Our Classes Need More Religion
Good graduate-level survey courses discuss how history should be taught at the undergraduate level. In one such recent conversation, the topic turned to the matter of religion’s role in the first half of the undergraduate American history survey usually covering from around 1500 to either the end of the Civil War or Reconstruction. The instructor posed the question: could one construct an entire survey of this period using religion as a primary focal lens?
Even as a historian of religion, I squirmed. It sounded repellant; what student not already interested in the subject would want to sit through fifteen weeks of overtly religious history? Who would want to force a room full of uninterested students to talk about religion for three months? Only a scholar hopelessly obsessed with their own research would foist such a burden on a 100-level class.
Yet my initial revulsion abated as I thought more on the idea. I allowed myself to consider how the lens of religion might impact a student’s understanding of events they had discussed with varying degrees of complexity since entering the American school system. How, for example, might the presence of various religions in the British mainland colonies complicate the narrative of the American Revolution? I entertained the possibility that such a class could go well and—more importantly—provide a platform for the development of a more civil societal discourse. After thinking on it for several weeks, I am now increasingly convinced that religion should hold a prominent place in our teaching of undergraduate surveys on American history.
Before continuing, I need to clarify what I mean by “religion”. Religion does not mean Protestant Christianity, at least not exclusively. The survey I am suggesting would need to carefully interrogate a variety of questions that extend far beyond the narrow confines of Anglo-Saxon Protestantism. What religions did indigenous peoples practice, and how did their religious rhetoric shape their response to contact with Europeans? How did that religious rhetoric effect future diplomacy as the geopolitical landscape of the Americas shifted? How did enslavement impact various African religions? How did contact with Catholic and Protestant Christians inspire syncretic adaptations in European, African, and indigenous religions? How did conflicts between Protestant and Catholic Christians shape the political and economic landscape of the Americas during the colonial era? How does the presence of Islam in the Americas during this period complicate the religious legacy of the region?
But this course would do far more than merely unveil the complicated religious milieu of the Americas from the sixteenth century forward. The real value of this course would be its ability to challenge students to interrogate the practical ramifications of a belief system counter to their own. Religious belief inspired real historical action as varied as the Great Awakenings and the Ghost Dance. Religion certainly did not operate in a vacuum to inspire these events. Still, faith effects its practitioners on a deeper level than other historical paradigms. With this in mind, the course would call students to carefully interrogate how one person or society’s understanding of the divine drove them to certain action. The reasoning behind that action will make little to no sense to a student who does not share the respective metaphysical tradition. Yet the student will still have to recognize the historical legitimacy of that belief.
This process of interrogating different religious traditions challenges a destructive trend in current public discourse. The conversational middle has all but disappeared from American society. Through self-selected membership in various social enclaves, individuals block themselves from perspectives different than their own. In this isolated environment, individuals affirm the myth that they have nothing in common with those outside their confined discursive space. In this climate, reasonable expressions of political, religious, or social views contrary to our own do not exist. We knock over a sequence of strawmen in our effort to assure ourselves we are correct. We live our lives never interrogating the weight of contrary positions, because we refuse to engage them except in their most hyperbolic forms.
The survey proposed herein invites students out of this conversational isolationism. Through examination of primary sources, the class would expose students to actual practitioners of multiple religions rather than caricatured portrayals designed to amuse and humiliate. Each day of class would expose students to figures whose markedly different understanding of the world still drove historical change. Students would regularly confront the fact that religions inspire a variety of different actions, some they may even find relatable and positive.
This class does not provide an ultimate solution to the dissolution of civil discourse in American society. But it still helps. Anything that calls isolated individuals to engage with other perspectives merits at least an attempt. History, with its appreciation of nuance and varied reasons for change over time, seems an ideal field to introduce individuals to new perspectives. Religion, with its absolute claims that are so often different than our own, seems a useful lens with which to interrogate these diverse perspectives.
About the author: Taylor Smith is an MA student working with Dr. Matthew Sutton. He received his BA in History from Western Washington University. He studies American faith movements in the 20th century, with special interest in those who disguised a pentecostal identity.
