Showing papers on "Religious education published in 1998"

Putting Islam to work : education, politics, and religious transformation in Egypt

Abstract: The development of mass education and the mass media have transformed the Islamic tradition in contemporary Egypt and the wider Muslim world. In "Putting Islam to Work", Gregory Starrett focuses on the historical interplay of power and public culture, showing how these new forms of communication and a growing state interest in religious instruction have changed the way the Islamic tradition is reproduced. During the twentieth century new styles of religious education, based not on the recitation of sacred texts but on moral indoctrination, have been harnessed for use in economic, political, and social development programs. More recently they have become part of the Egyptian government's strategy for combating Islamist political opposition. But in the course of this struggle, the western-style educational techniques that were adopted to generate political stability have instead resulted in a rapid Islamization of public space, the undermining of traditional religious authority structures, and a crisis of political legitimacy. Using historical, textual, and ethnographic evidence, Gregory Starrett demonstrates that today's Islamic resurgence is rooted in new ways of thinking about Islam that are based in the market, the media, and the school.

Taking Religion Seriously across the Curriculum.

Abstract: No wonder you activities are, reading will be always needed. It is not only to fulfil the duties that you need to finish in deadline time. Reading will encourage your mind and thoughts. Of course, reading will greatly develop your experiences about everything. Reading taking religion seriously across the curriculum is also a way as one of the collective books that gives many advantages. The advantages are not only for you, but for the other peoples with those meaningful benefits.

Educational Pluralism - a historical study of so-called 'pillarization' in the Netherlands, including a comparison with some developments in South African education

Abstract: Recently, modern democratic governments have been facing religious and other minorities demanding state funding of separate schools. A system of completely equal treatment of both state and denominational schools has existed in the Netherlands since 1920 and is firmly rooted in the Dutch history of the previous centuries. It may be of interest to know how this pluralistic system of 'pillars'-as it has been called in Dutch historiography-came into being and how it has functioned ever since, even until the present day, when 'pillarization' is still a prominent feature of the Dutch educational domain, despite strong secularising and post-modern tendencies. This paper describes the historical roots of the Dutch pillarized educational system, i.e. of this remarkable subcultural segmentation of education-and of society in general-on the basis of different religious or philosophical views. In the process of pillarization a crucial part was played by Dutch Protestants. With South Africa being heavily influenced b...

Morality and citizenship in education

Abstract: Part 1 Tradition and change - is Britain in cultural and moral decline?: a nation in decline? - the limits of Conservative cultural pessimism millennial moralism, tradition and modernity. Part 2 Curriculum implications - moral and civic education for 21st century citizens: "spiritual and moral development" and religious education moral education and civic education citizenship education - problems and possibilities enterprise culture and the new managerialism - institutional and curricular implications.

Religious Belief and Practice

Abstract: The religious history of the fifteenth century was dominated by the Great Schism. The religious education of the laity had never occupied so high a place among the priorities of those clergy who took their duties seriously. The majority of priests capable of preaching and eager to do so effectively lived in towns, and thus their normal congregations represented only a small proportion of the total Christian population. At the beginning of the fifteenth century a ruling of the Inquisition listed the actions characteristic of a good and faithful Christian. The Catholic belongs to a complex society which cannot function without priests. Image-makers, painters and sculptors, put the resources of their talents and craft at the service of this multi-faceted religion. As people can estimate the frequency and regularity of religious practice, they can establish that the majority of the faithful did carry out the prescriptions of the Church, year in, year out.

The Borders between Religions: A Challenge to the World Religions Approach to Religious Education

Abstract: The type of world religions approach which provides a methodology for the study of religion as a series of discrete and mutually exclusive traditions came under renewed criticism with the publication of the School Curriculum and Assessment Authority Model Syllabuses to advise local authorities in the teaching of religious education in English and Welsh schools. This article explores the key criticisms of the approach adopted by the SCAA Model Syllabuses in the context of ethnographic studies carried out at the borders of the Hindu, Muslim and Sikh communities in Britain and the Indian subcontinent. It argues that the world religions approach does not do justice to the full complexity of religious traditions in the subcontinent, as it ignores the eclectic or syncretistic nature of religious experience in that part of the world.

