ARTICLES

Embodying Learning: Post-Cartesian Pedagogy and the

Academic Study of Religion

Michelle Mary Lelwica

Concordia College, Moorhead, Minnesota

Abstract. This paper explores the concept and practice of “embodied pedagogy” as an
alternative to the Cartesian approach to knowledge that is tacitly embedded in traditional
modes of teaching and learning about religion. My analysis highlights a class I co-teach
that combines the study of Aikido (a Japanese martial art) with seminar-style discussions
of texts that explore issues pertaining to embodiment in the context of diverse spiritual
traditions. The physicality of Aikido training makes it an interesting “case study” of
embodied pedagogy and the lessons it offers both teachers and students about the aca-
demic study of religion. Ultimately, the questions and insights this class generates illus-
trate how post-Cartesian pedagogies can expose, challenge, and correct epistemological
assumptions that contribute to one-dimensional views of religion and that fail to address
our students as whole persons. A final part of the paper considers other possible venues
for embodying teaching and learning in the academic study of religion.

Challenges of the Cartesian Legacy

During the past few decades, “the body” has become a rather hot topic in the academy –
not just in the field of religion but in other disciplines as well.* This turn to the body is
part of the broader insurrection of “subjugated knowledges” (Foucault 2003, 7) heralded
by feminists, postmodernists, postcolonialists, and critical thinkers of various stripes.
Though not always explicit, an important facet of this revolution is the critique of Carte-
sian assumptions. More specifically, Descartes’ assertions (1) that the essential feature
of human beings is their capacity to reason; (2) that the mind is independent of the
body; and (3) that the body by itself lacks intelligence (Descartes 1956, 21, 23), have
been challenged by more complicated and integrated views of humans in which “body”
and “mind” are inextricably linked (Bordo 1993; Lakoff and Johnson 1999; Abram
1997; Damasio 1994; Bresler 2004; Csordas 1994; Weiss and Haber 1999).1

* I would like to thank the two anonymous Teaching Theology and Religion reviewers, as well as Kimerer
LaMothe, for their helpful feedback on an earlier draft of this article. I can only hope that my revisions do at
least some justice to their insightful suggestions.
1
It is important to note that “body” and “mind” are linguistic constructs that create the appearance of a
seemingly neat division that does not, in reality, exist. English-speaking people use these terms to designate
different dimensions of human beings that are, in fact, inextricably connected. In his address to the New York
Academy of Medicine in 1928, John Dewey noted the dualistic perspective that our conventional use of such
terms unintentionally produces, even among those who question such dualism: “We have no word by which to
name mind-body in a unified wholeness of operation . . . Consequently, when we endeavor to establish this
unity in human conduct, we still speak of body and mind and thus unconsciously perpetuate the very division
we are striving to deny” (quoted in Bresler 2004, 8).

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Lelwica

Ironically, however, the critique of Cartesian dualism remains largely theoretical

when it comes to our pedagogical practices, which often reflect a disembodied approach
to learning, as if our “minds” and “bodies” were separate entities. As music educator
Wayne Bowman points out, “We ‘know’ and have learned to say that mind is incorpo-
rated; but we have neither grasped fully the profundity of that claim nor the range of its
implications” for teaching and learning (2004, 33). In the field of religious studies, a
tacit but pervasive view of knowledge as acquired through the process of disembodied
thinking is embedded in conventional pedagogies: students read about religious phenom-
ena and ideas; they gather in classrooms to explore the information and analyses pre-
sented in their readings; they sit (or slouch) in desks and chairs, while we stand in front
of them striving to bring these ideas to life.
To be sure, the traditional classroom has certain advantages. The relative distance it
provides (both from our students and from our subject matter) is part of what makes the
academic study of religion possible. Such distance enables scholars and students alike to
move from believing in religion to understanding it. While this movement need not be
linear, it is crucial, especially for those of us teaching about religion in religiously affili-
ated colleges, where students often come with deep-seated assumptions about the superi-
ority of their faith tradition. The shift from parochial beliefs to a broader, historical, and
analytic view of the role of religion in human life and cultures depends on the very
intellectual skills – the doubt, the distance, the analytical and critical thinking – that
Descartes’ method introduced.
A few important questions emerge: How can we retain the edge of analytical-
critical thinking at the heart of the academic study of religion without cutting the
mind off from the body? How might we incorporate the body into our intellectual
explorations – not just as another subject of study but also as a part of the process of
teaching and learning about religion? And, how might doing so enrich our understand-
ing of religion?
These questions are important for at least three interrelated reasons. First, leaving
the body out of the learning process deprives us of a valuable resource for reflecting
both on the role of the body in the production of religious discourses, and on the way
those discourses influence humans’ experiences of embodiment. Second, a disembod-
ied approach to religious studies can lead to a distorted, one-dimensional view of
religion, one that overemphasizes its cognitive dimensions (especially belief) while
neglecting both the corporeal practices through which beliefs are cultivated and rein-
forced and the aesthetic and emotional resonances that make them compelling. A third
problem with pedagogies that enlighten our “minds” without engaging our “bodies” is
that they are less likely to captivate the attention of our students, whose sensibilities
are well trained by the titillating sights, sounds, tastes, and touches of commercial
culture.