Even as a historian of religion, I squirmed. It sounded repellant; what student not already interested in the subject would want to sit through fifteen weeks of overtly religious history? Who would want to force a room full of uninterested students to talk about religion for three months? Only a scholar hopelessly obsessed with their own research would foist such a burden on a 100-level class.
Yet my initial revulsion abated as I thought more on the idea. I allowed myself to consider how the lens of religion might impact a student’s understanding of events they had discussed with varying degrees of complexity since entering the American school system. How, for example, might the presence of various religions in the British mainland colonies complicate the narrative of the American Revolution? I entertained the possibility that such a class could go well and—more importantly—provide a platform for the development of a more civil societal discourse. After thinking on it for several weeks, I am now increasingly convinced that religion should hold a prominent place in our teaching of undergraduate surveys on American history.
Before continuing, I need to clarify what I mean by “religion”. Religion does not mean Protestant Christianity, at least not exclusively. The survey I am suggesting would need to carefully interrogate a variety of questions that extend far beyond the narrow confines of Anglo-Saxon Protestantism. What religions did indigenous peoples practice, and how did their religious rhetoric shape their response to contact with Europeans? How did that religious rhetoric effect future diplomacy as the geopolitical landscape of the Americas shifted? How did enslavement impact various African religions? How did contact with Catholic and Protestant Christians inspire syncretic adaptations in European, African, and indigenous religions? How did conflicts between Protestant and Catholic Christians shape the political and economic landscape of the Americas during the colonial era? How does the presence of Islam in the Americas during this period complicate the religious legacy of the region?
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| Tenskwatawa, brother of Tecumseh, and a Shawnee Prophet at the turn of the nineteenth century. Tenskwatawa would be a good figure to explore when centering religion in the U.S. Survey. Click the image to see the source. |
But this course would do far more than merely unveil the complicated religious milieu of the Americas from the sixteenth century forward. The real value of this course would be its ability to challenge students to interrogate the practical ramifications of a belief system counter to their own. Religious belief inspired real historical action as varied as the Great Awakenings and the Ghost Dance. Religion certainly did not operate in a vacuum to inspire these events. Still, faith effects its practitioners on a deeper level than other historical paradigms. With this in mind, the course would call students to carefully interrogate how one person or society’s understanding of the divine drove them to certain action. The reasoning behind that action will make little to no sense to a student who does not share the respective metaphysical tradition. Yet the student will still have to recognize the historical legitimacy of that belief.
This process of interrogating different religious traditions challenges a destructive trend in current public discourse. The conversational middle has all but disappeared from American society. Through self-selected membership in various social enclaves, individuals block themselves from perspectives different than their own. In this isolated environment, individuals affirm the myth that they have nothing in common with those outside their confined discursive space. In this climate, reasonable expressions of political, religious, or social views contrary to our own do not exist. We knock over a sequence of strawmen in our effort to assure ourselves we are correct. We live our lives never interrogating the weight of contrary positions, because we refuse to engage them except in their most hyperbolic forms.
The survey proposed herein invites students out of this conversational isolationism. Through examination of primary sources, the class would expose students to actual practitioners of multiple religions rather than caricatured portrayals designed to amuse and humiliate. Each day of class would expose students to figures whose markedly different understanding of the world still drove historical change. Students would regularly confront the fact that religions inspire a variety of different actions, some they may even find relatable and positive.
This class does not provide an ultimate solution to the dissolution of civil discourse in American society. But it still helps. Anything that calls isolated individuals to engage with other perspectives merits at least an attempt. History, with its appreciation of nuance and varied reasons for change over time, seems an ideal field to introduce individuals to new perspectives. Religion, with its absolute claims that are so often different than our own, seems a useful lens with which to interrogate these diverse perspectives.
About the author: Taylor Smith is an MA student working with Dr. Matthew Sutton. He received his BA in History from Western Washington University. He studies American faith movements in the 20th century, with special interest in those who disguised a pentecostal identity.
While I understand and appreciate your point on the importance of religion, I firmly believe that class is a more useful and a more important lens with which to interrogate historical events, questions, and issues.
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