Theological, Pedagogical, and Ethical Approaches to Israel/Palestine Seminar

This seminar is designed to bring a religious studies dimension to the emergent theological, pedagogical, ethical, and social scientific inquiry on Israel/Palestine that is developing in a variety of subfields across academia. We intend to contribute to a number of cutting-edge discourses that create interdependencies among Islamic, Christian, Jewish and secular conversations. Our focus will be on ethical questions raised by the century-old conflict in Israel/Palestine, including, for example, the political uses of archeological programs, religious tours, and the participation of international organizations. We will survey theological questions that emerge from interactions, both pacific and conflictual. The seminar will engage mainstream theological discourses, and also those emerging from collectives that are pushed aside or subsumed by reigning discourses. Because Israel/Palestine has been a subject causing major controversy in academia and especially in our Religious Studies classrooms we will interrogate pedagogical questions and strategies to discover how we can create educational frameworks that respect multiple identities and contribute to social justice. Finally, the seminar will explore anthropological and sociological frameworks that focus on multiple nationalisms, modern capitalistic and socialist development, imperialisms, critique of political economy, settler colonialism, interfaith dialogue and modernity/coloniality to examine their connections to the religious studies analysis of the conflict. The seminar will welcome all AAR members who write, teach, and think about these subjects and welcome respectful encounters with scholars with opposing views that will benefit the development of new approaches to Israel/Palestine Studies.