The "Science, Religion and Culture" seminar, one of the Mahindra Humanities Seminars, provides an opportunity to critically interrogate the categories of science, religion and culture and the sociocultural and discursive processes that create and transform these categories and the structures of authority attached to them. It sponsors conversations among scholars using anthropological, sociological, historical and philosophical methods with special interest in questions of race, gender and sexuality and different strategies of inclusion and exclusion that transform the production and consumption of knowledge.
This seminar series will host several Harvard faculty members as well as scholars from the wider academy who will discuss general themes pertaining to the series focus on science, religion, and culture.
Seminar Chairs:
Ahmed Ragab, Richard T. Watson Assistant Professor of Science and Religion at Harvard Divinity School and Affiliate Assistant Professor at the Department of the History of Science.
Janet Gyatso, Hershey Professor of Buddhist Studies at Harvard Divinity School.
SCHEDULE OF SEMINAR MEETINGS
Assistant Professor of History and of Social Studies, Harvard University
"I work at the intersection of political and intellectual history, with a focus on the interaction of knowledge production with political culture and institutions in the United States. I am especially interested in how discursive elements have moved between the public sphere and the increasingly specialized academic disciplines, and in the political contexts for this circulation. "
Tuesday, Sept 25: 6-7.30 pm (Barker 113)
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Panelists: Janet Gyatso, Karen King, Ahmed Ragab and Mayra Rivera Rivera
Tuesday, Dec 13: 6-7.30 pm (Barker 114)
- Marcia C. Inhorn
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William K. Lanman Jr. Professor of Anthropology and International Affairs, Yale University
Inhorn’s research interests revolve around science and technology studies (STS), gender and feminist theory (including masculinity studies), religion and bioethics, globalization and global health, cultures of biomedicine and ethnomedicine, stigma and human suffering.
Tuesday, January 29: 6-7.30 pm
- TJ Hinrichs
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Associate Professor, History Department, Cornell University
"A central thread running through my research and teaching is the investigation of connections between intimate experiences such as illness and personal transformation; communal practices such as medical training and religious rites; and broader historical shifts such as the consolidation of the civil service examination system, commercialization and urbanization, the spread of printing, and the development of landscape painting."
Tuesday, Feb 26: 6-7.30 pm
- K. Healan Gaston
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Lecturer on American Religious Histor, Harvard Divinity School
Her research focuses on the role of religion in American public life, with particular emphasis on the relationship between theology and democratic theory.
Gaston's courses include:
- Protestant-Catholic Relations in America, 1600-2000(Spring 2013)
- Religion and Identity in Modern American History, 1865-2000(Fall 2012)
Tuesday, March 26: 6-7.30 pm
- Alison Simmons
Samuel H. Wolcott Professor of Philosophy at Harvard College
"Being Human: Mind-Body Union and the Limits of Cartesian Metaphysics, or Making Sense of the Mind-Body Union"
Tuesday, Apr 22: 6-7.30 pm
*Note: This event takes place at the Braun Room, Andover Hall, 45 Francis Ave.
Assistant Professor of Religion, Williams College
"His research explores the contested borderland between “religion” and “science.” He focuses on practices and beliefs often considered “superstitions,” and therefore frequently dismissed as worthy of consideration in the disciplinary formations of science and religion."
Tuesday, Apr 23: 6-7.30 pm