REL 332 - Japanese Religions through Anime

This course provides an overview of Japanese religions through the medium of Japanese animation, otherwise known as Anime. It will address fundamental values and points of concern for Japanese religion and society, past and present, including life and death; cosmology; human relationships with nature and non-human animals; ritual and tradition; inter-religious cooperation; understandings of gender and sexuality; nostalgia for a past that probably never existed but serves legitimating functions for the religious and political ideologies of the present; and coming to grips with the apocalypse. Letter grade with Pass/No Pass option. (Offered interterm.) 3 credits