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- Hi everyone. Thank you for joining us.
My name is Adam Duncan.
I'm the recruitment and liaison officer
for the Faculty of Liberal Arts & Professional Studies.
And today we're going to be talking about,
one of our more interesting programs,
which is religious studies.
Before we get started, I would like to take a moment.
This meeting is virtual.
You're watching us in your homes and because of that,
we're not all actually gathered in the same space.
York's land acknowledgement,
might not represent the territory you are currently on,
and I would ask if that is the case,
that you each take the responsibility to acknowledge
the traditional territory that you are on
and its current treaty holders.
As a member of the York university community,
I recognize that many Indigenous nations
have longstanding relationships
with the territories upon which York university campuses
are located,
that precede the establishment of York university.
York university acknowledges its presence
on the traditional territory of many Indigenous nations.
The area known as Tkaronto,
has been taken care of by the Anishinabek Nation,
the Haudenosaunee Confederacy,
the Huron-Wendat and the Metis.
It is now home to many Indigenous Peoples.
We acknowledge the current treaty holders,
the Mississaugas of the Credit First Nation.
This territory is subject to the Dish,
and with One Spoon Wampum Belt Covenant,
an agreement to peaceably share and care,
for the Great Lakes region.
Thank you very much for,
ah, giving your attention to that.
I would to now introduce,
our very special guest we have with us.
Professor Anthony Burke,
who is with us from our religious studies program.
Welcome, thank you for joining us today.
And I understand that you have a presentation for us.
- Yes.
Ah, just turn my ah,
screen on.
Every university has a religious studies program.
For those of you who come from high schools
where religion was not part of the curriculum,
university would be your first
introduction to its study.
For those of you do have some previous experience.
with religion,
either from high school courses,
or because you're part of a faith community,
university will broaden your knowledge and understanding,
of religion.
Because university programs have a particular way,
of studying religion.
Not as insiders,
influenced by the particular teachings of one religion,
not with the belief that one religion is more superior
than the others,
but as scholars,
that look into religious traditions from the outside,
even temporarily, even just within the classroom,
because we wanna try to understand how religions work.
We wanna think about the circumstances of their origins,
the meanings of their practices,
and how they interact and sometimes come into conflict
with other religious traditions.
Most of all,
we want students to view the religions critically.
To ask questions, to confront problems.
And that's the spirit of the university.
Often in my classes,
I tell students,
you don't necessarily have to solve these problems,
but just recognize that they are there.
And that's kind of the beginning of, of wisdom.
So we don't learn anything if we don't ask questions.
And if we don't test our assumptions.
Sometimes this, this can be a difficult problem,
for some of our students,
particularly new students to the program.
Because now that they're being asked
to look at their own religious traditions
in a new and maybe even uncomfortable way,
but it's very rewarding.
I'd certainly like to think so.
Because if you can tackle the big actions,
that religion poses
I think you can tackle anything.
So our students find that the lessons of our program
transfer well to other disciplines,
universities should be about teaching critical thinking.
I don't think that, that's done more so
than in religious studies.
Why people enroll in our program,
I often say that we don't get a lot of students
who begin their university careers,
as religious studies majors.
Traditionally many students come to religious studies,
from other programs.
Often in their second or maybe even their third year.
And this is because,
in some cases at least,
what they came to university for ended up being,
not the right thing for them.
It's not quite the right fit.
And that's what happened to me.
My, my D minus in first year economics,
told me that business school was not for me.
But I had taken a few religious studies,
courses as electives in my first year.
And I found that those courses,
were far more interesting and I was far better at them.
And that's you know, part of the,
the goal really to find the thing that,
that captures your interest,
that makes you want to keep studying it,
for years sometimes.
So I came a bit late to my future career,
but that's life,
we often move more in zigzags than straight lines.
Now, as it turns out,
I'm not entirely correct that our,
majors are all refugees from other programs.
We have seen a steady increase,
in students entering the program in first year.
Certainly,
this is because some of the religious studies students,
see religious studies as a career.
Something that they already have a plan,
outline in their minds.
But someone rolls simply out of a desire
to learn more about the world around them,
or about their neighbors,
or about such things as how religion can be both a force
for good and a force for evil.
Now,
our program,
the courses that we, that we've had in the program,
they they, include courses on the origins
and teachings of the major world religions,
as any religious studies program does.
So we look at Islam, Judaism, Christianity, Buddhism,
even some smaller ah,
size religions like Sikhism.
And these -
but what we're most proud of in our program,
are the courses that examine the interactions of religions.
Particularly in Canada,
and just show you a few of these,
descriptions for a few of these.
Our world religion sorry,
world religions in Canada course.
This is a required course now,
for our majors.
