Spring 2020/Fuller Online

TC533

Goodwin

TC533: THEOLOGY AND TELEVISION: COMMUNICATING THE GOSPEL IN A MEDIATED WORLD OF TECHNO-CULTURAL CHANGE (4 Units: 161 hours). Richard Goodwin.

DESCRIPTION: This course will consider a theology of culture by focusing on one of the most pervasive cultural forms in the Western world: Television. It will engage the technologies, narratives, ideologies, and ritual practices of hyper-modern culture through the lens of television as a contemporary form of life. The course will provide students with a set of analytical tools for critical understanding and sympathetic engagement with the medium of TV in both the US and global contexts, but it will also address a number of contextual approaches to the medium in order to develop a constructive theology of TV—one that will enable Christian leaders to articulate and demonstrate the Gospel in ways that are meaningful to modern persons inhabiting a mediated world of rapid techno-cultural change.

LEARNING OUTCOMES: Upon successful completion of this course, students will have demonstrated the ability to (1) articulate the relationship between theories and practices for sympathetic engagement and critical understanding of television as a modern technology, a narrative art form, a cultural commodity, and a portal for ritual life; (2) utilize a number of critical tools from the social sciences, aesthetic theory, media ecology, religious studies, and theology for analyzing and understanding the power and meaning of both TV programming and the cultural imagination that it mediates; (3) describe in general terms the history of the relationship between the church and televised media in order to situate their own engagement with media within a larger theological framework; and (4) consider possible theological/apologetic approaches for Gospel demonstration and articulation, with a special emphasis on imagining new ways of collaboratively expressing the Gospel within a hyper-segmented cultural context.

RELAIONSHIP TO PROGRAM LEARNING OUTCOMES: This course addresses MDiv PLO2 “Students will have demonstrated capacities to engage diverse cultural contexts for transformational discipleship, mission, and ministry” and MATM/MAT PLO2 “Students will have demonstrated capacities for historically informed theological and ethical reflection”. It may also contribute to MAICS PLO4 “Students will have demonstrated capacities to pursue vocations that engage the mission of God globally”.

COURSE FORMAT: This course will be conducted online on a ten-week schedule aligned with Fuller’s academic calendar for a total of 40 instructional hours. Students are required to interact with the material, with each other, and with the instructor regularly through online discussions, reading, and other assignments that promote active learning.

REQUIRED READING: 1,200 total pages required

Callaway, Kutter and Batali, Dean. Watching TV Religiously: Television and Theology in Dialogue. Baker Academic, 2016. ISBN: 978-0801030734, Pub. Price $30.00 [288 pp.].

Shimpach, Shawn, ed. The Routledge Companion to Global Television. Routledge, 2019. ISBN: 978-1138724341, Pub. Price $240.00. Available as an e-book from the Fuller Library [150 pp.].

Turner, Sarah E. and Nilsen, Sarah. The Colorblind Screen: Television in Post-Racial America. NYU Press, 2014. ISBN 978-1479891535, Pub. Price $29.00. Available as an e-book from the Fuller Library [363 pp.]

Course Reader [approx. 200 pp.]: selected chapters including work from:

Johnston, Robert K. God’s Wider Presence: Reconsidering General Revelation. Baker Academic, 2014. ISBN: 978-0801049453, Pub. Price $28.00. Available as an e-book from the Fuller Library

Mittell, Jason. Complex TV: The Poetics of Contemporary Television Storytelling. New York University Press, 2015. ISBN: 978-0814769607, Pub. Price $29.00. Available as an e-book from the Fuller Library

Additional readings available via eReserves from: Diane Winston, Barbara Nicolosi, Henry Jenkins, Mitchel Stephens, Robert Woods, Jana Riess, Michele Rosenthal, Lynn Schofield Clark, Craig Detweiler, Quentin Schultze, and others.

SPECIAL TOPICS, choose one [max. 200 pp.]:

Crome, Andrew, and James McGrath. Religion and Doctor Who: Time and Relative Dimensions in Faith. Cascade, 2013. ISBN: 9781625643773, Pub. Price $33.60. Not available as an e-book from the Fuller Library [366 pp].

Decker, Kevin S. and David R. Koepsell. Philosophy and Breaking Bad. Palgrave Macmillan, 2017. ISBN: 978-3-319406657-7, Pub. Price $39.99. Not available as an e-book from the Fuller Library [266 pp].

Duncan, Ann W. and Jacob L. Goodson, eds. The Universe is Indifferent: Theology, Philosophy, and Mad Men. Wipf & Stock, 2016. ISBN: 9781625648976, Pub. Price $39.20. Not available as an e-book from the Fuller Library [428 pp.]