Religious beliefs in science classrooms

Abstract: The question of the relationship between science and religion assumes importance for many secondary school students of science, especially but not exclusively for those in Christian schools. Science as presented in many school classrooms is not as objective and value free as it might seem on first examination, nor does it represent adequately the range of beliefs about science held by students and teachers. This paper reports part of a larger research study into beliefs about science and religion held by students, teachers and clergy in a Lutheran secondary school. Results indicate that participants in the study was the relationship between science and religious belief in ways unforeseen and unappreciated by traditional school science programs. The stories of selected participants are told and they frame a discussion of implications of the study for science teaching.

‘I Am Nothing'‐‐Does It Matter? A Critique of Current Religious Education Policy and Practice in England on behalf of the Silent Majority

Abstract: Drawn from research in England in the 1990s,1 this article revisits the recent history of RE, injustices caused by legislation to minority groups, and the shift in emphasis in RE from concepts of religion to concerns of religions. Recognising the need for moves to alleviate the injustices, and suggesting that the move towards the systematised study of religions is counter‐productive, it moves on to discuss wider forms of disparity of esteem experienced by the majority of participants in RE. These people are pupils and teachers who might be described as belonging to the ‘religions of the silent majority’, but who might also describe themselves as ‘nothing’. Using John Wolffe's categorisation of these religions, it then illustrates the concerns and experiences of these people by introducing the reader to a ‘fictional’ pupil and her teacher. Moves towards pedagogies for RE are indicated, based on mutual understanding and exchange in which the minority groups (including Christian communities) and the majority...

På spaning efter livets mening. Om livsfrågor och livsåskådning hos äldre grundskoleelever i en undervisningsmiljö som befrämjar kunskapande

Abstract: This dissertation makes up the first report based on data collected during the project "Teenagers: aspects of their life style and attitudes" (Tonaringens livssituation och livstolkning) in the subject Religious Studies taken by pupils attending Year 9 during the 1993/94 school year. The general aim of the study is to discover the central values of life which pupils hold, as expressed in an essay on what is worth striving for in life. The focus for the study is to (1) show the direction and character of the pupils’ central values of life, (2) investigate how consistent or diverse these ideas are amongst the pupils, and (3) develop a form of teaching designed to stimulate pupils to reflect on questions of an existential nature, and subsequently to use their reflections in the teaching of the subject Religious Studies. The investigation shows: (i) That older pupils express a strong love of the family, a trust in education, a leaning towards a value-rational work ethic, developed and reflective thought processes on existential questions, a clearly articulated foundation of values, and a belief in the future which generates an ambition to act accordingly. The pupils do, however, find it easier to approach such problems from an anthropological rather than ontological perspective. (ii) That girls often write longer and more emotionally in their essays than boys. The investigation shows a consensus on common ideas, but also a diversity which creates a demand for teaching adapted to the individual. The pupils’ alternative viewpoints also hint at a possible future change of values on existential questions. The study shows that the pupils means of expressing their ideas is dependent on their age, but it also reveals much in common with earlier studies on younger children. One can, however, note a difference in quality in older pupils in this study, owing to the fact that they possess a greater ability to express their reflective thinking. (iii) That a consistently followed programme of teaching based on the pupils’ own ideas gives rise to good possibilities of knowledge acquisition in the compulsory-school subject Religious Studies, and that a democratic and pupil-active method of teaching increases pupils’ involvement in and motivation for the subject.

