From Theological College to University

This review complements Hughes’s book by reflecting on the development of the Department of Religious Studies at Queen’s University to the present. It validates his claim that the growth of religious studies in Canadian universities was dependent on administrative cultures often idiosyncratic to particular institutions. In the case of Queen’s, a pattern of administrative interaction and shared faculty between the University and Queen’s Theological College persisted much longer than in comparable organizations. This can be explained by three considerations: the ethos of the United Church of Canada, growing awareness of multiculturalism from the 1970s onward, and the influence of the Association of Theological Schools in the United States and Canada. Although the first two of these factors are identified by Hughes, the last has been overlooked. It explains why, however, the Masters of Theological Studies could act as a de facto graduate degree in Religious Studies at Queen’s until the department developed its M.A. in 2001

Art · De facto · Ethos · Multiculturalism · Perspective (graphical) · Political science · Queen (butterfly) · Sociology · Theology · American Constitutional Law and Politics · Law · Philosophy · Reformation and Early Modern Christianity · Religion and Society Interactions · Religious studies