Feltmate, David. Drawn to the Gods: Religion and Humor in The Simpsons, South Park, and Family Guy. NYU Press, 2017. ISBN: 9781479890361, Pub. Price $29.00. Not available as an e-book from the Fuller Library [304 pp].

Howell, Charlotte E. Divine Programming: Negotiating Christianity in American Dramatic Television Production 1996-2016.Oxford University Press, 2020.ISBN: 9780190054373, Pub. Price $125.00. Not available as an e-book from the Fuller Library [280 pp.].

Jacoby, Henry, ed. Game of Thrones and Philosophy: Logic Cuts Deeper Than Swords. Blackwell, 2012. ISBN: 978-1-118-20605-8, Pub. Price $12.99. Not available as an e-book from the Fuller Library [320 pp.].

Joustra, Robert and Alissa Wilkinson. How to Survive the Apocalypse: Zombies, Cylons, Faith, and Politics. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 2016. ISBN: 978-0802872715, Pub. Price $18.00. Not available as an e-book from the Fuller Library [198 pp.].

Madden, Katherine, Mara Einstein, and Diane Winston, eds. Religion and Reality TV: Faith in Late Capitalism. Routledge, 2018. ISBN: 9781315545950, Pub. Price $22.48. Not available as an e-book from the Fuller Library [210 pp.].

Valenzano III, Joseph M. and Erika Engstrom. Religion Across Television Genres: Community, Orange is the New Black, The Walking Dead, and Supernatural. Peter Lang, 2018. ISBN: 978-1-4331-5282-5, Pub. Price $42.95. Not available as an e-book from the Fuller Library [162 pp.]

Wetmore Jr., Kevin J. The Theology of Battlestar Galactica: American Christianity in the 2004-2009 Television Series. McFarland & Company, 2012. ISBN: 978-0-7864-8946-6, Pub. Price $29.95 Not available as an e-book from the Fuller Library [219 pp].

ASSIGNMENTS AND ASSESSMENT:

Online participation, which includes weekly threaded discussions reflecting on course content (approx. 250 words), and weekly responses to classmates’ posts (approx. 150 words) (15%). [This assignment is related to learning outcomes #1-4]. [15 hours].
Required reading (1,200 pages) and required viewing of all TV programs. [This assignment is related to learning outcomes #1 and 2]. [68 hours reading + 30 hours viewing = 98 hours].
An open-book, multi-choice quiz (20 questions) based on Turner/Nilsen’s The Colorblind Screen (10% total). [This assignment is related to learning outcomes #1, 2, and 4]. [1 hour].
A 5-minute book review (book to be chosen from the Special Topics reading list), presented as a recorded slide show (e.g., PowerPoint, Keynote, Google Slides, Prezi, etc.) to be made available to classmates for viewing. (10%). [This assignment is related to learning outcomes #1–3]. [5 hours].
Student will create a small-group discussion guide designed for encouraging Gospel demonstration and articulation based upon a serialized TV program. They will then facilitate a small-group discussion that makes use of these materials. Student will submit both the discussion guide itself and a 500-word reflection on the utility of the resource they have created (20%). [This assignment is related to learning outcomes #1-4]. [10 hours].
“The Showrunner’s Pitch: Contextual Theology” Assignment. Student must come up with a concept for a TV program and create a document that describes and assesses the following: (1) The core of the program’s power and meaning, (2) theological strategies for exploring and encouraging Gospel demonstration and articulation among the audience to whom this program is narrow-cast, (3) a proposal for a “televisual” liturgy that might capture the imagination of this particular, hyper-segmented portion of the broader culture (20%). [This assignment is related to learning outcomes #1-4]. [10 hours].
An essay offering a theological engagement with a seminal TV program or TV series of the student’s choosing [2,500 words]. Students will demonstrate their ability to examine or apply the theological theories presented in class by placing their chosen television program into dialogue with the biblical text and theological tradition. Papers will seek to achieve three goals: (1) offer a critical analysis/description of the TV program/series; (2) develop a possible theological and biblical approach for engaging with our contemporary culture as expressed in this television program; (3) reflect upon the ways in which the Gospel might best be articulated and demonstrated within one’s local context (mediated or otherwise) as it is shaped by the broader televisual culture (25%). [This assignment is related to learning outcomes #1-4]. [21 hours].

PREREQUISITES: None.

RELATIONSHIP TO CURRICULUM: Option to meet the C2 requirement in the 120 MDiv and 80 MATM Program (Fall 2015). Option to meet the TH5 requirement.

FINAL EXAMINATION: None.