Undergraduate Course: Lived Theology (DIVI10011)
Course Outline
| School | School of Divinity |
College | College of Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences |
| Credit level (Normal year taken) | SCQF Level 10 (Year 4 Undergraduate) |
Availability | Available to all students |
| SCQF Credits | 20 |
ECTS Credits | 10 |
| Summary | What do people do when they do theology? Does their practice change their theology? Does their theology change their practice? And why does it matter? Through placements in the Charteris Centre in Edinburgh, a community hub for people from religious and non-religious backgrounds, run by Greyfriars Kirk, a congregation of the Church of Scotland, this course investigates the significance and scope of practice for theology. The course concentrates on learning by doing. It offers a structured and supportive environment for students to conceptualise and conduct their own research projects on a theological issue that presents itself in the work of the Centre. The research can cover a variety of issues, ranging from poverty through community organising campaigns to pluralism. Students identify, investigate, and interpret the issue from theological and sociological angles, including empirical explorations. Thus, they analyse and assess theology as it is actually practiced, while impacting and improving the work of the Centre through their expertise.
This course is open to all students. Ministry students are particularly welcome. Since the number of placements might be limited, students who would like to participate in this course should send a short statement, explaining their motivation (300 words maximum), to the Course Organiser via email. |
| Course description |
Academic Description
This course investigates the significance and scope of practice for theology. Working in the wake of the participative turn to practice as accentuated in recent sociological and theological reflections on lived religion, the course places students in the Charteris Centre in Edinburgh, a community hub for people from religious and non-religious backgrounds, run by Greyfriars Kirk. In a structured and supportive course environment, students conceptualise and conduct their own research projects on a theological issue that presents itself in the work of the Centre. The research can cover a variety of issues, ranging from poverty through community organising campaigns to pluralism. Students identify, investigate, and interpret the issue from theological and sociological angles, drawing on their own empirical explorations. Thus, students analyse and assess theology as it is actually practiced, while impacting and improving the work of the Centre through their expertise.
Outline
The course is organised around the students' placement in the Charteris Centre in Edinburgh. These placements run in addition to weekly sessions. Framed by Introduction and Conclusion that cover the requirements and the results of research on theology in practice, these weekly sessions cover the challenges that confront students while they conceptualise and conduct their own research projects. Concentrating on the students experience and exploration of the practice of the Charteris Centre, the workshops consider sociological and theological conceptualisations of practice, including a variety of methodological approaches to theology as it is lived.
Student Learning Experience
The course is structured around the students' placement in the Charteris Centre in Edinburgh. These placements run in addition to weekly seminar sessions. While there will be lectures that cover the sociological and theological conceptualisations of practice in theology, most of the weekly seminar sessions will be workshops on the challenges that students encounter in conceptualising and conducting their own research project. Practitioners working at the Charteris Centre may join these sessions from time to time. The set texts are selected in accordance with the students' research projects, but students are expected to research literature on their own.
Students are assessed in three consecutive and complementary steps: (1) a presentation on the theological issue that they would like to research, (2) a portfolio of fieldwork notes that identifies the core concern and the core concepts of their research, and (3) a 3000-word essay presenting their research. Through these assessments, students demonstrate the achievement of the learning outcomes of the course.
|
Entry Requirements (not applicable to Visiting Students)
| Pre-requisites |
|
Co-requisites | |
| Prohibited Combinations | |
Other requirements | This course is open to all students. Ministry students are particularly welcome. Since the number of placements might be limited, students who would like to participate in this course should send a short statement, explaining their motivation (300 words maximum), to the Course Organiser via email. Once the deadline for applications has passed, you are welcome to email the Course Organiser to see whether there are still places available. |
Information for Visiting Students
| Pre-requisites | None |
| High Demand Course? |
Yes |
Course Delivery Information
|
| Academic year 2022/23, Available to all students (SV1)
|
Quota: 0 |
| Course Start |
Semester 1 |
Timetable |
Timetable |
| Learning and Teaching activities (Further Info) |
Total Hours:
200
(
Lecture Hours 11,
Seminar/Tutorial Hours 11,
Feedback/Feedforward Hours 1,
Summative Assessment Hours 2,
Programme Level Learning and Teaching Hours 4,
Directed Learning and Independent Learning Hours
171 )
|
| Assessment (Further Info) |
Written Exam
0 %,
Coursework
100 %,
Practical Exam
0 %
|
| Additional Information (Assessment) |
100% Coursework:
Presentation (10%): Each student will deliver a presentation of about 10 minutes, outlining the theological issue that they would like to research.
Portfolio (30%): Each student will submit a portfolio of fieldwork notes, identifying the core concerns and the core concepts of their research project.