The Gaps in Our Own Sensory Education

Indirectly, these problems point to potential benefits (which I discuss below) of moving
beyond a Cartesian approach to studying and teaching about religion. Making this move,
however, is more easily accomplished in theory than in practice. At least in part, this is
because of the somatic education many of us received (but may not have been aware of)
in the process of becoming intellectuals.
For over two decades, many of us attended schools where learning was assumed to
take place primarily in our heads. In most of our courses, (with the important excep-

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tions of Physical Education, Art, or Music classes – for those of us who were lucky
enough to have them), we were educated from the neck up, leaving the rest of our
body to serve as a mere support (or apparent obstacle) in our search for knowledge
and understanding, rather than an essential vehicle in this quest (Powell 2004, 193).
As dance teacher Liora Bresler points out, standard academic pedagogies “target the
mind and cognition, ignoring the body at best and subduing it at worst.” In this
context, a student’s moving body is regarded as disruptive or in some way trouble-
making (Bresler 2004, 127), as “an accessory to a crime, like the restless body of a
hyperactive student, or the listless posture of a sleeping, bored, or exhausted student”
(Ross 2004, 171–172). Thus while our minds are acquiring important knowledge, our
bodies are also absorbing a significant lesson, namely, that the mastery of ideas
requires us to tame or detach from our physicality, which is irrelevant to (or disrup-
tive of) our academic progress.
Reflecting on the conventional training of religion scholars in particular, Kimerer
LaMothe observes:

Beginning in kindergarten or before, and continuing through the final throes of

graduate school, we learn to sit still in order to think, and as the condition for
attaining the intellectual mastery we desire . . . We learn to think and feel and act
as if ‘we’ as minds have control over the ‘bodies’ we inhabit. We so identify our-
selves with the mind over body patterns of sensation and response we have per-
fected that we find it nearly impossible to remember what our bodies know about
the process of becoming someone who thinks in this way. (2008, 590)

Like the proverbial fish in water, we fail to recognize both the extent to which we have
absorbed a Cartesian approach to learning and how this approach in turn shapes our
understanding of the phenomena we study. As a result of our intellectual training out of
our bodies, LaMothe notes, we remain attached to linguistic methods, metaphors, and
models that prevent us from adequately understanding the physical dimensions of reli-
gion (574, 586). Ultimately, she suggests, “we must ask ourselves how the sensory
education we receive in learning to master linguistic forms shapes our thinking, and
whether it is sufficient for understanding the rich array of bodily movement evident in
religious life” (591).
Conditioned to believe that analytical-critical thinking and knowledge acquisition are
fundamentally non-corporeal affairs, it is not surprising that many of us feel uncomfort-
able integrating alternative pathways of knowledge into our pedagogical practices. And
yet, diversifying our epistemologies by bringing our bodies into the process of learning
can open new and interesting vantage points on the subjects we are teaching. Consider,
for example, the different understandings of a particular spiritual practice – mindfulness
meditation – that emerge from different methods of study. Here is a short description of
this practice that appears in a textbook on world religions:

