Who We Are

The Department of Religious Studies is the principal hub and focal point at Stanford University for the academic study of religion. We study religion in general as a human phenomenon, as well as specific religious traditions, from a scholarly and critical standpoint, using the tools and methods of various disciplines in the humanities and social sciences.

We seek to afford all Stanford students the means to enhance their knowledge and appreciation of religion as an important aspect of the human experience and of the world’s cultural diversity. By developing and maintaining a coordinated program of undergraduate and graduate courses broadly representative of the major areas, themes, and methods of Religious Studies, we aim to enrich students’ education and equip them for global citizenship. We also aim to contribute to the public understanding of religion and its role in human affairs by working, in collaboration with other Stanford departments and affiliated centers, to stage lectures, symposia, and other events directed toward the wider community.

We embrace these objectives in the conviction that religion is not simply a fact of life, a product of history, or a force in the contemporary world to be known and understood, but is also something that by its very nature prompts critical reflection on knowledge itself, and on what it means to be human.