ReligionWise

This episode of ReligionWise features Rev. Dr. Falres Ilomo, Chair of the Faculty of Theology at the University of Iringa, Tanzania. Dr. Ilomo's work considers the intersections of traditional African religious systems with Christianity in Africa, as well as the history and development of Christianity in Tanzania and the surrounding region. In this conversation, we discuss the perceptions and realities of the varieties of religious expression in Africa and consider several aspects of the belief and practice of the Christian tradition in Tanzania.

Show Notes:

•  Cultural and Natural Heritage in Tanzania: A Case of Southern Highlands (https://heritagestudies.eu/wp-content/uploads/2017/08/Keynote-Falres-Ilomo.pdf)
• Interfaith Dialogue in an African Context (https://iiste.org/Journals/index.php/JPCR/article/view/55674)
• Hymns Translated by Berlin Missionaries in Southern Tanzania: Some Eschatological Implications of Translation (https://www.iiste.org/Journals/index.php/JRDM/article/view/57746)
• African Religion: A Basis for Interfaith Dialogue Today, Dar es Salaam University Press, 2013

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In this episode of ReligionWise, we talk with Sonja Thomas, Associate Professor of Women's, Gender, and Sexuality Studies at Colby College. In addition to her work on caste, class, and racial privilege in Kerala, India, Dr. Thomas has become a leading voice arguing against caste discrimination in the United States. This conversation considers caste alongside of race, gender, sexual identity, and religion as cite of discrimination and the efforts that are being made to confront it.

Show Notes:

• Privileged Minorities: Syrian Christianity, Gender, and Minority Rights in Postcolonial India (https://uwapress.uw.edu/book/9780295743844/privileged-minorities/)

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In this episode of ReligionWise, we talk with Michal Bar-Asher Siegal, Professor of Rabbinic Judaism in the Goldstein-Goren Department of Jewish Thought at Ben-Gurion University in Israel. Though her research considers the intersections of Rabbinic thought and the development of the Talmud with early Christianity, she is also keenly interested in thinking about the role of the humanities in the context of the modern University. Through her collaborative work in a variety of institutional and governmental contexts, she has developed a novel perspective on the value of the humanities.

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In this episode of ReligionWise, we talk with Dena Davis, Presidential Endowed Chair in Health and Professor of Bioethics at Lehigh University. In addition to her work in healthcare ethics, Dr. Davis has written on a brewing controversy over a group of ultra-Orthodox religious schools in New York. These Yeshivas concentrate their instruction, not on English, math, and science, but on the study of religious texts. The result of this curriculum is that students of these schools graduate without basic competence in skills necessary to navigate the modern world. Dr. Davis provides legal and ethical context for the collision between these religious and secular institutions.

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This episode of ReligionWise features the Reverend Janelle Neubauer who currently serves as the College Chaplain and Director of Religious and Spiritual Life at Muhlenberg College. Prior to holding that post, Pastor Neubauer has had a number of experiences in ministry abroad, including as a missionary pastor for the Lutheran Church of Rwanda. In this conversation, we discuss the contemporary practice of global mission work in the post-colonial experience as well as the opportunities and challenges of this type of work in the global south.

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This episode of ReligionWise features Chris Borick the Director of the Muhlenberg College Institute of Public Opinion. In this conversation, we consider how pollsters try to understand religious identity and sentiment, the limitations of those methods for considering religious minorities, and how the rise of a religiously unaffiliated public has shown up in recent polls.

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This episode features Reverend Frederick Davie, who among other roles, serves as the Senior Advisor on Racial Equity for Interfaith America. In this far ranging discussion, we talk about the role of interfaith dialogue in wider public discourse, the shifting understanding of religious freedom, and the relationship between governmental policy and the priorities of religious communities.

Show Notes:

• Interfaith America (https://www.interfaithamerica.org/)
• US Commission on International Religious Freedom (https://www.uscirf.gov/)

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This episode features Rangina Hamidi, who, until the fall of the government in 2021, served as the Education Minister for Afghanistan. In this conversation, Hamidi talks about her life in public service and discusses the complicated relationship between religion and education in contemporary Afghanistan.

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Today’s episode features Matthieu Aikins, an award winning journalist and reporter who covered the war in Afghanistan and the subsequent refugee crisis.

In this conversation, we consider both his reporting from Kabul after the fall of the Afghan government as well as the plight of refugees as they flee the country and the Taliban. 

Show notes:

• Matthieu Aikins' website (https://maikins.com/)
• The Naked Don't Fear the Water (https://maikins.com/book)
• Matthieu Aikins' articles (https://longform.org/archive/writers/matthieu-aikins)

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This installment of ReligionWise features Kocku von Stuckrad, Professor of Religious Studies at the University of Groningen in the Netherlands.

In this conversation, we discuss discourse analysis and its utility in the academic study of religion. In particular, we consider examples from Professor von Stuckrad’s two most recent books: The Scientification of Religion (2015) and A Cultural History of the Soul (2022).

Show Notes:

• A Cultural History of the Soul: Europe and North America from 1870 to the Present  (https://cup.columbia.edu/book/a-cultural-history-of-the-soul/9780231200370)
• The Scientification of Religion: An Historical Study of Discursive Change, 1800–2000 (https://www.degruyter.com/document/doi/10.1515/9781614513490/html)

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