[Buddhism’s] key salvific practice is mindfulness meditation (vipashyanâ): a

careful attending to the three characteristics of existential reality – suffering
(dukkha), impermanence (anitya), non-self (anâtman). Attention to, and compre-
hension of, these conditions in direct personal experience has a critical twofold
effect: it develops non-attachment that stills desire and it cultivates spiritual
insight (prajñâ) that dispels ignorance. (Esposito, Fasching, and Lewis 2002, 396)

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Now, for the sake of contrast, imagine inviting students who are learning about Bud-
dhism and who read this description to study mindfulness meditation by practicing it.
You might invite them to sit on their chairs (or on cushions on the floor), straighten their
posture, relax their shoulders, soften their gaze (or close their eyes), and breathe from
their bellies, observing the air as it enters and leaves their bodies. You might instruct
them to gently return their attention to the present moment by focusing on their
in-breath and out-breath whenever particular thoughts, feelings, or physical sensations
enter their awareness. And you could ask them to continue this meditation study for
several minutes to give them a glimpse of the kinds of insights and experiences the
practice may produce.
The point of imagining this experiment is not to suggest that textbook representations
of religious ideas and practices are somehow shallow or useless. Rather, the point is to
illustrate how different modes of apprehension produce different kinds of knowledge.
Bringing the body into the process of learning about religion introduces a kind of
epistemic diversity that changes – and potentially enriches – our understanding of reli-
gious practices and beliefs by revealing the creative role the body plays in the construc-
tion of religious meaning.
In the imaginary scenario described above, students study mindfulness meditation by
practicing it (after reading about it). The intent is not for them to have a religious expe-
rience but to foster a more multilayered understanding of the practice and the ideas
associated with it. By sitting quietly and (re)focusing on their breath as it flows in and
out of their bodies, students can explore some key Buddhist concepts, such as “imper-
manence” and “non-attachment.” The embodied practice transforms these ideas from
pieces of information about “Buddhist beliefs” into a richer understanding of the
insights and capacities that Buddhists cultivate through their practice. By “richer” I
mean an understanding that recognizes the body’s creative role in the construction of
spiritual ideas – in this case, for example, how paying attention to the in-and-out move-
ment of one’s breath makes the concept of “impermanence” meaningful. While such
an understanding does not enable students to know what Buddhists experience during
meditation (as if all Buddhists experienced the same thing), it can help them appreciate
how the meanings associated with this practice are created (with the help of the body),
rather than given. Ultimately, the kind of knowledge such embodied learning cultivates
differs from the knowledge acquired solely through linguistic methods because it recog-
nizes and includes the “knowledge” of the body and underscores its contributions to the
production of religious meaning.2
To the extent that we recognize the constructive character of religious beliefs and
practices – how the deepest truths people hold and act out of are the products of their
own personal and collective making – it behooves us to investigate more closely how
this construction process happens. When we do so through methods of study that engage
our thinking/knowing on multiple levels – methods that involve a variety of our senses –

2
I do not mean to suggest that students’ bodies are not involved in textbook approaches to learning.
Indeed, as LaMothe points out, reading and thinking analytically are physical disciplines that require repeti-
tive, ongoing sensory training. But because this kind of training privileges linguistic knowledge and ways of
knowing, it renders the body’s contribution to the learning process invisible (2008, 588–590). This in turn
makes it difficult for students (and their teachers) to recognize the central role that bodies play in creating
religious meanings.

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we discover something very interesting: the body’s essential role in the creation and
apprehension of religious meaning.
In the remainder of this article, I would like to explore the concept and practice of
embodied pedagogy as an alternative to the Cartesian approach to studying and teaching
about religion. By “embodied pedagogy,” I mean educational methods that engage stu-
dents’ somatic sensibilities in the process of learning, connecting the life of the “mind”
with the life of the “body” and illuminating the interaction between them. The aim of
this approach is not only to complicate and flesh out, if you will, our understanding of
religion, but also to diversify our epistemological methods, models, and sources, while
addressing students as whole persons.