But it comes at the second year level,
in part because,
again we have quite a few students who come to us
from in later years.
And the course introduces students to the full breadth
of the world religions.
But it focuses on the Canadian experience,
with attention particularly,
on the people who make up the York community,
really wanna answer,
or the needs and interests of our,
of our community here.
So we hope students see something of their own experiences,
in the course,
as well as those of their neighbors.
The same approach is taken in one of our newest courses,
an upper level course,
so the 3000 level.
it was just called antisemitism and Islamophobia in Canada.
This has been instrumental in encouraging discussions,
among Jews and ah,
Muslims on campus.
And it shows them,
from, from what I hear from the instructor and students,
is that there's more that unites them than divides them.
Another course was just created just last year,
this has gone online religion in the digital age.
And it was designed specifically as an online course,
trying to be, trying to be kind of clever with things.
A course about God online,
that is online.
And as you can imagine,
it became quite topical,
over the past year when lockdowns made it necessary
for religious communities to gather virtually.
Now, ah, these are all upper level courses,
but students entering the program,
have the option to choose
from a variety of first-year courses.
As it happens our religious,
our first religious studies courses are very popular.
We get lots of people,
wanting to take religious studies courses.
So we mount quite a few of them.
But there's no first year required course as I mentioned.
So,
you have a lot to choose from.
And one of those who might,
you might want to choose from is Gods and Humans.
This again serves as an introduction,
to a variety of religious traditions,
but focuses specifically
on interactions between Gods and humans,
in literature, art and philosophy.
Religion permeates our culture,
or should say cultures,
it's not, we don't have just one culture here.
And official scripture,
are not the only place that one can go to,
to learn about it.
As I said again,
there's lots of other first year courses
that you could choose from,
if you're entering the program.
Some that look at individual religious traditions,
such as Islamic traditions or the Jewish experience,
and others look at multiple traditions,
such as the nature of religion.
Now, if you're thinking about religious studies as a career,
I have this large list here,
a possibilities available to you.
It's such a wide open list,
because religious studies can lead to many other,
careers,
once you graduate.
But many of our students,
are in the education program here at York.
So they take religious studies courses,
as one of their teachable subjects.
We have graduates also,
who have gone on to work in libraries and museums,
and some have become professors of religion, like me.
Some have moved from the university environment,
to religious post-secondary institutions,
to become community leaders,
such as priests, pastors, and nuns,
etcetera.
And then others have used their knowledge,
of religious traditions for such careers as journalism,
fiction writing or human rights advocacy,
so there's quite a lot of options for you.
So for many of us in religious studies,
the degree is not the end of our career journey.
It's just a stop along the way.
Thanks,
Adam.
- Fantastic.
Thanks so much for that overview of the program.
I was wondering if we could talk a little bit about,
the faculty members,
who are in the religious studies faculty.
and what some of the research they do is,
and some of the areas that they are interested in.
We cover well early Christianity,
both through what I teach and,
through our colleague, Phil Harland.
So we'd look at the biblical texts and texts that were
composed around same time as the Bible.
And the Jewish studies,
our colleagues in Jewish studies
who are affiliated with us,
also cover the, the, the Jewish tradition.
And so I said, I said three,
but now I'm adding the fourth with Judaism.
And the other two are Buddhism,
which is covered principally by our colleague,
Alicia Turner.
And she's a,
sheet covers South Asian,
religious traditions,
which includes Buddhism.
And the fourth is Islam.
And we have two faculty members,
Selma Zecevic and,
Marta who is just new,
so her last name escapes me, sorry about that.
So we covered,
you could, range of religions in quite considered,
in the considerable amount of detail.
But again, we do have other courses as well.
One of which,
I mentioned in the, well,
I mentioned the tradition and the discourse talk there,
is Sikhism,
which is a course that our students have wanted,
for quite a long time,
but we haven't been able to mount.
And we've recently hired a new person in it,
and Asian cultures who will be teaching,
Sikhism and Hinduism,
so that will add now to our,
to our portfolio of traditions that we cover in the program.
- Fantastic.
Now,
for students who might be interested in religious studies,
but have other areas of interests such as say history,
or literature,
how easy is it to pair religious studies,
with some of the other majors or disciplines?
If the student wanted to do two things at York,
even as maybe a major and a minor combination.
- Yeah.
You can pair religion with just about anything,
but certainly some things will make a bit more sense.
My own experience when I was an undergrad, I,
I besides a D minus and economics,
I like to tell everyone about,
is I, I started,
wanting to,
after business,
I started as an English major,
and and, then added religious studies as a second major.
And for me it made a lot of sense,
because I was reading these classics of English literature
and ah,
the imagery and,
the topics were so much infused,
by the biblical world,
that I thought this would be a good pair,
to help me understanding,
the literature better.
