In Teaching Religion and Film, an interdisciplinary team of scholars thinks about the theoretical and pedagogical concerns involved with the intersection of film and religion in the classroom. They examine the use of film to teach specific religious traditions, religious theories, and perspectives on fundamental human values. Some instructors already teach some version of a film-and-religion course, and many have integrated film as an ancillary to achieving central course goals. This collection of essays helps them understand the field better and draws the sharp distinction between merely "watching movies" in the classroom and comprehending film in an informed and critical way.

In a culture increasingly focused on visual media, students have learned not only to embrace multimedia presentations in the classroom, but to expect them. Such expectations are perhaps more prevalent in a field as dynamic and cross-disciplinary as religious studies, but the practice nevertheless poses some difficult educational issues -- the use of movies in academic coursework has far outpaced the scholarship on teaching religion and film. What does it mean to utilize film in religious studies, and what are the best ways to do it?

About the Author

Greg Watkins is Lecturer in the Program in Structured Liberal Education, Stanford University and Co-Director of Virtual Mandala, a project of the Stanford Humanities Lab. He is also a filmmaker, with an MFA in Film Production from UCLA.

Review 

"This book is a gold mine for faculty who teach religion and film. Full of theoretical and practical resources for effective teaching, it opens exciting avenues for exploration. These thoughtful essays provide wonderful questions and suggestions for expediting discussion of the inevitably complex knots of race, gender, class, values, and ethnicities raised so forcefully by movies. Teaching Religion and Film contributes greatly to refining a relatively new and exciting field." --Margaret R. Miles, author of Seeing and Believing: Religion and Values in the Movies

"There is currently no other guide that offers such challenging and important approaches to understanding pedagogical concerns for teaching religion and film. This compilation of works from ground-breaking authors in the field analyzes the distinctiveness of film and its religious dimensions, not only from a theological approach to religion, but from other cultural frames of reference which manifest themselves in movies. Timely and comprehensive, this book offers a much needed, authoritative, and wide-ranging set of pedagogical tools not just for the teacher but for anyone who wishes to understand the complex characteristics of film and religion." --Rubina Ramji, Assistant Professor, Department of Philosophy and Religious Studies, Cape Breton University, Nova Scotia, and Film Review Editor for the Journal of Religion and Film