Margins, Speak

Catalog description

Taught by PSR. This course is a seminar on global hermeneutics and the Bible. We will concentrate on the study and critique of particular interpretations of the New Testament coming from marginalized communities that have at one time or another felt disenfranchised, powerless, and voiceless. Such communities take it upon themselves to resist the dominant interpretations and in doing so they begin to create a space in which their voices can be heard and empowered. Special attention will be given to critical approaches, issues of identity, colonialism and resistance, and the ideological spectrum between the margins and the center. In so doing, this course serves the stated program goal of helping students attend to "the continuing importance and practice of interpretation of texts and their communities in history and culture." During the semester, we will read and study biblical texts using different perspectives within a postmodern ideological framework. Under this postmodern lens, all interpretations of the biblical text -- whether historical, theological, literary or of any other kind; and whether presented by the instructor or the students -- are partial and non-universal readings. All real readers, flesh-and-blood readers like us, read subjectively and partially.