Lessons from Aikido

To explore “embodied pedagogy,” I will discuss a class I co-teach called “Religion and
the Body / Introduction to Aikido,” which combines the study of Aikido with seminar
style discussions of religious and cultural texts that deal with issues relating to embodi-
ment.3 Aikido is a Japanese martial art that emphasizes the neutralization of aggression
and cultivation of mindfulness through non-competitive partner training. It is more aptly
described as a spiritual path (a do, or “way”) than a religion, and in many ways it illus-
trates some of the problems with the category “religion” (Fitzgerald 2000, 8). The
intense physicality of the Aikido training creates a kind of lab for students to explore
the ideas and insights they encounter in their readings and in the classroom, especially
regarding the relationships between mind, body, and culture in the production of reli-
gious ideas and values. The aim of the physical training, then, is not simply to teach
students how to do Aikido but also to give them a hands-on experience that serves as
a resource for reflection on the body’s constitutive role in the production of religious
knowledge.
It will help to briefly describe the organization of the class before discussing the
lessons it offers with regards to embodied pedagogy. Although I have studied Aikido for
about fifteen years, my husband is a professional Aikidoist, and he teaches the Aikido
part of the class. Twice a week students trek to the dojo (training hall), where they suit
up in homogenous-looking gis (training uniforms) before stepping on the mat. After
lining up and bowing in unison with their teacher at the start of class (bowing is a
gesture of respect and humility), they immerse themselves in the practice, taking turns
throwing or pinning their partners and being pinned or thrown. Twice a week we also
meet as a class back on campus to discuss the day’s assigned readings. Frequently,
we spend the first chunk of our hundred minutes together debriefing from the previous
night’s Aikido practice. This helps students make connections between ideas from their
readings and their experiences on the mat.
Making these links is a vital part of embodied learning because it is through them
that diverse ways of knowing become visible and different kinds of knowledge are inte-
grated. This sets the stage for a view of spiritual practices and ideas as meaningfully

3
This class was sponsored by a Start-Up Grant from the Bringing Theory to Practice Project, an indepen-
dent project in partnership with the American Association of Colleges and Universities and funded by the
Charles Engelhard Foundation. The Dovre Center of Concordia College provided additional funding for
research related to the course.

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connected to particular, embodied experiences. An example of this process is seen in the

way one student used his experiences learning Aikido to help him understand a concept
he encountered in one of our texts. He wrote about this connection in a reflection paper:

For the first few weeks of Aikido class, I couldn’t tell my right foot from my left,
and this really frustrated me. Then we read Shunryu Suzuki’s book, and I was
struck by the notion of shoshin (“beginner’s mind,” 21). I realized that I had har-
bored all these ideas about how Aikido was supposed to feel and how I should be
progressing faster, and these expectations were fueling my frustration. The
concept of “beginner’s mind” helped me understand why I was getting so frus-
trated during practice, and my experience of frustration helped me understand the
concept of “beginner’s mind” (because I clearly didn’t have it). (Anonymous
student, quoted with permission, 2006)

