Texas board tries to imbue school textbooks for the U.S. with God/Christianity

[merithyn]

Indeed we are - there is really no where to go once someone simply refuses to think through the consequences of their position.

Indeed.

[grumbler]

Harvard has the Harvard Divinity School, which hosts about 50 faculty members. The teaching of religious studies is done by a Committee on the Study of Religion which is an umbrella bringing together faculty from different department, yes, but most are from the Divinity School.

And this is the way religion should be taught:  as a specilized course for those who want to take a specialized course in it, but otherwise merly as an issue where it impinges on the core subject of other courses.  This is much like how racism, or economics, or partisan politics is taught.  Requiring everyone to take a course in religion itself make sno more sense than requiring everyone to take one in women's studies or mass media.  It would be nice to have the time to teach everyone everything, but it isn't practical.

Ditto for textbooks.  I would love to have textbooks that go into detail on the religious controversies that distinguished Zwingli from Luther from Calvin for my world history class, but that would require leaving out something more directly relevant to "the narrative" - or else make the textbook hopelessly long.

[jimmy olsen]

@ Tim.

I used to work a fair bit on projects with the Divinity School fundraisers, as we were another "poor tub" at the university.  The rich tubs like the Medical School, the Law School, and the Business School hung together and the poor tubs had their own little clique going.  It was very junior high-ish.

As if I didn't know about the Harvard Divinity School before I came across this article.
Moreover, did you guys even read the article? They specifically talk about the Divinity School.

[garbon]

And this is the way religion should be taught:  as a specilized course for those who want to take a specialized course in it, but otherwise merly as an issue where it impinges on the core subject of other courses.  This is much like how racism, or economics, or partisan politics is taught.  Requiring everyone to take a course in religion itself make sno more sense than requiring everyone to take one in women's studies or mass media.  It would be nice to have the time to teach everyone everything, but it isn't practical.

Well universities often make you take one out of the subset. I believe I was required to take one gender or race class and one "world cultures" class which I think including the religious classes.  But yeah, everyone shouldn't be forced to take everything.

[merithyn]

And this is the way religion should be taught:  as a specilized course for those who want to take a specialized course in it, but otherwise merly as an issue where it impinges on the core subject of other courses.  This is much like how racism, or economics, or partisan politics is taught.  Requiring everyone to take a course in religion itself make sno more sense than requiring everyone to take one in women's studies or mass media.  It would be nice to have the time to teach everyone everything, but it isn't practical.

Ditto for textbooks.  I would love to have textbooks that go into detail on the religious controversies that distinguished Zwingli from Luther from Calvin for my world history class, but that would require leaving out something more directly relevant to "the narrative" - or else make the textbook hopelessly long.

I honestly saw the topic as being a paragraph or two in a chapter on social factors pertaining to the creation of the Constitution. Something to be addressed among the myriad of other things that make up the environment of the times. I do remember that our text had something along those lines. At no time did I consider it to be necessary to have an entire chapter dedicated to the topic, much less an entire class.

And were I to write it, the paragraph would explain the various religious conflicts going on, and how that helped the forefathers decide that they wanted nothing to do with a state religion.

I understand what you're saying, grumbler. I'm just failing to see how it would take so much time to explain that small bit. In fact, when/if I'm teaching a US History class (which I hope to do one day), I'm fairly sure I'll take five minutes to explain that, then move on with the subject matter. I really do feel that to ignore that aspect is to ignore the reason behind the concept of separation of church and state. There was a reason for it beyond deist and atheist men writing the document. That reason is why people fight so hard today to maintain the separation.

[Valmy]

The phrase "America is a Christian Nation" in school social studies textbooks utterly uninteresting? Especially since the exact opposite of that phrase is US Law.

When they teach it to the kids?  Oh yeah. 

[Oexmelin]

As if I didn't know about the Harvard Divinity School before I came across this article.
Moreover, did you guys even read the article? They specifically talk about the Divinity School.

Then I guess I don't understand your reaction. How is Harvard shying away from studying religion ? The article itself doesn't make that clear either, pointing rather to the «bureaucratic» problem of navigating different faculties, the physical distance of a school from main campus, and then to some comments by a star prof.

Of all the bureaucratic problems that happen in a University, taking multi-faculty courses and hoping into the inter-campus shuttle is not quite insurmountable. Although it may be well so that Harvard's programme on that topic fails to attract students. I'll ask around.

[Caliga]

Well universities often make you take one out of the subset. I believe I was required to take one gender or race class and one "world cultures" class which I think including the religious classes.  But yeah, everyone shouldn't be forced to take everything.

I took a religion course as an undergrad but I can't remember if it was required or not.  I was a history major with a focus on classics and medieval history so it would have been kind of weird for me to NOT have an overview course on the Abrahamic faiths, even if it wasn't a requirement.

[garbon]

hoping into the inter-campus shuttle is not quite insurmountable.

If I had to take an inter-campus shuttle to get to class...I ain't going.