Goucher College 2020-2021 Undergraduate Catalogue 
    
    Mar 29, 2024  
Goucher College 2020-2021 Undergraduate Catalogue PLEASE NOTE: This is an archived catalog. Programs are subject to change each academic year.

CPEC 255 - Drinking the Kool-Aid: The People’s Temple and the Psychology of New Religious Movements (4 Cr.)

(GCR Humanities and Interdisciplinary Studies area)
This course will examine the origins, theology, rituals, and development of the religious movement The People’s Temple (Jonestown). We will explore how the movement grew from a utopian religious movement in California to a group that engaged in a mass suicide/murder involving 909 people, one third of whom were children. The course will address motivations for joining new religious movements and for staying in movements even when they promote increasingly isolated and violent behavior. The course will also explore the role of race, socio-economic status, and gender in the origins, development, and public memory of the group. Students are restricted to one CPE course per semester. Duncan.