How religious communities change and adapt as they move to different areas

Each student will write a term paper on some topic relating to how religious communities change and adapt as they move to different areas or how they deal with other faith communities.

Examples of the former would be how Christianity began in the Near East as a Jewish movement but eventually spread to non-Jews throughout the Roman Empire, or how Buddhism started in India but today has spread to places such as China and Japan where it has exerted immense influence, or how the slave trade led to a synthesis of African religions with Christianity producing the religions we know today as Santeria and Vodou.
Examples of the latter, would be how Muslims view Jews and Christians as Peoples of the Book while rejecting polytheistic religions, or how Hindus view the Buddha as an incarnation of Vishnu (though this doesn’t mean they convert to Buddhism).
The topic must receive the approval of the instructor before it is handed in. The proposals will not be graded, but failure to turn in a proposal will result in the final paper grade being lowered a third of a letter grade (e.g. a B would become a B-, a B- would become a C+, etc.).
The paper should be six to nine pages long, excluding bibliography with 12 point font and lines double-spaced. Margins for the pages should be 1 inch on all sides and the style should conform to MLA formatting. Be sure that you include two to three academic or scholarly sources.You can include additional sources as well, if you would like, but the academic or scholarly sources are mandatory.
See announcements for helpful resources, including an MLA style guide.