Facts are facts, but often there is more than one way to tell a “true” story. In this lesson, students will examine the story of the missionaries’ arrival, viewing it from different characters’ perspectives and thinking about the different true versions that can be told about one set of events.

This project discovers the history of Modern Europe, starting at the Hundred Years War and ending at the present time.
A chronological perspective of history is attempted within this text. Although this is the case, it is also important to understand patterns within European History, therefore chapters will attempt to cover a breadth of material even though their titles might be that of a specific pattern in history rather than a time period.

In this video segment from Religion & Ethics Newsweekly, learn about Muslims in Lawrenceville, Georgia, their plans to build an Islamic cemetery and the stiff objections from their Christian neighbors.

In this lesson, students will use the case of Park51’s Islamic Cultural Center as a starting point for a discussion about whether religious freedom is absolute and if religious freedom requires respect for other religions.

As we read broadly from throughout the vast chronological period that is "Homer to Dante," we will pepper our readings of individual ancient and medieval texts with broader questions like: what images, themes, and philosophical questions recur through the period; are there distinctly "classical" or "medieval" ways of depicting or addressing them; and what do terms like "Antiquity" or "the Middle Ages" even mean? (What are the Middle Ages in the "middle" of, for example?) Our texts will include adventure tales of travel and self-discovery (Homer's Odyssey and Dante's Inferno); courtroom dramas of vengeance and reconciliation (Aeschylus's Oresteia and the Icelandic Njáls saga); short poems of love and transformation (Ovid's Metamorphoses and the Lais of Marie de France); and epics of war, nation-construction, and empire (Homer's Iliad, Virgil's Aeneid, and the Anglo-Saxon Beowulf).

This subject offers a broad survey of texts (both literary and philosophical) drawn from the Western tradition and selected to trace the growth of ideas about the nature of mankind's ethical and political life in the West since the renaissance. It will deal with the change in perspective imposed by scientific ideas, the general loss of a supernatural or religious perspective upon human events, and the effects for good or ill of the increasing authority of an intelligence uninformed by religion as a guide to life. The readings are roughly complementary to the readings in 21L001, and classroom discussion will stress appreciation and analysis of texts that came to represent the cultural heritage of the modern world.

This course aims to introduce students to the rich diversity of human culture from antiquity to the early 17th century. In this course, we will explore human culture in its myriad expressions, focusing on the study of literary, religious and philosophical texts as ways of narrating, symbolizing, and commenting on all aspects of human social and material life. We will work comparatively, reading texts from various cultures: Mesopotamian, Greek, Judeo-Christian, Chinese, Indian, and Muslim. Throughout the semester, we will be asking questions like: How have different cultures imagined themselves? What are the rules that they draw up for human behavior? How do they represent the role of the individual in society? How do they imagine 'universal' concepts like love, family, duty? How have their writers and artists dealt with encounters with other cultures and other civilizations?

This subject examines interactions across the Eurasian continent between Russians, Chinese, Mongolian nomads, and Turkic oasis dwellers during the last millennium and a half. As empires rose and fell, religions, trade, and war flowed back and forth continuously across this vast space. Today, the fall of the Soviet Union and China's reforms have opened up new opportunities for cultural interaction.

The study of ancient Greece is vital to the study of all other periods of history, including modern history, in understanding how past enduring influences shape our present. This lesson may be part of a unit on Ancient Greece that covers the major areas of this ancient civilization: geography, architecture, democracy, government, philosophy, Olympics, daily life, Athens, and Sparta. Students will learn about the gods and goddesses, their place of origin, their symbols, and their sanctuaries.   

In this video segment from Religion & Ethics Newsweekly, meet an American Muslim as he prepares for Hajj, the pilgrimage to the holy city of Mecca that commemorates the Abrahamic roots of Islam.

Performed with over two million other Muslims, the rites of Hajj, the required pilgrimage to Mecca, have a profound personal impact on each pilgrim. In this video from Religion & Ethics Newsweekly, a Muslim from America experiences Hajj for the first time.

Students learn about an American Muslim's impressions of his first pilgrimage to Mecca in this video segment from Religion & Ethics Newsweekly.

A dining hall at Dartmouth College accommodates the religious dietary requirements of Muslims, Jews and Hindus as explained in this video from Religion & Ethics Newsweekly.

See https://northeast.edu/news/article/5152-hawk-talks-roots-of-abrahamic-religions-postponed-to-fri-march-17"Pollock’s primary areas of interest are in the history of Northern Europe, East Asia, and the Middle East with a focus on Abrahamic religions. His presentation will cover the origins of the three major Abrahamic beliefs, Judaism, Christianity, and Islam....“Professor Pollock is a rare scholar who is able to approach all three of these faiths from a critical perspective while at the same time celebrating them and appreciating all of the beauty they have to offer...During his time in college, Pollock delved into understanding the history of Christianity’s global legacy and the religions of other civilizations. He teaches world religions in his World Civilization class for Modesto Junior College. " 

This course explores how identities, whether of individuals or groups, are produced, maintained, and transformed. Students will be introduced to various theoretical perspectives that deal with identity formation, including constructions of "the normal." We will explore the utility of these perspectives for understanding identity components such as gender, sexual orientation, race, ethnicity, religion, language, social class, and bodily difference. By semester's end students will understand better how an individual can be at once cause and consequence of society, a unique agent of social action as well as a social product.

International Women’s Voices has several objectives. It introduces students to a variety of works by contemporary women writers from Asia, Africa, the Middle East, Latin America and North America. The emphasis is on non-western writers. The readings are chosen to encourage students to think about how each author’s work reflects a distinct cultural heritage and to what extent, if any, we can identify a female voice that transcends national cultures. In lectures and readings distributed in class, students learn about the history and culture of each of the countries these authors represent. The way in which colonialism, religion, nation formation and language influence each writer is a major concern of this course. In addition, students examine the patterns of socialization of women in patriarchal cultures, and how, in the imaginary world, authors resolve or understand the relationship of the characters to love, work, identity, sex roles, marriage, and politics.

If you have any trouble with the audio, try this version: https://youtu.be/mQWpO889MrQ(it is the same video with enhanced audio).

The Mexica were an incredibly advanced society……. but their religion and cosmovision is immensely layered and complex.

So in this brief lecture we’ll introduce Mexica philosophy, religion, and their worldview.

We’ll also introduce the most important deities, and talk about which deities are related because in many ways, the Aztec gods are a family history.

This course is an introductory survey of the genres and themes of the humanities. The material focuses on philosophy, religion, language, and the arts. As themes, the ideas of freedom, love, happiness, death, nature, and myth are be explored. Typically, a study of humanities looks at western philosophers, maybe a few of the world religions, a history of western music and western visual arts. This textbook begins to break down the barriers of limiting ourselves to learning primarily about western humanities. The question “What makes us human?” is answered by looking at many traditions.