REL 225: Th e Ph ilosoph y of Religion

Response Papers
The Basics

You are required to submit 7 short response papers and/or Word Journals (maximum of 3, see below) throughout the semester, in advance of the class for which the paper is written. These papers are an opportunity for you to reflect on the topic of the week, the readings and for you to put forth some discussion questions for class. They will also serve as a tool for you to practice articulating yourself in writing in anticipation of your Midterm and Final Project, as well as to begin to get feedback from me on your writing. You are free to choose the weeks for which you will write a paper (limit 1 per week), but you must complete at least 3 before mid-semester. You may submit these papers via email to me (walsh_robyn@wheatoncollege.edu) the evening before class by 10pm. Your paper will be graded on a , + or - scale, based on how well you have read, understood and metabolized the material in question and the issues you raise. Overall, these papers will be worth 25% of your final grade in the course. Each paper should be approximately 1-2 pp. long, double-spaced, 1-1.25 inch margins and in 12 point font. I recommend Times New Roman. It should be no less than 500 words in order to adequately address the readings and the ideas you pose. Quotations from the readings will not count toward this final word total. Be sure to put your name and the date at the top of your paper.
stylistic considerations

In general, you should view these response papers as short essays that must conform to the stylistic and academic rules of any other kind of formal writing. This includes avoiding spelling mistakes, improper grammar, SMS language (textese) and, most importantly, plagiarism. If you feel tempted to plagiarize, it is likely a sign that you have not read carefully enough or given yourself enough time to finish the assignment, in which case I recommend you come to talk to me about your approach to the material. Be sure to cite your sources correctly. If you are quoting directly from a reading, please cite the source and page number parenthetically. For example:
In The Ontology of Religion, Stanley Stowers states that [c]ontemporary scholarly thinking about religion is bedeviled by the post-Cartesian legacy of dividing reality up into subject and object (Stowers 2008: 6).

You may also find it helpful to cite the source and page number from which you derive a general point about a reading or readings. For example:
Burton Mack and Russell McCutcheon each acknowledge the influence of Max Weber on the field of religious studies; however, they also note that scholars in the Weberian tradition tend to avoid offering a firm social theory of religion (Mack 2000: 286; McCutcheon 2001: 21).
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Ideally, your response papers will manage to engage all of the readings for a given class session; however, it is okay if you choose to focus in on one reading or aspect of an argument. My one caution with this approach is that, if your response paper raises a point that is somehow addressed or answered in another one of our readings that day (and, therefore, indicates that you wrote your paper before finishing all of the reading), you may find that you receive a lower grade (e.g., a rather than a +). It is okay to use I in your papers, but you may find it is better to do so sparingly. Finally, these papers are a chance for you to really engage with the readings, explore your own thinking on the questions raised and to express your unique viewpoint(s) on the material. While you must conform to certain expectations in regard to form and style, do feel free to express your creativity within those parameters. Let me know what you are thinking, what you think of the assignment, what is still confusing or troubling about a concept. These papers are a tool for you to work on your writing and be prepared for class, but they are also a tool for me to help assess how you are doing in the class, how the class is going overall, what we may need to review and what we might emphasize going forward, based on your interests. Attached are more details on the assignment options.

 This course asks you to be an active readerto consider the act of reading as a full contact sport and to create meaning from the text rather than simply absorbing the material. In this vein, a reading response paper should engage the text in some fashion. The paper should examine and begin to formulate the questions that a more formal analytical argument essay might argue. Ultimately, your college career will most likely ask you to devise your own paper topicsrather than responding to the questions a professor might pose about a text (literary or otherwise), you will be asked to make an academic argumentwithout the guidance of leading questions. The purpose, then, of this response paper is to help you begin to see the kinds of issues that most interest you in the texts you read. From there, you can begin to take control of your academic voice. Writing a response paper means that you may choose to write about your own reaction to a given reading or readings as a whole or you may choose to write about a particular point or points made by the author. Whatever you choose to focus on, the response must be critical, not simply a description of your own personal feelings about the essay. Writing a response paper might seem to imply that you will be writing about your emotional responses and reactions to a particular text, that you will be answering the question: How did you feel about the text? This is NOT what you are to do in a critical response paper. In this sort of paper, How did you feel is a legitimate starting point perhaps, but what is more interesting is why you felt that way. The response paper consists of your close examination of the text and the questions in the text that most intrigue you. It does not need to be a fully structured and argued essayit should, however, pull together your thoughts about a particular issue in the text. Guidelines to help you produce a good response paper: Write about something you care about. Take a look at some of the questions asked by the author, or even some of the questions I occasionally list on our handouts, for inspiration. Make a statement / take a position (a thesis) about the topic. Sometimes that statement will be an argument for or against a position; at other times it will be a statement of confusion, when the writer isn't sure what to believe. Explain your reasons for believing your thesis, so that your reader can understand why you are making this assertion. If your thesis is a statement of confusion, explain why you're confused! Use evidence and citations from the readings. Construct an argument. Show what it was in the assigned text that made you think about this topic. If possible, compare and contrast the assertions of the assigned text with your own.
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Option #1: The Critical Response Paper

