REL
6319: Interpreting Asian Religions Fall 2006
Wednesday
2:00-5:00 pm in Classroom Building 105, room 234
Instructor:
Jason Neelis
Office: 130
Office hours:
Tuesday 1:00-2:30 and by appointment
Phone:
352-392-1625, ext. 240
e-mail: jneelis@religion.ufl.edu
Course website:
http://www.clas.ufl.edu/users/jneelis/classes/rel_6319_fall2006.htm
Course
description and goals
This graduate
seminar is designed to expose participants to contemporary debates, critical methods,
and theories of interpretation of Asian religions. An important goal of the
seminar is to develop an understanding of the genealogy or history of the
academic field and related disciplines. Ongoing encounters between outside
interpreters of Asian religious traditions and the dynamic responses within these
traditions will be explored. Many of the readings address ideological biases
and their ramifications for the academic study of religion by challenging constructions
of the “other” engrained through processes of alterity. Participants in the
seminar will be exposed to critiques of “Orientalism” and responses from
various academic disciplines related to Asian religions. Critical perspectives
on the study of world religions (and the place of Asian religions in this
model) are also addressed. By providing an opportunity to take stock of
arguments and to reassess positions on relevant issues, the seminar is not only
intended for intellectual stimulation, but also as an important preparation for
professional dialogues.
Books that
can be purchased online:
1) S.N. Balagangadharan. The Heathen in His Blindness:
2) William Halbfass.
Required books available
for purchase at Goerings Book Store (
3) Bernard Faure. Double Exposure: Cutting Across Buddhist and Western
Discourses (translated by Janet Lloyd).
4) Lionel Jensen. Manufacturing Confucianism: Chinese
Traditions and Universal Civilization. Duke University Press,
5) A.L. Macfie, ed. Orientalism : a reader. NYU Press,
6) Tomoko Masuzawa, The Invention of World Religions: Or,
How European Universalism Was Preserved in the Language of Pluralism.
Recommended:
Russell T. McCutcheon. Manufacturing Religion: The Discourse on Sui
Generis Religion and the Politics of Nostalgia.
Edward W. Said. Orientalism (25th Anniversary Edition with a New Preface
by the Author). Vintage Books,
Reference
books:
a) John R. Hinnells, ed. Penguin Dictionary of Religions.
Penguin,
b) Jonathan Z. Smith, ed. HarperCollins Dictionary of Religion. Harper,
c) Taylor, Mark
C., ed. Critical Terms for Religious Studies.
Requirements
1) 3 response
papers based on reading assignments (30%):
These essays
(no longer than 5 pages in length) can address arguments proposed or questions
raised by authors or points about texts discussed during seminar meetings. Additional
research is not necessary to complete these assignments, but engagement with
recommended readings will be welcome. The papers should be submitted to the
instructor within a week after the last seminar meeting devoted to each text
(see schedule below).
2) Seminar
presentations (20%):
Participants
are expected to come to each meeting prepared to contribute to the discussion
of the assigned readings, which must be completed in advance. Individual
participants may be asked (or “volunteered”) to lead the discussion on
particular chapters or articles. Each participant will also be expected to make
an individual presentation in November or December on the topic of their
individual research project.
3) Term paper
(50%):
A term paper
submitted during final exam week (at the absolute latest by December 15) should
critically analyze an issue in the interpretation of a certain Asian religious
tradition. Topics may include critiques of particular methods, analysis of the
works of an influential scholar or school of scholarship, or applications of
theoretical models to the study of a text, religious figure, or historical
period. Papers directly related to MA thesis or PhD dissertation topics are
welcome as long as there is direct engagement with themes in the reading
assignments. Participants should begin developing ideas for the term paper
early in the semester and should attempt to integrate points raised in
discussions of the reading assignments. The instructor is available to discuss
the development of topics for the term paper.
Tentative
Schedule
Week 1 (8/23) Course
Introduction
Week 2 (8/30) Early
Encounters with
Recommended: Foreword
to Raymond Schwab, The Oriental Renaissance,
by Edward Said and chapters 1-2, pp. 1-80.
Week 3 (9/6) European
Impact and Text Critical Methodologies
Reading: Wilhelm
Halbfass, India and Europe, 84-170 (chapters 6-10); A.L. Macfie, Oreintalism:
A Reader, 13-17 (G.W.F. Hegel, “Gorgeous Edifices” and Karl Marx, “The
British Rule in India”); selections from S.M. Katre, Indian Textual
Criticism (2nd ed.) and Colin Flight, “How Many Stemmata?” Manuscripta
34.2 (1990), 122-128.
Week 4 (9/13) Indian
Responses to Colonial Interpretations
Recommended: Selections from J.E. Llewellyn, ed. Defining Hinduism: A Reader.
Week 5 (9/20) Hindu
Reinterpretations and Terms of Dialogue
Recommended:
Fitzgerald, James (translator). The
Mahābhārata, vol. 7. Introduction to The Book of Peace, Part One,
100-142, and Appendix 4: Certain Difficult Sanskrit Words and Their Usual
Translations [particularly dharma], 641-643.
Week 6 (9/27) Invited
guest: Prof. Dermot Killingley [topic:
Six indriyas]
Recommended:
Robert Sharf, “Experience” in Critical Terms for Religious Studies,
94-116.
Week 7 (10/4) Critical
Reflections on the study of Asian Religion 1st Response Paper
due
Reading: S.N.