As this student’s reflection suggests, engaging the body to study an idea – or studying
an idea through embodied experience – can foster perceptions that go beyond concep-
tual knowledge and definitions. Such perceptions can help students appreciate both
how religious ideas function to help people make sense of their experiences, and how
such experiences shape the various meanings religious beliefs have for those who
hold them.
Some of the concepts and insights LaMothe develops from modern dance may be
helpful in further explaining how embodied pedagogy can foster a post-Cartesian
understanding of religious life. LaMothe proposes a view of our bodies and selves
as always involved in a dynamic process of becoming, a moment-to-moment creative
process in which new “patterns of sensation and response” develop in relation to envi-
ronmental cues, situations, and ideas. A practice like dance makes us more conscious
of this dynamic process. It does so by helping us see how bodies become educated
by rehearsing certain movements (mental, emotional, and physical), and how this
“sensory education” in turn gives rise to the expression of certain thoughts, feelings,
and actions. In dance as in life, the movements we make are making us (583–584,
588).
By heightening our awareness of the transformative process and power of sensory
education, embodied pedagogy equips us to recognize the productive role that bodies
play in religious beliefs, experiences, and behaviors. The more conscious we become
of our own body’s involvement in giving meaning to the ideas and truths that orient
our lives, the more capable we will likely be of recognizing the body’s constitutive
role in generating religious meanings in diverse contexts. Thus a course that engages
students’ somatic sensibilities in the process of studying religion has the potential to
illuminate the central role of the body in the construction and apprehension of reli-
gious ideas.
In the case of Aikido, learning through the body sheds light on how spiritual beliefs
are cultivated through corporeal training, particularly through actions that are performed
repeatedly. Repetitious practice of various forms (kata) is at the heart of Aikido peda-
gogy. After observing their teacher demonstrate a technique, students “study” it by prac-
ticing it again and again until the next one is demonstrated. Such repetitive training of
the body’s movements and response patterns develops students’ physical skills while
simultaneously instilling a knowledge or sensibility of various concepts and ideals in the
philosophy of Aikido (“Ai-ki-do” literally means “the way of harmony”).

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For example, students develop their understanding of ki (“energy”), a core concept in

Aikido, through the focused concentration that the physical training requires, through
maintaining a strong and steady presence as they perform techniques over and over, and
through proper breathing. By repeating these physical activities, they develop new “pat-
terns of sensation and response” that give them a sense (simultaneously mental and
physical) of what ki refers to and what it might mean, even though the concept is rela-
tively foreign to most of them as westerners. At the same time, this sensory education
helps them to recognize the process by which ki is generated, felt, and understood
through specific corporeal training.
Students use their bodies to study several other spiritual ideals and qualities that are
integral to the philosophy of Aikido. They study harmony, for example, by blending
their actions with those of their partner; humility by falling down repeatedly or bowing;
and compassion by showing sensitivity to their partner’s movements (often in spite of
significant differences in body size). What is key here is the notion of “study” as “prac-
tice”: it is through their practice – their physical training and the transformation it
fosters – that they learn about the principles at the heart of Aikido. This method of study
extends our inquiry from what a particular spiritual ideal means (be it harmony, humil-
ity, compassion, or something else), to how it means. In so doing, it increases the likeli-
hood that students will notice and come to appreciate the creative role the body plays in
other forms of spiritual life.4
In Aikido, the body’s creative potential – its capacity for change, its ability to
learn, and its power to make sense out of various ideas and experiences – is evident
in the transformation that occurs through the training. The first several times students
practice falling down (after watching their instructor demonstrate this technique),
many of them hit the mat with so much impact that they develop bruises (thankfully,
none of them serious). Within a few weeks of training, however, nearly all of them
can “take ukeme” (fall down) gracefully from a standing position. It is as if the
“corners” of their bodies become rounded with practice. By learning to fall down
without getting hurt, students simultaneously explore the ideals of selflessness and
non-resistance that are central to the knowledge of Aikido. They discuss these ideals
and reflect on them in their papers, always in relation to their struggles and efforts on
the mat. A student wrote:

When training, we are supposed to harmonize with the movements of our partner,
instead of trying to overcome him/her. Though difficult, this training is giving me
a new perspective on what it means to be “selfless.” It doesn’t mean I have to sell
everything I have and give it to the poor and live on the streets. But it does mean
that “I” am not the center of the universe. It means trying to connect rather than
be in control. (Anonymous student, quoted with permission, 2006)

The constitutive role of the flesh in the creation of religious meanings is evident in
the work of Mary Douglas (1982; 1991), for whom the body is a metaphor for society

4
I would not claim that all students who take this class develop this appreciation. And I am hesitant to
assume that it occurs “inevitably,” as LaMothe seems to suggest (2008, 592), as a result of embodied methods
of learning. Nonetheless, I am satisfied with the more modest claim that courses that incorporate embodied
pedagogy, especially those that do so intentionally, are more likely to foster this appreciation and the multidi-
mensional view of religion connected to it.