Final Essay (60%): Each student will submit a 3000-word essay presenting their research. |
| Feedback |
Given that the course consists of weekly workshops in which students design and discuss their own research project, there will be opportunities for formative feedback throughout. In addition, students will be given the opportunity to receive feedback on an essay plan in advance of the submission of their final essay. |
| No Exam Information |
Learning Outcomes
On completion of this course, the student will be able to:
- Demonstrate an understanding of the significance and scope of practice for theology
- Identify theological issues as they present themselves in practice
- Conceptualise a research project in theology, including successful research ethics clearance
- Conduct a research project in theology, including empirical explorations
- Engage in constructive and critical debate with peers
|
Reading List
Indicative Bibliography
Required
Nancy T. Ammerman, Sacred stories, Spiritual Tribes: Finding Religion in Everyday Life (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013).
Duncan B. Forrester, Truthful Action: Explorations in Practical Theology (Edinburgh: T&T Clark, 2000).
Henk de Roest, Collaborative Practical Theology: Engaging Practitioners in Research on Christian Practices (Leiden: Brill, 2019).
Recommended
Jeff Astley, Ordinary Theology: Looking, Listening and Learning in Theology (Farnham: Ashgate, 2002).
Jeff Astley and Leslie J. Francis (eds), Exploring Ordinary Theology: Everyday Christian Believing and the Church (Farnham: Ashgate, 2013).
Helen Cameron, John Reader, Victoria Slater and Chris Rowland, Theological Reflection for Human Flourishing: Pastoral Practice and Public Theology (London: SCM Press, 2012).
Helen Cameron, Deborah Bhatti, Catherine Duce, James Sweeney and Clare Watkins, Talking about God in Practice: Theological Action Research and Practical Theology (London: SCM, 2010).
Duncan B. Forrester, Theological Fragments: Explorations in Unsystematic Theology (London: T&T Clark, 2005).
Elaine Graham, Heather Walton, Frances Ward and Katja Stuerzenhofecker, Theological Reflection: Methods. Second Edition (London: SCM, 2019).
Stephen E. Gregg and Lynne Scholefield, Engaging with Living Religion: A Guide to Fieldwork in the Study of Religion (London: Routledge, 2015).
David D. Hall (ed), Lived Religion in America: Toward a History of Practice (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1997).
Robyn Henderson-Espinoza, Activist Theology (Minneapolis: Fotress Press, 2019
Michael Lamb and Brian A. Williams (eds), Moral Theology and the Practices of Ordinary Life (Washington DC: Georgetown University Press, 2019).
Charles Marsh, Peter Slade and Sarah Azaransky (eds), Lived Theology: New Perspectives on Method, Style and Pedagogy (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2017).
Meredith B. McGuire, Lived Religion: Faith and Practice in Everyday Life (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2008).
Bonnie Miller-McLemore (ed.), The Wiley-Blackwell Companion to Practical Theology (Chichester: Wiley-Blackwell, 2012).
Bonnie J. Miller-McLemore, Christian Theology in Practice: Discovering A Discipline (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2012).
Pål Repstad (ed.), Political Religion, Everyday Religion: Sociology Trends (Leiden: Brill, 2019).
Henk de Roest, Collaborative Practical Theology: Engaging Practitioners in Research on Christian Practices (Leiden: Brill, 2019).
Christian B. Scharren (ed.), Explorations in Ecclesiology and Ethnography (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2012).
Christian B. Scharren, Fieldwork in Theology: Exploring the Social Context of God¿s Work in the World (Grand Rapids: Baker, 2015)
Christian B. Scharren and Aana Marie Vigen (eds), Ethnography as Christian Theology and Ethics (London: T&T Clark, 2011).
Chris Shannahan, A Theology of Community Organizing: Power to the People (London: Routledge, 2013).
Michael Stausberg and Steven Engler (eds), The Routledge Handbook of Research Methods in the Study of Religion (London: Routledge, 2011).
John Swinton and Harriet Mowat, Practical Theology and Qualitative Research (London: SCM, 2016).
Pete Ward (ed.), Perspectives on Ecclesiology and Ethnography (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 2012).
Pete Ward, Introducing Practical Theology: Mission, Ministry and the Life of the Church (Grand Rapids: Baker, 2017).
Natalie Wigg-Stevenson, Ethnographic Theology: An Inquiry into the Production of Theological Knowledge (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2014). |
Additional Information
| Graduate Attributes and Skills |
-Ability to analyse and assess evidence from a variety of sources, including empirical explorations.
-Ability to engage in conversations with peers and people from a variety of backgrounds.
-Ability to engage in interdisciplinary dialogue.
-Ability to pursue and present independent research in a structured and supportive environment.
-Ability to think systematically. |
| Keywords | theology,politics,ethics,lived religion,practice |
Contacts
| Course organiser | Dr Ulrich Schmiedel
Tel: (0131 6)50 8918
Email: |
Course secretary | |
|
|
University Homepage