Syllabi Archive

A 2005 course by Susan Ridgely at the University of Wisconsin-Oshkosh "explores the colorful, contested history of religion in American culture. While surveying the main contours of religion in the United States from the colonial era to the present, the course concentrates on a series of historical court cases that reveal tensions between a quest for a (Protestant) American consensus and an abiding religious and cultural pluralism."

A course by Ira Chernus at the University of Colorado at Boulder explores "the notion of 'American Civil Religion' as an academic category."

A 2010 course by Marcia Robinson at Syracuse University "focuses upon the role that religion may have played in women’s understandings of themselves as abolitionists, social reformers, and human beings" with special attention to Frances Ellen Watkins Harper, Sarah and Angelina Grimké, and Elizabeth Cady Stanton.

A 2011 course by Ellen Blue at Phillips Theological Seminary "is a survey of the history of women and religion in the U.S. from the colonial period to the present" in the United States.

A 2007 course by Ira Chernus at the University of Colorado at Boulder "studies selected eras of war and selected movements for peace throughout U.S. history . . . the Pequot war, the war with Mexico, the Spanish-American war, World War II, the Cold War, the U.S. wars against Iraq, and the "war on terrorism" are featured.

A course by Joseph Kosek at George Washington University "considers how religion and politics have influenced each other in the United States as well as the ways that Americans have understood those influences."

A 2011 course by David Campbell at the University of Notre Dame analyzes "the ways in which religion is interwoven into American politics . . . (and) America's religious pluralism."

A 2009 course by Ira Chernus at the University of Colorado-Boulder focuses "principally on the relation between religion and nationalism in the history of the United States. We will look particularly at the the question of how a self-styled “chosen people” understands itself and its mission and deals with other peoples."

A 2012 course by Mark Brewer at the University of Maine examines the "thoughtful and critical examination of the many different ways that religion affects American politics, and also ways in which politics affects matters of religion."

A 2013 course by Kenneth Wald at the University of Florida concerns "the impact of religion on the major dimensions of politics in the United States. 'Religion,' as defined in the course, refers not only to formal theological creeds but also to the social beliefs, organizations and subcultures associated with various religious communities. The principal aim of the course is to understand how religion affects politics (and vice versa)."