REL 253 Exam Topics I

REL 253 Exam Topics A

The exam will be in two parts. Part I, THE FIRST HALF OF THE EXAM, will be on matters related to Writing Papers. Part II will be on topics covered thus far in the readings and lectures. If you will not be here on the exam date to take the exam, you must make prior arrangements at least one week before. You must receive prior permission for absence as well as to take the exam separately. Only exceptional cases will be allowed.

The exam will be multiple choice, and as covered in the syllabus, will count 10% of your grade. There is only one right answer per question. If there appears to be more than one right answer, pick the best answer.

If you have any questions about the exam or the topics included in the exam, please ask me. You can come in during office hours, make an appointment or send me email.

Part I: Writing Papers

Read the following essays and guidelines that are posted on the Writing Papers links on my web pages:

I. Four Keys to Writing in the Humanities

II. Four Stages of Writing

III. Paper Writing Guidelines

IV. Sentence Structure and Puncuation: Clauses and Commas

V. Writing: The Bridge between Consciousness and Unconsciousness

Part II: Readings and Lectures

Peter Brockelman, Time and Self

What does Brockelman mean by the "co-referentiality" of time in the self?
Why does the self inherently need "faith" as part of its narrative makeup?
Brockelman claims that the preconscious self of experience helps to establish its unity over time. How does he use the concept of "self-deception" and the example of "anger" to help illustrate his view of the unity of the self, as opposed to the fact of its disunity or difference over time?

Jerome Bruner, "The 'Remebered' Self"

What does Bruner mean by "victimicy?"
What does he mean when he says the self is a "perpetually rewritten story" (and how does this contrast with Brockelman's views)?
Why does the self need to rewrite the past?

Michel Foucault, "What is an Author"?

What does writing have to do with the problem of death and immortality?
What is the difference between what Foucault calls the "author function" and what one ordinarily thinks of as the "author"?
How does Foucault's "author function" differ from the self as described by Brockelman and Bruner?

Elspeth Graham et al, "Pondering All These Things in Her Heart"

Why are secrets necessary in the case of the religious Christian women Graham describes, and what do these secrets enable these women to do?
According to Graham, where do these "secrets" lie in relation to the private and public spheres of life?

Hilde Nelson, Damaged Identities, Narrative Repair

According to Nelson, what is the relation between narrative, agency, and identity in the development of self?
What is "infiltrated consciousness"?
What are "counterstories"? Nelson describes four types of 'counterstories gone bad.' What are they?
What are "found communities" and "communities of choice"?

Mark Freeman, Rewriting the Self and Augustine's Confessions

According to Freeman, how does Augustine's Confessions' emphasis on the historical accuracy of autobiography differ from previous accounts of people's lives?
How is this sense of historical accuracy related to Augustine's sense of self-examination and Christian asceticism?
How is Augustine's Confessions a precursor to the modern sense of inner dialogue?
What is are the key themes of Augustine's conversion to faith?

Sigmund Freud

Be familiar with Freud's three models of the psyche:

ego, id, super-ego (structure model)
conscious, pre-conscious, unconscious (structure model)
the libidinous drives of eros (love/life/sex) and thanatos (aggression/death/sex) (drive model)

How does the super-ego represent Freud's view of religion?
Freud sees an evolution from Animism -> Religion -> Science (Psychoanalysis)
What is the difference between "repression" and "sublimation"?
Totem and Taboo: How does Freud's story of the "primal horde" and what follows represent his view of the development from tribal totemic religion to Christianity?