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as a whole, and classifications such as pure and impure, sacred and profane are con-
structed through bodily practices and regulations. Building on Douglas’s insights,
Catherine Bell (1992) uses the concept of “ritualization” to highlight how religious
meanings are produced (rather than reflected or simply dramatized) in ritual activity
(1992, 8, 67, 74). Bell moves beyond an understanding of religion that privileges sym-
bolic knowledge by paying attention to the physical dimensions of ritual activity. Ritual-
izing gestures and behaviors are rooted in the “ritualized body,” a body that has been
socialized to look, feel, and act in culturally and religiously mandated ways.5 Religious
meanings are thus ritually generated through the body in relation to prevailing social
norms and in reference to “realities thought to transcend the powers of human actors”
(48–49, 83–85, 90).
It is precisely because religious ideas often reference “realities thought to transcend
the power of human actors” that attention to the physical aspects of religious meaning-
making is so vital for the academic study of religion. For such attention reminds us that
religious truths are human constructs, variously created and developed in relation to spe-
cific embodied experiences, cultures, and historical moments and situations.
Discovering the body’s central role in generating religious knowledge comes as a
surprise to many of my students. Most of them are white and Protestant and have grown
up thinking of religion primarily as a matter of belief – and for many of them, “belief”
means assenting to truths that are divinely given. The repetitious, ritualizing quality of
their Aikido training has the potential to move them beyond a “logocentric” view of
religion that focuses primarily on religious thought (Marini 2001, 3) to an understanding
of its practical, embodied, and experiential dimensions. At the same time, this method of
learning opens up the possibility for a more critical understanding of religion – one that
recognizes its constructive character.
Ultimately, the process of learning through the body that Aikido illustrates suggests
an epistemological compliment to (rather than replacement of) pedagogies that privilege
written words and ideas. Indeed, embodied learning does not assume that the body is
somehow a more reliable resource for truth than books or theories. In fact, the Aikido
training illustrates the potential for embodied pedagogy to expose the power of religious
and cultural ideals to shape somatic experiences.
This is most evident in relation to gender. Almost invariably, the (re)education of the
body that takes place through Aikido practice leads students to reflect on the ways their
bodies have been trained to be “feminine” or “masculine.” Many female students, for
example, note the difficulty they experience in developing the heavy “center” one
desires in Aikido (the physical feeling of gravity, presence, and fullness a few inches
below the navel) because of their cultural training on the importance of being flat-
bellied and skinny. For many male students, learning to find strength through flexibility
(rather than muscles) is challenging because of their social conditioning to be dominant
and tough. Far from creating a view and experience of the body as a natural reservoir of
pristine truths, engaging the body in the process of learning has the potential to reveal
what many feminist thinkers have long recognized, namely, the socialized quality of

5
To develop her concept of the “ritualized body,” Bell draws heavily on the work of Pierre Bourdieu,
especially his concept of the “socially informed body” (see Bourdieu 1992, 94 and 124). Bell also uses the
work of Michel Foucault to develop the idea that the body is basic to sociopolitical relations of power.

