Coming into this course, I was extremely excited to learn about a phrase that I use to describe my personal religious affiliations. Matthew Hedstrom was such an enjoyable professor, as he would even include pictures of himself at certain sacred landscapes we would learn about in class! His enthusiasm and love for the subject made class fun to attend, even though attendance was not mandatory. The grade was made up of weekly reading response, discussion attendance, 2 papers, a midterm, and a final! Although it sounds like a bit, it was extremely manageable and not overwhelming whatsoever. His TA's were not the greatest, but as long as you show up, you'll be fine. There's assigned readings each week, but I completed about 40% of them and still succeeded. SBNR allows you to explore your own definitions of religion, spirituality, and more! Highly recommend. ##tCFspring2022

I found the material to be very interesting, and the lectures were enjoyable. This class is very heavy on the readings (usually around 70-100+ pages a week), but you can easily skim them and figure out what is actually important and applicable to exams/papers/discussions. The essays were easy and interesting to write about as well - I could usually knock them out in a couple hours. Since I took this course online, our exams were take home. I'm not sure if it is always like this, however. With this take home format, it was definitely easier to take the exams and find quotes from the readings to integrate into it. He also gives a study guide with a bunch of possible ID terms. Overall, I highly recommend this course! It's my favorite class I've taken at UVA so far and it isn't too hard. Anderson was also a great TA - take with him if possible!

Very interesting worthwhile class! Hedsteom is such a nerd, it was entertaining to see him geek out. He definitely eats this stuff up, but my TA pushes back on a lot which made the class more interesting and engaging. Two exams with study guides not very hard. One page paper, 3 page paper, and 5 page paper

I took this class because I love the AMST department and also was intrigued by the name: Spiritual but not religious. Hedstrom does a great job of keeping the lectures interesting with relevant historical examples. The reading is pretty heavy; at the end of the course you will end up reading around 5 books and a TON of shorter essays by various authors. However, I skimmed the readings for discussion, which you have an attendance/reading quiz each time, and was able to pull off an A-. There is a midterm and a final, both having term identification and shorter and longer essays that allow you to use what you read from the books and also examples you talk about in class. There are also 3 shorter papers, 1 is 2 pages, the other 2 are 4-5 pages, that allow you to use the books and expand on the ideas and relate them to class lectures. Overall, this was a worthwhile course! I learned a lot about spiritualism in the U.S. as well as the intermingling of Eastern and Western religions which you focus in on during the second half of the semester.

I love Professor Hedstrom, and really enjoyed this class. The material is very interesting, and Hedstrom does a good job of incorporating music/pop culture/personal vacation photos to keep it interesting. The grade comes from a few papers (one short, a couple longer ones), participation in discussion, a midterm and final, none of which were particularly hard. Isaac May was my TA, I'd definitely recommend him for any class. Overall, if you have any interest in religious studies, definitely take this class (or any class with Hedstrom).