Rel & Phil in Amer Identity

Catalog description

From the founding of the American nation under the influence of Puritanism to the rise of Transcendentalism in the nineteenth century, philosophic and religious propositions have decisively shaped the American character. This course examines several important episodes in American thought in order to determine what makes Americans different from other sorts of people, what habits of thought inform their decisions, and what principles govern their understanding of the relation between religion and public life. This course typically involves making two off-campus visits to historical sites in Philadelphia.