AV名湿

This course considers how Protestant, Catholic聽and Jewish conversations about sexuality and reproduction have shaped access to and attitudes towards reproductive health in the US over the course of the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. We will consider the invisible religious assumptions in many seemingly secular decisions about reproductive policy. We will examine how religious law and theology on sex and reproduction do and do not connect to the needs, beliefs聽and practices of members of their own religious communities. We will ask how the feminist potential of contraception and abortion have shaped how and when religious communities have supported those forms of healthcare. We will also explore the relationship between religious conversations about reproduction as they relate to reproductive rights versus reproductive justice.

Learning Objectives

• Students will be able to articulate and describe how religious groups in the United States have responded to changes and developments in reproductive health and policy. (For instance, how different religious groups have reacted to contraception, abortion聽and the reproductive justice movement);
• Students will be able to analyze primary sources relating to religion and reproductive politics in the United States by paying attention to the historical and political context that created the source, the author鈥檚 perspective聽and its genre;
• Students will be able to evaluate academic writing (secondary sources) on religion and reproductive politics, identifying the author鈥檚 argument and the evidence that they use to support their claims;
• Students will be able to draw on the resources of the class to make their own arguments about religion and reproductive politics in the United States.