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Religion 64: Theories of Religion - Case Study 1 (Amherst College course packet)
John Pemberton (compiler)
A course packet — a photocopied reader — assembled for an Amherst College religion course, 'Religion 64: Theories of Religion,' taught by Professor John Pemberton. Rather than a published book, it is the kind of compiled anthology that anchors an undergraduate seminar: selected readings gathered around a single case study, meant to be worked through alongside lectures and discussion. Materials of this sort typically pair foundational theorists of religion — figures such as Durkheim, Weber, Freud, Otto, Eliade, or Geertz — with a focused example that lets students test abstract theories against a concrete tradition. As an artifact it captures a particular classroom and a particular teacher's framing of how scholars have tried to explain what religion is and does. Its value is pedagogical and documentary rather than bibliographic.
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The compiler
John Pemberton III (1928–2016) was Professor of Religion at Amherst College from 1958 to 1998, holding the Crosby and later the Andrew W. Mellon chairs. Beginning around 1970 he became a leading scholar of Yoruba art, culture, and religion, co-authoring standard works such as Yoruba: Nine Centuries of African Art and Thought and Yoruba: Sculpture of West Africa. He was known at Amherst as a formative teacher of the theory and comparative study of religion.
The book
This item is a course packet for "Religion 64: Theories of Religion — Case Study 1," not a trade publication. Such packets collect journal articles, book chapters, and primary sources under fair-use for enrolled students, organized to move a class from general theories of religion toward a specific applied case.
How to read it
Treat it as a snapshot of a syllabus rather than a finished book: its selections, sequence, and emphases reflect one professor's pedagogy at one institution. Without the accompanying lectures its through-line may be partly implicit, but the readings themselves point to the enduring questions of the field — is religion best explained socially, psychologically, or as a category sui generis?
For more context
See Daniel Pals's Nine Theories of Religion for a modern survey of the same terrain, and Pemberton's own Yoruba scholarship.
Sources
- Type
- Book
- Author / Maker
- John Pemberton (compiler)
- Place of publication
- Amherst, MA
- ISBN
- None
- Shelf
- Spirituality & Philosophy
- Location
- Colorado