Balagangadharan, Heathen in his Blindness, part I, 1-140; Russell
McCutcheon, Manufacturing Religion, 3-26, esp. 14 ff.
Recommended: Raymond
Schwab, Oriental Renaissance,
108-122, 289-295.
Week 8 (10/11) Critical
Reflections, cont.
Recommended:
Russell McCutcheon, Manufacturing Religion, 27-73.
Week 9 (10/18) Prospects and alternative models for the study of Asian Religions
Reading: S.N. Balagangadharan, Heathen in his Blindness, part IV, 393-459; Gavin Flood, “Reflections on Tradition and Inquiry in the Study of Religions” Journal of the American Academy of Religion 74 (2006) 47-58.
Recommended:
Russell McCutcheon, Manufacturing Religion, 127-157.
Week 10 (10/25) Buddhism I: Assessment of the field Response Paper #2 due
Recommended:
Selected articles from Gregory Schopen, Bones, Stones and Buddhist Monks
or Buddhist Monks and Business Matters.
Week 11 (11/1) Buddhism II: Cross-cultural encounters and
dialogues
Recommended: Philip
Almond, The British Discovery of Buddhism, 1-32 and/or Guy Welbon, The
Buddhist Nirvāṇa and its Western Interpreters
Week 12 (11/8) Constructions of East Asian Religions
Recommended:
Norman Girardot, The Victorian Translation of China: James Legge’s Oriental
Pilgrimage; Eric Reinders, Borrowed Gods and Foreign Bodies
Week 13 (11/15) Responses within East Asian Religions
Recommended: Norman Girardot, The Victorian Translation of China: James Legge’s Oriental Pilgrimage.
Week 14 (11 / 22) Thanksgiving break
Week 15 (11/29) Orientalism and World Religion Response
Paper #3 due
Recommended: Edward
Said, Orientalism [review if previously read]; Russell T. McCutcheon, Manufacturing
Religion, 158-191; Fred Dallmayr, “Exit from Orientalism? Comments on
Wilhelm Halbfass” in Beyond Orientalism, 49-69; selections from Orientalism
and the Postcolonial Predicament
Week 16 (12/6) Seminar conclusions
Tomoko Masuzawa, The Invention of World Religions,
147-328; Paul J. Griffiths, “On the
Future of the Study of Religion in the Academy,” Journal
of the
Books and Articles on Course Reserves [preliminary list]
Almond,
Phillip. The British Discovery of Buddhism.
Bharati,
Agehananda. “The Hindu Renaissance and its Apologetic Patterns,” Journal of
Asian Studies 29.2 (1970), 267-287.
Breckenridge,
Carol A. and Peter van der Veer, eds. Orientalism and the Postcolonial
Predicament.
Cabezón, José Ignazio. “Buddhist Studies as a
Discipline and the Role of Theory,” Journal
of the International Association of Buddhist Studies 18.2 (1995) 231-268.
Cabezón, José Ignazio. “The Discipline and Its Other: The Dialectic of
Alterity in the Study of Religion,” Journal of the
Fitzgerald,
James (translator). The
Mahābhārata. Vol. 7 (11. The Book of the Women and 12. The Book
of Peace, Part One).
Flight, Colin.
“How Many Stemmata,” Manuscripta 34.2 (1990) 122-128.
Flood, Gavin. “Reflections on Tradition and Inquiry in the Study of
Religions” Journal of the
Franco, Eli and Karen Preisendanz, eds. Beyond
Orientalism: The Work of Wilhelm Halbfass and its Impact on Indian and
Cross-Cultural Studies.
*Girardot,
Norman J. “’Finding the Way’: James Legge and the Victorian Invention of
Taoism,” Religion 29 (1999) 107-121. (*available online through the UF
Library catalog and www.sciencedirect.com)
Girardot,
Norman J. The Victorian Translation of China: James Legge’s Oriental
Pilgrimage.
Gómez, Luis O.
“Unspoken Paradigms: Meanderings through the Metaphors of a Field,” Journal of the International Association of
Buddhist Studies 18.2 (1995) 183-230.
Griffiths, Paul J. “On the Future of
the Study of Religion in the Academy,” Journal of the
Katre, S.M. Introduction to Indian Textual Criticism.
2nd ed.
Llewellyn, Jack, ed. Defining Hinduism: A Reader.
Lorenzen, David. Who Invented Hinduism? Essays on
Religion in History.
Maas, Paul. Textual Criticism. Translated by Barbara
Flower.
*Maclean,
Masuzawa, Tomoko. The Invention of World Religions: Or
How European Universalism was Preserved in the Language of Pluralism.
Reinders, Eric. Borrowed Lands and Foreign Bodies:
Christian Missionaries Imagine Chinese Religion.
*Schopen, Gregory. Bones, Stones and Buddhist Monks.
Schopen, Gregory. Buddhist Monks and Business Matters.
Schwab,
Raymond. The Oriental Renaissance:
Europe‘s Rediscovery of India and the East, 1680-1880. Translated by Gene
Patterson-Black and Victor Reinking with a Foreword by Edward W. Said.
Sharf, Robert. “The
Zen of Japanese Nationalism,” in Curators of the Buddha: The Study of
Buddhism under Colonialism, ed. Donald S. Lopez, Jr.
Welbon, Guy
Richard. The Buddhist Nirvāṇa and its Western Interpreters.
Chicago/London: