Department of Religious Studies

Why do people love superheroes—and love to hate villains? How do superheroes diagnose what is wrong with the world and how it can be righted? Can superheroes help us to understand and bring out the best in ourselves? This course asks what superheroes can tell us about religion, spirituality, and science—as well as race and ethnicity, gender and sexuality, and class and age—in American culture. We will read comic books and watch Marvel movies and DC Netflix series. Instead of taking exams, students will write papers that 1) analyze superheroes, and 2) invent a superhero and/or heroic universe; students have the option of creating their own comic book, game, or film.