This course presents African Americans who have created religious and spiritual lives amid the variety of possibilities for religious belonging in the second half of the twentieth century and the early twenty-first century. By engaging an emerging canon of autobiographies, we will take seriously the writings of theologians, religious laity, spiritual gurus, hip hop philosophers, LGBT clergy, religious minorities, and scholars of religion as foundational for considering contemporary religious authority through popular and/or institutional forms of African American religious leadership. Themes of spiritual formation and religious belonging as a process— healing, self-making, writing, growing up, renouncing, dreaming, and liberating—characterize the religious journeys of the African American writers, thinkers, and leaders whose works we will examine. Each weekly session will also incorporate relevant audiovisual religious media, including online exhibits, documentary films, recorded sermons, tv series, performance art, and music. 0
Vaughn BookerAuthor
Dartmouth CollegeInstitution
Private College or University Institution Type
Syllabus Resource Type
Intro, Seminar Class Type
2019 Date Published
Religious Studies, Other Discipline
Buddhism, Islam, New Religious Movements, Other Christianities, Protestant Religous Tradition
Topics