Look for Us at Homecoming 2021

It's Homecoming Week at Bethel University, and there are lots of Hippo connections to be found. Tomorrow's chapel speaker will be seminary alum of the year Joel Johnson '80 S '86, a local pastor who talked about studying philosophy as part of his Seminary of the Year alum video, and the 2021 winner of that …

Meet Our New Social Media TA: Essie Shull

In recent years, I've often used my teaching assistant to help with the History Department's social media activities, a tradition I'm continuing with the new Department of History, Philosophy, and Political Science. I'm thrilled to be working with Essie Shull '23, who was kind enough to answer a few questions about herself by way of …

September 2021 Events and Deadlines

Upcoming Events Thursday 9/9: Model UN First MeetingBethel's Model United Nations club will hold its first meeting of the year this Thursday at 11:15am in CC 431. We'll be discussing activities on campus for the year, as well as our Chicago conference in November. Interested in joining us as we play the role of China? There's …

Hippo Alumni in the (Bethel) News

We'll be saying more about our alumni soon, but if you want to get some sense for what History, Philosophy, and Political Science students have gone on to do with their Bethel degrees, just check out these recent Hippo-related stories at Bethel News: Diba Domínguez '20 Combat medic, U.S. Army "Domínguez decided to attend Bethel …

Get a Preview of Prof. Gehrz’s New Book

Our faculty are readers, but also writers. Next month, history professor Chris Gehrz will publish his fifth book, Charles Lindbergh: A Religious Biography of America's Most Infamous Pilot (Eerdmans). Part of a series that includes recent entries on everyone from British prime minister Winston Churchill to African American theologian Howard Thurman, Prof. Gehrz's book tells …

What’s Changing with Our Merger? What’s Staying the Same?

As we announced on Monday, the departments of History, Philosophy, and Political Science have merged into a single department housed in the CC 429 suite. While that creates some exciting opportunities for the "Hippos," such a change can also raise concerns. Will we lose what made the individual departments special by coming together as a …

Call Us “Hippos”!

We're pretty excited to start doing our collective thing as Bethel's Department of History, Philosophy, and Political Science. But we've got to admit: that's kind of a mouthful. So what can you call us for short? The historical record on this matter is sketchy, but oral tradition holds that it was philosophy professor Sara Shady …

Meet the Department of History, Philosophy, and Political Science

Today we'd like to announce formally a change that's been percolating for over a year now: History, Philosophy, and Political Science have merged into a single department. We value the distinctive methods, insights, and emphases of our various disciplines and will keep our distinct programs. [Look for more on that topic in a follow-up post, but …

Responding to COVID with Digital Humanities

Be sure to check out the current story at Bethel News: it features History professor Charlie Goldberg and his Advanced Digital Humanities students, who spent part of last fall using the tools they were learning in class to respond to the same pandemic that was reshaping life on campus. DH majors used photogrammetry to create …

A Commencement Benediction

For History students and faculty, this most unusual academic year ended on Saturday afternoon, with our first in-person Commencement ceremony since December 2019. As we say farewell to the Class of 2021, we thought we'd share with you the closing reflection and benediction delivered by our own Prof. Amy Poppinga. In order to maximize the …