<p>Lecture, two hours; discussion, 30 minutes. Study traces ways religion and liberation have been understood to connect in the later 20th-century phenomenon called liberation theology. Started by James Cone’s embrace of Christian Black Power movement in the U.S. and Gustavo Gutiérrez’s Latin American theology against poverty, this method of religious interpretation spread across world and sacred traditions. Reading of central texts that sparked the movement, and sampling of various ways movement was picked up and adapted by people of other identities: queer, South African, Islamic, Palestinian, etc. Highlights key issues of the relationship between religion and liberation, political-religious theory, utopia, oppression, justice, and hope. P/NP or letter grading.</p>

Religion, Study of

College of Letters and Science

RELIGN 156 - Religion and Liberation

Religion and Liberation

To think critically about the ways liberationist thought has found religious expression from 1970 through the present;

To understand how liberationist thought complicates the idea of a static, coherent religious body by naming the way these movements both vigorously oppose mainstream elements of their traditions while simultaneously aspiring to fulfill their core faith commitments;

To explore the un/usefulness of religion in liberation movements by interrogating whether the aims pursued in these movements are aided or burdened by religious language and symbols.

General Catalog

Religion and Liberation

RELIGN 156

4 units