginative way, the popular religion of its day." [team 3]
artifact
or event analysis project is described
October 11
Immigration, Roman Catholicism, and Protestant responses.
Reading: “The Immigrants and Their God’s: a New Perspective in American
Religious History," Jay Dolan;
Gaustad selected
documents covering Orestes Brownson: 438-466
Background: Ahlstrom, chapters 32, 33,
34
Discussion
statement: “Orestes Brownson argues that Roman Catholicism was
naturally fitted to America, but ordinary immigrants and frontier
settlers knew that Roman Catholicism had to change to adapt to America.”
[team 1]
October 18 Class trip to
Emmitsburg to see National Lourdes Shrine [Background reading
supplied for this trip]
[Note to students: your artifact or event analysis proposals must be
approved by this date]
October 25th Westward
movement, Progressive reform, temperance and suffrage
Reading:
“Feminization of American Religion,” Barbara Welter in Butler and
Stout;
Background: Ahlstrom, chapter 39
Discussion statement: “The
world that women wanted could only be created with the help of the
clergy.” [Team 2]
November 1 Abolition, Civil
War, and Religious involvement.
Reading: Butler
and Stout: Chapter 11, Documents and debate: On Whose Side? God,
Slavery, and the Civil War” pgs 222-238
Gaustad: “White
Abolitionists and White Apologists”477-91
Background: Ahlstrom, chapters 40, 41,
42
Discussion Statement: “Church
members in the North and South were learning two ways to interpret the
Bible that still affects our culture today.” [team 3]
November 8th Religious
dimensions of cultural clash and social change.
Reading: “The
Lakota Ghost Dance: An Ethnohistorical Account,” Raymond J. DeMallie;
Background: on the Historic Black
Churches and White Southerners after the Civil War, Ahlstrom, chapters
42, 43
Gaustad:
Millennialism, [n.b. vol 2] 292-97; check internet sites for depictions
of the "Ghost Dance",
Discussion Statement: "The national culture of
America is marked by its violent encounter with cultural difference."
[Team 1]
November 15th Religion,
Politics and Social culture in America: Americanism, Fundamentalism,
Modernism, and the Denominations Reading: Debate: 1920-1940 –
Dark Ages of Modern American Protestantism?; Gaustad volume,
Modernism/Fundamentalism 385-405
Background: Ahlstrom, 53, 54, 55
Discussion Statement: “Denominations were a
successful response to the complexity of Modern American life.” [Team 2]
November 22nd Civil
Rights and the power of African American Preaching:
Reading: Butler and
Stout, William E Montgomery “The Preachers” chapter 15, and Chapter 23,
Hortense J. Spillers, “Martin Luther King and the Style of the Black
Sermon,
Background: Ahlstrom, chapters 62, 63
Discussion Statement: Do you agree with Ahlstrom
that: “The awakening of black America which became so prominent a fact
of the sixties did more than anything else to make that decade a turning
point in American religious history.”? [Team 3]
November 29th For
this session, the artifact or document or event analysis is due, and
students will present their topics to the class. We will meet at my
home, 123 Springs Avenue, at the regular class time.
December 6th America’s
religious pluralism: Hindus
Reading: A New
Religious America, Diana Eck,
Introduction and chapter 3
Discussion Statement:
“Hinduism will make a mark on American religion more through its temple
practices than through educating Americans about its universal ideals.”
[team 1]
December 13th
Muslims and America’s pluralism lived in the context of world affairs
Reading: A New Religious America, Eck,
chapter 5 and chapter 7
Discussion Statement: “If
world peace depends on peace between religions how does America’s
religious history contribute to this goal?” [team 2 ]
Take Home Exam, due on
December 17th
__________________________________
Descriptive Report
2.402 Religion in America
Fall, 2003
Student__________________________________________________
II. Objectives:
1. Can describe the diversity of religious
expression and practice in the United States.
a.
discussion papers
b.
analysis paper
c.
take home exam
2. Is acquainted with major figures and communities
in American Religious History.
a. take home exam
3. Can situate these individuals and groups in
their time and place and can discern and recognize the choices and
constraints they faced.
a.
artifact analysis paper
b.
take home exam
4. Engages in critical thinking and reflection on
religious and cultural pluralism in America.
a.
discussion papers
b.
artifact analysis paper
Comments:
Final Grade:
_______________________________
Date:_____________________
Professor: Maria E. Erling
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