So English literature is a really good
ah, companion.
History is also good.
The two kind of feed off one another.
Its what we all,
always talk about in religious studies,
is trying to understand a religion
in its particular context.
And if you can broaden that context,
with a deeper look at history along the way,
that's that, can be very helpful to you.
But other things come to mind to political science.
Politics and
religion are intertwined today.
You can't really look at one without the other.
Indigenous studies,
again,
that's a natural kind of fit.
So there's a lot, certainly lots of options.
But even some of the more peculiar ones,
one might think strike you as peculiar,
are certainly possibilities as well.
Think of like a business,
administration degree with religion as well,
and what kind of,
insights that want,
that these two can lead, lend to one another.
And,
that can position you once you graduate,
as an interesting candidate for,
for a job who has that kind of breadth,
and depth to what they're doing.
- Absolutely.
And we work really hard in our Faculty,
to help students make those,
combinations.
So I'm really glad to hear that the,
program supports that sort of,
diversity and study.
Another question I had,
so a lot of people who are gonna be watching this video,
are not going to be familiar at all.
And you spoke a little bit about,
some of the course examples.
But if we could look maybe a little closer,
it doesn't have to be that,
a general course,
but maybe an introductory level course
that you might have instructed.
What can students expect,
in sort of their, their first classes?
What is religious studies?
If you can summarize,
what is it sort of about,
and what a first class might look like?
'Cause I think a lot of people might confuse,
religious studies with maybe theology a little.
- Sure.
I can tell you about,
the course Bible in modern contexts.
So first your Bible course,
sometimes we call it the baby Bible course,
cause it's the first year class.
And ah,
it's actually was transformed somewhat by me last year.
And I,
I'll talk to you about what that kind of transformation is.
But essentially,
it began as a course that would be an introduction,
to the Bible.
So both the Hebrew Bible,
or old Testament as Christians call it,
and the new Testament.
And,
we try to introduce,
by modern contexts.
We want introduce students principally,
to what we call the historical critical approach,
which is the way we study,
religious literature in the university.
We're trying to figure out what these texts meant
in their original context,
who wrote them?
Why did they write them?
How did the write them?
To what kinds of sources might they have used,
and etcetera.
So we want to try and understand the texts.
But this course has changed.
And this latest iteration,
because I really wanted to focus
on this modern context idea.
So it's not just the historical critical approach,
but also how are these texts now being used
in modern contexts?
So we would look for example,
at topics related to,
roles of women,
or race or,
homosexuality in the biblical texts,
and then cover a bit of a range of history
about how the text has been used in each of those topics,
and then how it's being used today.
So the idea is to really try
and engage the students far more,
than its early iteration did,
by showing them why this text is still relevant.
So it's still a scholarly approach,
but it's not just an ancient scholarly approach,
but it's looking at,
these topics throughout the history of,
principally Judaism and Christianity.
- Excellent. Thank you very much.
I think that's a great overview of the program.
I was wondering if you had any sort of final thoughts,
to leave with some of the prospective students
who might be thinking about the religious studies program
at York university?
Well,
I always felt felt, that,
I, I kinda led off with this a little bit,
that religious studies,
is really what the university is about.
That we,
that its as all the big questions.
These are the things that once,
when you've been in school all day,
and then you go hang out with your friends,
maybe at the bar,
or just an at residence or wherever.
And you start to think about the big questions.
That's why you're at university.
You want to think about these things.
And,
these are the courses
that feed those kinds of conversations.
You don't want to be the person in the room who isn't,
who is ill informed about what you're talking about.
So the more you can bring to those conversations,
the better.
And,
I do think it's, as I said,
it encourages critical thinking that you can use
anywhere in life.
I think a person who is engaged with the world,
asks questions about the world,
and thinks about problems and ways to solve those problems,
rather than which, what would be,
maybe the approach you have about religion
coming into the university,
where you just repeat the things that you've been told,
for years and years and years,
because it's part of your tradition.
It doesn't mean abandoning those things,
but it hopefully,
brings a depth to that,
to those experiences where you can both look at
how the religion,
how your religious tradition affects you today,
and other religious traditions affect other people,
but also where these things came from,
and how they've developed over time.
Now, that's my,
that's the best,
promotion I can give for the program I think.
- That was fantastic.
Thanks so much.
Well that takes us to about the end of our time,
this afternoon.
Thank you so much,
Professor Burke for joining us today,
and sharing information about,
the religious studies program.
For students who wanna find out more,
please feel free to contact us at goyork@yorku.ca,
with any questions.
You can also follow us on Twitter and Instagram
@yorkulaps.
And don't forget to submit your applications,
as soon as possible.
Thanks very much.
Bye bye.