Dropping the Albatross: Teaching Religion and Literature in a Postsecular Age

Abstract

Teaching literature after the ‘secularisation thesis’ requires both a critical recognition of the distinctly religious origins of the British Romantic movement and the intentional recovery of a wider range of authors and religious beliefs during the age. In this essay, I offer a brief consideration of disciplinary integration within higher education, with particular attention to the work of John Henry Newman, S.T. Coleridge, and Daniel Hardy. Next, I offer a case study that presents an ecofeminist reading of S.T. Coleridge’s ‘Rime of the Ancient Mariner’ with an assist from the religious scholarship of Sallie McFague. Finally, I conclude with some brief recommendations on how faculty might teach religion and literature in the classroom and, in the process, contribute to the current effort within higher education to diversify the curriculum.