The religious educator as story‐teller: suggestions from paul ricoeur's work

Abstract: Contrary to what the dominant meta‐narrative and what the mass media have taught, narrative religious education should follow a hermeneutic of fiction. It should be, in other words, education in perception, in seeing, and in hearing, a school of fictionality and imaginative variation, and a school of responsiveness, remembering, and solidarity. Fictionality means to realize the “difference,” to realize the “it‐could‐be‐otherwise” in order to play imaginatively with new worlds. Responsiveness means not only to be aware of the otherness of the other, but, as we can say with Ricoeur, learning to see oneself as another.

The need for a paradigm shift in teaching religion in multi-cultural schools in South Africa

Abstract: Teaching religion in a multi-cultural or multi-religious school is an essential aspect of discussions on education. Problematic situations have already surfaced in instances where children from different cultures with the same religious background attend the same school communal values and religion are regarded as non-negotiable elements of the school tradition in order to maintain specific values and belief systems within a closed school community. In a multi-cultural community it is obvious that these components will become increasingly contentious. It may be expected that a multi-cultural school community will exert pressure on emotive' subjects, such as teaching religion in the school curriculum. This article will argue that only preparing new curricula for religious education as such offers no solution. A preceding paradigm shift by educators, teachers and school communities is needed to counter wrong perceptions, arguments and decision-making in teaching religion in multi-cultural schools.

Hermeneutics and Religious Understanding Part Two: towards a critical theory for religious education

Abstract: The previous article offered an account of the hermeneutics implicit in religious education from 1960 to the present. It was suggested that an uncritical reliance on the traditions of romanticism and postmodernism serves to impair the emergence of religious literacy. Here an attempt is made to plot the contours of a critical hermeneutical theory for religious education, drawing on the resources of linguistic hermeneutical theory provided by the critical realism of Gadamer and Habermas.

Religious freedom in Germany

Abstract: I. INTRODUCTION At least from a U.S. perspective, religious freedom in Germany has become a matter of concern in recent years.1 It may well be time to reconsider the law and the facts of religious life in a country under scrutiny due to its twentieth-century history. Upholding religious freedom is a key issue in any community committed to the idea of human rights. After the end of the devastating rule of national-- socialism, Germany reestablished its long-standing cultural history in which it had intensively contributed to the development of human rights. The purpose of this article is to describe the various normative sources of religious freedom in Germany and to establish an understanding of religious freedom as a positive freedom in harmony with the legitimate culture of the people concerned. II. THE NORMATIVE SYSTEM A. Constitutional Provisions Religious freedom has a prominent place in Germany's constitution.2 Freedom of religion is protected before many other freedoms. Only human dignity,3 freedom and life,4 and equal protection5 are human rights placed before religious freedom in Germany's constitution. Religious freedom under the German constitution means freedom of belief and freedom to act according to one's beliefs. The constitution secures religious freedom for both individuals and collective bodies. The various freedoms guaranteed for religious institutions in Germany can be found in the German constitution, in the constitutions of the German Lander and in ordinary laws, and in the various treaties between the state and specific religions.6 In addition to the central guarantee of religious freedom, the constitution offers additional religious rights and institutional guarantees for churches and religious communities. According to Article 3 of the constitution, no one shall be prejudiced or favored because of his faith or religion.7 This guarantee is specified for civil rights, public office, and public service.8 Article 4 provides for the right to refrain from military service in the name of religion.9 Article 7 guarantees religious instruction in public schools and includes the right to abstain from that instruction.10 Article 7 also secures the right to establish and to run religiously or ideologically based private schools.11 Several far-reaching institutional guarantees for churches and other religious communities referred to in the German constitution12 have been incorporated from the German Reich's Weimar constitution of 1919 ("WRV").13 The most important provisions are as follows: there shall be no state church, i.e., no established church;14 all religious communities shall enjoy the right to self-- determination,15 the status of certain religious communities as public corporations,16 equal rights to associations that foster a non-- religious, philosophical creed,17 the guarantee of Sundays and feast-- days,18 and chaplainry in public institutions.19 The preamble to the German constitution also describes Germany's commitment to religious freedom. It states: "Conscious of their responsibility before God and humankind, animated by the resolve to serve world peace as an equal part of a united Europe, the German people have adopted, by virtue of their constituent power, this Basic Law."20 The reference to God and humankind acknowledges responsibility for the crimes committed during national-- socialism and responsibility to prevent a repetition of those events in Germany. This reference to God does not allude to nor establish any specific religious belief.21 Rather, by referring to God, the preamble acknowledges a sphere of transcendence, indicating a borderline for the state-that is, a field beyond the reach of the state. It suggests that there is something other than the political order established by the constitution, that the state is not all-powerful. The preamble is anti-totalitarian. B. Other Textual Sources of Religious Freedom Religious freedom in Germany is rooted as well in texts other than the constitution, such as the Lander constitutions, agreements between the government and specific religious organizations, and case law. …