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embodied experience and the power of cultural norms and religious ideals to get under
our skin (Bordo 1993, Sawicki 1991, Butler 1990, Bartkey 1990, Haug 1987, Lelwica
1999).
In connection with the class readings, the embodied pedagogy of Aikido also has the
potential to increase students’ awareness of the diverse ways of knowing and sources of
knowledge that permeate a variety of spiritual traditions in both pre- and post-colonial
contexts. As Vasudha Narayanan points out, “Dances, temples, cities, medical therapies,
and so on are embodied ways in which knowledge was transmitted in pre-colonial cul-
tures and still continues to be transmitted in many diasporic realms” (499). By engaging
the body in the process of knowing, embodied pedagogy challenges what Narayanan
calls “the authority paradigms based on texts alone,” while it valorizes complimentary
pathways of learning and sources of knowledge that have been marginalized by domi-
nant, hegemonic cultures (516). In this way, embodied learning can introduce students
to categories and questions that may be particularly well suited for studying the
spiritual lives of people in non-dominant religious traditions and in pre- or post-colonial
situations.
What aspects of religious life – or life in general – do we neglect by fixating our
scholarly gazes on “phenomena that look and act and can be translated like texts”
(LaMothe, 581)? The wide and creative range of research paper topics students in the
“Religion and the Body / Aikido” class select – for example, acupuncture, baseball,
childbirth, yoga, pilgrimage, eating disorders, rock climbing, veganism, and peace activ-
ism, to name just a few – may shed some light on this question. The relatively uncon-
ventional quality of some of these (and other) research paper topics suggests that the
embodied epistemology of the class facilitates a broad view of what can fruitfully be
studied by students (or scholars) of religion.
The creativity behind many students’ selection of their research paper topics points
to the potential of embodied pedagogy to captivate students’ attention. Indeed, the
embodied learning in this course generates a level of intellectual curiosity and energy
among students that I do not experience in my more traditional classes. My sense is
that students are more mentally focused and prepared to engage in analytical-critical
discussions, not simply because the physical training increases the blood flow to their
brains, but more importantly because the Aikido “labs” give them a means for trying
out and relating to the ideas we explore in class. Although only a few of the reading
assignments deal specifically with Aikido, the training provides a shared, embodied
touchstone for contemplating the other spiritual practices about which we read, from
Zen meditation, to Shamanic trance, to the whirling of Sufi dervishes. Students’
reflection papers and class discussions suggest that the physical practice provides a
helpful method for thinking through some of the spiritual questions that shape their
own lives.
The extent to which the embodied pedagogy of this class energizes and captivates
students’ “minds” and “bodies” brings into focus a question with which I have wrestled
throughout my years of teaching undergraduates, namely, how can we address our stu-
dents as whole persons – respecting and acknowledging their diverse, experiential, and
multifaceted searches for meaning – without compromising the integrity of the academic
study of religion? To what extent can or should a class that explores religion from a
scholarly perspective be spiritually meaningful for students? Embodied pedagogy makes
such questions difficult to avoid because it addresses students as more than just walking
brains.

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While the “Religion and the Body / Introduction to Aikido” class has not answered
these questions for me (at least not definitively), it has underscored their importance
and the need for further dialogue about them among those of us interested in peda-
gogical issues. For like it or not, as bell hooks points out, our students want and need
more than good information. They want and need knowledge that is meaningful to
them, knowledge that helps them know how to live, and how to take responsibility for
themselves in relation to our troubled world (1994, 19). This is confirmed by Barbara
Walvoord’s recent study of teaching college-level Introductory Religion courses
(2008), which documents many students’ desire for these courses to nurture their
spiritual development alongside their intellectual growth. In light of Walvoord’s find-
ings, the value of embodied pedagogy is not just that it fosters a more multifaceted
view of religion, but also that it has the potential to help students connect the dots
between their own lives, what they learn in our classes, and the complex issues and
problems in the world around them.

Other Strategies for Embodying Learning

Students’ desire to grow both intellectually and spiritually through their religion courses
returns us to the question of how to retain the edge of critical-analytic thinking when
studying religion without cutting the mind off from the body. Undeniably, a big part
of what makes the “Religion and the Body / Introduction to Aikido” class work is that
it gives students the opportunity to study firsthand a spiritual practice that is foreign
to them and that does not mandate a particular set of beliefs. At the same time, this
hands-on study motivates them to reflect deeply, analytically, and critically on their
assigned texts. Precisely this combination of distance and proximity enables them to
stay, to varying degrees, both critical and connected to their subject of study. This obser-
vation is important as we look for other strategies for embodying learning; strategies
that can illuminate the role of the body in the construction of spiritual ideals, cultivate
a multilayered view of religion, increase epistemological diversity and the variety of
sources we use to study religion, and help us address our students as whole persons by
engaging more than their cerebral faculties.
Those of us with experience in spiritual practices that do not require adherence to
specific religious beliefs might invite our students to become participant observers as a
way of exploring the ideas connected to such practices. In a class called “Spirituality
and Healing,” for example, Kwok Pui-lan taught her students tai chi to illustrate the
interplay between yin and yang as well as the principles of balance and transformation
in Chinese medicine (Kwok 2004, v). In a course called “Religion, the Environment,
and Contemplative Practices,” Mark Wallace took his students into the woods near his
campus and invited them to participate in a “Council of All Beings,” a ritual designed to
sensitize them to humans’ interconnection with and responsibility for the natural world
(Wallace 2005, 137–140). These are just two examples of courses that successfully
enlisted students’ bodies in the process of learning in ways that enriched their ability
to understand the issues surrounding their subject of study. In each case, the success
of such strategies depended on opportunities that enabled students to simultaneously
embody their knowing while maintaining enough distance and textual grounding to
foster analytical-critical thinking.
Religion scholars who teach classes that deal with social justice issues might con-
sider using “engaged pedagogy,” a form of embodied pedagogy that typically involves
service learning. In Teaching to Transgress, bell hooks distinguishes between the

