MA in Global Leadership, Moodle Online Course

MP 519: FALL 2015 – Downes

MP519: MISSIONAL ENGAGEMENT WITH CONTEMPORARY CULTURE (4 units)

Dr. Donna Downes, Associate Professor of Global Leadership[image]

DESCRIPTION: This course looks at contemporary culture from a missiological perspective, and covers issues of modernity, post-modernity, pluralism, secularism, globalization and the challenges and opportunities that each bring to Church worldwide, necessitating thoughtful, contextually relevant engagement and biblically sound responses. This course proposes the paradigm that missionary engagement should be the basic stance of the Church toward its cultural context, wherever the Church is located.

LEARNING OUTCOMES (“LO’s”): Upon successful completion of this course, students will have:

  1. Demonstrated the ability to “read or “exegete” modern/postmodern culture using missionary criteria and to articulate the relationship between theory and practice for sympathetic engagement with culture.

  2. Discerned those values and characteristics in their cultural contexts that can be affirmed, promoted, and leveraged for the benefit of God’s kingdom as well as the cultural values and forces that bring spiritual lethargy and decline.

  3. Designed strategies for missional engagement with contemporary culture that show cultural awareness and understanding, and in which the full resources of the Gospel are brought to bear in their ministries and churches.

  4. Explored the challenges and opportunities of globalization and its impact on the communication of the Gospel locally and internationally.

COURSE FORMAT: Conducted online, the ten weekly sessions align with Fuller's academic calendar. Students, the professor and teaching assistants will interact weekly through lectures, reading responses, discussions & writing assignments.

REQUIRED READING: Approximately 1,100 pages (65 hrs) of reading from the following materials:

NOTE: ALL TEXTS ARE AVAILABLE ELECTRONICALLY IN KINDLE EDITIONS.

ASSIGNMENTS AND ASSESSMENTS:

  1. Weekly forum discussions and reading interactions (35%) (2.5 hrs/wk = 25 hours) LO’s 1, 2 and 4

  2. A 1,500-word Cultural Analysis through Film comparing and contrasting two films and their post-modern cultural themes. (15%) (15 hours) LO’s 1, 2 and 4

  3. A 2,000-word Culture Watch assignment researching and assessing popular opinions about or approaches to a particular cultural problem or challenge—in preparation for the Final Case Study Paper (15%) (20 hours) LO’s 1 and 2

  4. A 3,500 -word Case Study paper that 1) presents a particular social challenge in context, 2) provides a critical assessment of how that challenge is currently being engaged or addressed by the student’s ministry, and 3) applying the relevant theories, theologies and approaches presented in this class to develop a missional proposal for changing, expanding and/or enhancing current practices. (35%) (35 hours) LO’s 2 and 3

Total expected workload: 160 hours

PREREQUISITES: This course is available only to those who are accepted into the MA in Global Leadership degree program. NO AUDITORS

RELATIONSHIP TO CURRICULUM: A required course for the Cohort portion of the MA in Global Leadership.
Meets C2 Contextualization Curricular requirements.

FINAL EXAMINATION: None.

This ECD is a reliable guide to the course design but is subject to modification. Update d August 2015


NOTE: This ECD is a reliable guide to the course design but is subject to modification. Textbook prices are set by publishers and are subject to change.

For your convenience, order these texts online through the Archives Bookshop.