The Senior Experience
Senior Capstone
The Senior Capstone is a required two-semester course (2 credits/semester, 4 credits/semester for honors) for Religious Studies majors. In this course, students will discuss recent debates concerning theories and methods in the academic study of religion and will complete a major work of independent research.
Pictured below: Furqan Qureshi presenting his capstone project, “Jinn and the Sharia’ah: How the Unseen is Used to Understand the Mandates of Islam,” at CLAS 2024.
Honors Program in Religious Studies
Students majoring in religious studies may apply at the start of their senior year for admission to the honors program, in which case they enroll in RE470 for four credits each semester and write a more substantial thesis than is otherwise required. Students are expected to submit their proposal to the department chair by the deadline for adding fall courses. Admission is contingent on a GPA of 3.65 or higher in the major at the completion of the junior year. On successful completion of the work for the honors program, students will graduate from the College with “Honors in Religious Studies.”
Senior Projects
2017-2018 Academic Year
Brooke Gentry (Honors Project with Professor Nikky Singh)
From Protagonists to Antagonists: Muslims on the Hollywood Screen
Lucy Soucek (Honors Project with Professor Nikky Singh)
Forging Religious Bonds through the language of Colors
Elizabeth Oakley
The Red Tent: Biblical Women in Contemporary Fiction
Ellie Geo Ellie Geoghegan
Reimagining Sita through a Feminist Lens
Skylar Labbe
How MLK Jr. Worked to Reach White Christians
Mark Snyder
Respect or Resist? Contextualizing Evangelical Identity in the Trump Era
2016-2017 Academic Year
Kelsey Poole
Sexual Norms for Women in the Bible and Today: Unfair Expectations?
2015-2016 Academic Year
Anna Spencer
Mishpucha: The familial nature of Jewish pastoral care in Waterville, Maine
Sarah Jean Shimer
Laudato Si: On Care for Our Common Home: A New Environmental Ethic
2014-2015 Academic Year
Annie Friedrich (RE 491, Senior Independent Project)
An Incomplete Completeness: Forming Integrity of Faith Through Youth Involvement in Short-Term Missions
Sonja Hagemeier (RE 492, Senior Independent Project)
The Tractor As Pulpit: Green Nuns and Catholic-Based Agriculture
Jimmy O’Leary (Honors Project with Professor Nikky Singh)
Bridging the Divide: The Religious and the Secular at Colby College
2013-2014 Academic Year
Nora Barnard
The Literature of Near-Death Experiences
Maddie Kurtz
Judaism in Modern and Postmodern Dance
Kristen Robinson
Dante’s Inferno Today