For example, for todays class you read Russell McCutcheons More Than A Shapeless Beast from Critics Not Caretakers (SUNY Press, 2001). In that piece, McCutcheon argues, among other things, that the idea that religion is a nonempirical, uniquely personal experience and evades rational explanation (McCutcheon 2001: 4) should be challenged within the academy. A response paper might take McCutcheons claim and argue the opposite position, or agree and expand on his argument.
McCutcheon argues that we risk reinscribing folk categories if we do not generate a concrete definition of religion; however, I think he too readily dismisses the importance of the experiential dimension of religion.

or
McCutcheon argues that we risk reinscribing folk categories if we do not generate a concrete definition of religion. I have often wondered how to tell the difference between religions, cults and superstitions as categories of analysis and I think his argument helps me understand how to begin to discern between them and why that is important.

You want to formulate a claima specific and arguable response to the aspect of the text that you are responding to. DO NOT simply summarize the text. You should briefly summarize the article to familiarize your reader with the ideas you are discussing, but the focus of a response paper is your argument. Again, be sure to organize your thoughts in a logical manner and to include quoted evidence from the text to support the claim you make.

Option #2: The Word Journal

Another option is for you to write a Word Journal. The Word Journal prompts a two-part response. First, summarize one or all of our readings in a single word. Second, write two or more paragraphs explaining why you chose that particular word to summarize the text(s) in question. The completed response is an abstract or synopsis of the reading(s) overall. For example:
Robyn Walsh Response Paper #1: Word Journal Source: Diogenes Laertius, On Diogenes, Crates, and Hipparchia Word: Moralizing Throughout Diogenes Laertius Lives of Eminent Philosophers, he recounts a number of seemingly mundane stories about the figureheads of various philosophical schools. Upon closer examination, however, these stories betray Diogenes goal of allowing small episodes from an individuals life to represent greater philosophical, ethical or moral positions. Ultimately, these are stories not only of the lives of notable philosophers, but studies in virtue and vice 9/4/12

The purpose of the Word Journal is to help you exercise and improve several academic skills. It focuses your ability to read carefully and deeply and to construct meaning from what you have read. It also assesses your ability and creativity at summarizing the arguments you encounter in your reading assignments. Finally, it is a means for you to work on your skills at explaining and defending a position or point of view. In the long run, practice with this form of writing should help with your ability to write highly condensed abstracts and to synthesize greater amounts of information into key conceptsa necessary task in fields like philosophy and religious studies! Some caveats: You are limited to using this technique 3 times throughout the semester in pursuit of fulfilling your required 7 responses. While Word Journals are helpful tools for engaging our readings and understanding concepts, they do not necessarily cultivate the same skills of analysis that will ultimately be required in your Midterm and Final Project. While I want you to express your point of view, you are not permitted to use words like stupid, boring, interesting, confusing, awesome or dry to describe a reading(s). The point is not to put a value judgment on the material, but to use your skills of discrimination to summarize comprehensively. If you find yourself sitting at your computer with a reactionary word in your mind, try turning it into a question in order to come up with a more appropriate response. What about this authors argument did I think was dumb or lacking? Was this boring to me because the author used poor examples? As with the traditional response paper, you want to turn your impressions into more concrete and critical observations about your assignments. You still must meet the 500 word minimum.
Some portions of this outline were adapted from The Critical Response The Writing Program, Syracuse University (wrt howard.syr.edu/Handouts/Critique.html) and Classroom Assessment Techniques eds., Angelo and Cross (Jossey-Bass, 1993).