Religion: Religion and Media Technology

See Schedule of Courses for specific titles.

Open to degree and PACE students; Special Topics sections cannot have CC designations.

Religious communities have often been cast as technological laggards, whether willfully ignorant or generally backwards. Such narratives, fueled by stories about religious leaders condemning cultural trends, conceal the ways religious actors have in fact innovated in the media sphere. Covering topics like spirit photography, biblical films, and digital religion, this course revisits the relationship between religions and media technologies through the following questions: How have media technologies shaped religious practice, identity, and belonging? Were religious critiques of mass media valid, particularly around questions of access, constraints, and consumption? And how have religious groups experimented with communications technologies to reimagine their use, message, and audience? These moments of encounter reveal how religious communities have not only adopted media technologies for their own purposes, but have driven much of what makes these them innovative and modern.

Class sessions expound on the themes from the readings by drawing connections to contemporary examples, provide some religious and historical contexts for the readings, facilitate discussions around media objects themselves, and prepare students for any upcoming deliverables.

It will be based on class participation; quality of weekly discussion posts; and mid-term and final assignments.