RELGST 1404 - EARLY CHRISTIAN SEX AND GENDER

Minimum Credits: 3
Maximum Credits: 3
Long Description This course examines early Christian thought and practice around sex, gender, and sexuality in the context of the wider ancient Roman world. Early Christians were embedded in pre-existing ideologies around sex and gender, but they also innovated new ways of thinking and theologizing about sex and gender. The figures of the virgin, the monk, and the martyr populate the structuring stories of early Christians, and early Christian theologians discussed the ontologies and ethics of gender and sexuality as they puzzled out who Jesus was and who Christians ought to be. We will read New Testament texts, saints' lives, martyr acts, medical manuals, homilies, as well as analyze artifacts and material culture. We will also intersperse readings in contemporary theories of gender, sexuality, and religion. The course is divided into four units which move from theoretical/methodological considerations to an exploration of gender and sexuality in the New Testament to the gendered archetypes (saint, monk, martyr) that emerge from scriptural interpretation to an interrogation of whether we can access the lives of non-elite women in early Christian traditions.
Academic Career: Undergraduate
Course Component: Lecture
Grade Component: LG/SNC Elective Basis

Click here for class schedule information.

Add to Portfolio.

Close Window