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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This installment of ReligionWise features Tim Loftus, a recent Ph.D. from Temple University who studies contemporary forms of Buddhism.  In this conversation, we discuss Buddhism in various geographic and cultural contexts. In particular, our conversation turns to the way that Buddhism is imagined in the contemporary world and the relationship between that narrative and the historical record.

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In this episode of ReligionWise, we talk with Tom Robinson and Hillary Rodrigues, two professors at the University of Lethbridge who direct the Robinest project, a website that provides digital resources for the academic study of religion. In this conversation we talk about these resources, and more generally about dispelling misconceptions of the academic study of religion in contemporary higher education and public discourse.

Show notes:

• Robinest - Digital resources for teaching world religions (https://www.robinest.org/)

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In this episode of ReligionWise, we talk with Jodi Eichler-Levine Professor of Religion Studies and Berman Professor of Jewish Civilization at Lehigh University. Our conversation considers the way that storytelling helps individuals and communities organize their lives and imagine their own identities, particularly when processing traumatic events.

Show Notes:

• Suffer the Little Children: Uses of the Past in Jewish and African American Children’s Literature (https://jodieichlerlevine.com/books/#suffer)
• Painted Pomegranates and Needlepoint Rabbis: How Jews Craft Resilience and Create Community (https://jodieichlerlevine.com/books/#painted)

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This installment of ReligionWise considers the place of teaching about religion and religious diversity in public secondary education. Our conversation features Greg Soden, who has taught courses on world religions in various high school contexts. Together, we think about the benefits and challenges of a religious studies curriculum in a public context.

Show Notes:

• The Classical Ideas Podcast (https://classicalideaspodcast.libsyn.com/)

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In this episode of ReligionWise, the discussion features Jessica Cooperman, Associate Professor and Chair of Religion Studies and Director of Jewish Studies at Muhlenberg College.  Our conversation focuses on the materials and methods that a historian uses to paint a picture from the past, including publicly and privately held archives.

Show Notes:

• Making Judaism Safe for America: World War I and the Origins of Religious Pluralism
  (https://nyupress.org/9781479885008/making-judaism-safe-for-america/)

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This episode of ReligionWise features a conversation with Khurram Hussain, Associate Professor of Religion Studies at Lehigh University.

In this far ranging conversation, we discuss the often overlooked humanistic elements present in Islam, reflect on ill-conceived narratives of intercultural interactions, and consider better ways of facilitating understanding across difference.

Show Notes:

• Islam as Critique: Sayyid Ahmad Khan and the Challenge of Modernity
  (https://www.bloomsbury.com/us/islam-as-critique-9781350248861/)
• The Muslim Speaks
  (https://www.bloomsbury.com/us/muslim-speaks-9781786998880/)
• The Oxford Handbook of Humanism: Humanism in the Middle East
  (https://www.oxfordhandbooks.com/view/10.1093/oxfordhb/9780190921538.001.0001/oxfordhb-9780190921538-e-35)

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This episode of ReligionWise features a conversation between Carrie Duncan, Program Specialist for the Institute for Religious and Cultural Understanding and Jill Peterfeso, the Eli Franklin Craven and Minnie Phipps Craven Associate Professor of Religious Studies at Guilford College.

 In this conversation, we consider how an element of American popular culture, the Disney corporation and in particular Walt Disney World, can be better understood using the tools of religious studies. Dr. Peterfeso not only teaches on the confluence of Disney and religion, but took a group of students to the Magic Kingdom as part of the “Fantastic Journeys” curriculum at Guilford. 

This conversation demonstrates a different way of thinking about religion itself and asks you to consider similarities and differences between traditional religion and broader cultural experiences.

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