New course: Religion & Social Struggle in the Americas

This Winter Term, Professor Jeremy Sabella will be teaching a new Religion course, Rel. 74.14, "Religion & Social Struggle in the Americas." This course examines twentieth and twenty-first century social struggles through a religious lens. Karl Marx described religion as the "opiate of the masses," but in practice, religion has been a resource for resistance as well as a mechanism of control. Drawing on case studies from the U.S. and Latin America. the course analyzes how both sides of a conflict understand and deploy religious concepts. How do those in power approach religion? How does this differ from how those outside power structures mobilize it? How do uses of religion evolve to accommodate different cultural contexts and new political circumstances? These are some of the questions the course will consider in preparation for analyzing contemporary movements such as Standing Rock and Black Lives Matter. Offered at the 2A Hour, and open to all classes.

Professor Sabella has taught at Boston College and Yale Divinity School, and currently teaches at Kalamazoo College. He is the author of An American Conscience: The Reinhold Niebuhr Story, which examines the life and legacy of twentieth-century ethicist, theologian, and social critic Reinhold Niebuhr; the book serves as a companion volume to An American Conscience, the award-winning documentary on Niebuhr features on PBS. This Winter Term (2018) at Dartmouth, he will be teaching Rel. 11.01, "God & Money," as well as Rel. 74.14.