REL 1820 Yoga, Karma, and Dharma: Hindu Traditions

Hinduism is the world’s oldest religious tradition, yet in today’s globalizing, technology-rich environment, it continues to reinvent itself. Ancient practices like yoga and astrology have today become global commodities and pop culture mainstays. Karma and reincarnation, concepts with complex histories, are appropriated throughout the western world. The course focuses both on India, where Hindu practices incubated for centuries, and the new global homes of a diverse and cosmopolitan Hinduism. Various forms of traditional and contemporary Hindu expression, from myths to movies and rituals to politics, bring Hindu worlds to life.

Credits

4 sh

Course Types

Asian Studies Elective; Interreligious Studies; IGS: Asia Regional Concentration

Offered

• Fall

Course Outcomes

1. Students will distinguish diverse practices within a particular religious worldview.
2. Students will recognize and analyze how religious traditions and/or identities emerge over time and within specific settings.
3. Students will recognize and explain the ways in which religious practices and traditions are embedded and function within, cultural, political and economic systems.
4. Students will apply disciplinary perspectives in analyzing texts, traditions, institutions, and practices.