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“banking system of education,” on the one hand, in which knowledge is gained, depos-
ited, and withdrawn through a disembodied process of memorizing and regurgitating
information, and “engaged pedagogy,” on the other hand, in which students become
aware of themselves and their society through active engagement and critical reflection
upon the world they wish to change. hooks’ version of engaged pedagogy goes beyond
standard critiques of conventional pedagogy because, in addition to its focus on critical
consciousness and embodied praxis, it emphasizes the mental, physical, and spiritual
well-being of both teachers and students. For hooks, the ultimate goal of education is
self-actualization and social transformation, both of which depend on more integrative
methods of teaching and learning than purely Cartesian pedagogies allow.
Another strategy for embodying learning about religion is travel. Opportunities for
global education move students minds and bodies out of the classroom and into the
world, where their close encounters with diverse peoples, customs, values, and world-
views can lead them to reflect on the particularity of their own assumptions, while
sparking their sense of interconnection and responsibility as world citizens. Of course,
one need not travel overseas to embody the study of religion through encounters with
difference. Any number of local or domestic destinations can open and sensitize stu-
dents’ minds by situating their bodies in a relatively foreign context. Because they
engage a wider range of students’ corporeal sensibilities, fieldtrips to mosques, temples,
synagogues, churches, and so forth hold great potential for deepening students’ under-
standing and appreciation of religious diversity. Alongside such visits, one might
develop assignments that require an ethnographic study, a more embodied research
method that fosters a “thicker” view of religion as it is lived and practiced.
Some final strategies that are logistically less complicated involve the use of music,
film, dance, and other forms of art that engage students’ multiple senses and thereby
help them attend to and understand the corporeal dimensions of religious thought and
behavior. Many of us already use some visual and auditory aids to help our students
develop a multifaceted understanding of a particular religious idea, place, or practice.6
Thinking of these aids as tools for embodying learning can make us more intentional
about employing them not just as a way to capture our students’ attention but also as a
means for developing a more complex and well-rounded view of religion.

Conclusion
As my reflections in this essay suggest, embodied pedagogy challenges Cartesian
assumptions about what it means to know by illuminating the different ways in which
we know and the various kinds of knowledge such “knowings” produce. For religion
scholars and teachers in particular, an embodied approach to teaching and learning
raises questions about what constitutes religious knowledge and about what constitutes
knowledge about religion. Though it may not settle such questions definitively, embod-
ied pedagogy allows us to glimpse both the creative role of the body in the production
and apprehension of religious ideas and the way such ideas impact our experiences of
embodiment. It diversifies our epistemology and in so doing leads us to discover new
and diverse sources for understanding religion. Last but not least, it engages our

6
For an illuminating discussion of teaching religion and music, see the Spotlight on Teaching special
issue (2001). For helpful discussion on the use of film in religious studies, see “Teaching Religion and Film”
(Spotlight on Teaching, 1998).

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Lelwica

students on multiple levels, thus allowing for the knowledge they acquire to mean some-
thing to them and thereby to empower them to act in the world as responsible and
informed citizens.
At a time when religion is playing a decisive role in both the disintegration and
the mending of the world we share, the value of such knowledge(s) should not be
underestimated.

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