In 2011, Pitzer College offered the first and still the only college major in secular studies. The prime mover behind that initiative was Dr. Phil Zuckerman, who in 2011 wrote that he could “sense the thirst out there. So many students, perhaps galvanized by the New Atheists, wanted to take classes that challenged religious worldviews, explored the social construction of religion, articulated rational ethics, provided a social grounding in evolution, and the like” (“Secular Studies Arrives at Last,”
FI August/September 2011). Buoyed by students’ interest in a course he offered in New Atheism, Zuckerman felt Pitzer a small liberal arts college in Claremont, California offered the perfect venue for our nation’s first undergraduate degree program in secular studies. Now a full professor of sociology and secular studies as well as a Pitzer associate dean, Zuckerman spoke with me in May 2020 about the program’s progress as it approaches its tenth anniversary. We also talke