RELS 209 Sport and Religion
From the first Olympic Games held in honor of Zeus to contemporary debates over public prayers on the football field to athletes who rely on meditation to perform under pressure, the relationship between religion and sports is long-standing and varied. Moreover, scholars have traced the ways in which sports function as religion in terms of the ritual structure of sporting events, the myths surrounding certain teams or players, and the community formed among fans of the same team. This course explores these many ways in which sports converge with religion. We will consider how sports and religion--from across global contexts--intersect with gender, race, sexuality, disability, commercialism, and the media by exploring case studies that students will select based on their interests. And we will extend our analyses in the classroom into the real world by taking field trips to sporting events.