Intergenerational education for an intergenerational church

Abstract: From the biblical era, Christian faith communities have been inter‐generational entities. This article examines how Christian education strategies have expressed intergenerationalism; suggests three major reasons why intergenerational Christian education should be developed with more vigor (Christian theology, spiritual formation, and societal fragmentation); and provides clues for facilitating intergenerationalism in faith communities.

Schooling, the churches and the state in Northern Ireland : a continuing tension?

Abstract: After a period of generally collaborative, professionally based relations between the main churches and successive governments in Northern Ireland since the late 1960s, a feature of the recent politics of education has been the renewed concern of the Protestant churches about the protection of their interests in the state school system, which most Protestant children attend. As one of the reforms of school governance in the 1980s, the setting up of the Council for Catholic Maintained Schools created a middle‐tier organization in the school system, which, in spite of its limited remit, has been able to establish itself as the ‘voice’ of the Catholic school system. In addition, government has supported the development of a religiously integrated group of schools with its own ‘parent’ body, the Northern Ireland Council for Integrated Education. In their response to these developments the main Protestant churches have sought to obtain government recognition of an ‘umbrella’ Protestant church body to ...

Textbook Wars: Governor-General James Francis Smith and the Protestant-Catholic Conflict in Public Education in the Philippines, 1904-1907

Abstract: American imperialism opened new battlefields for the conflict between Protestants and Catholics over religion in public schools. The nineteenth-century textbook wars followed the flag to the Philippines. American Catholics had fought to protect their children from anti-Catholic school books and Protestant Biblical readings since the beginning of the common school movement. These issues provided much of the rationale behind the 1884 decision to establish a separate Catholic school system. Nevertheless, many Catholic children continued to attend public schools. With the end of the Spanish-American War, Catholic frustration with secular Protestantism took on fresh urgency. Now they feared that Catholic children in the Philippines, and in other new territories, would have their minds and souls contaminated by false interpretations of their church, interpretations that seeped in through American textbooks. The textbook battles that erupted in the Philippines rekindled old animosities and became part of a longer struggle waged by Catholic leadership in the United States to exercise more authority over colonial education. Its repercussions found their way to the White House and Theodore Roosevelt.

Education in a Changing Environment

Abstract: It was the campaign for the education of women which challenged and changed the traditional role of women in Muslim society of Punjab. Once the movement to educate women got under way, the limited role of women as a result of strict seclusion within the homes increasingly came to be questioned. Muslim women observed purdah and lived in seclusion from men. The observance of purdah restricted their movements, and their excursions outside their homes were few, something to be recorded as a rare occurrence.1 Consequently, their education was also restricted to their homes. Their education was either religious, or concerned with teaching them basic skills for managing the household, like doing the accounts and being able to correspond with family members.2 A report by the Punjab government said, ‘In Muhammadan families little girls very generally learn to read the Qoran by rote, and sometimes easy books of instruction on morality and religious observances’.3 The same report added that there was also a prejudice amongst the Muslims against teaching their daughters to write, as it was not considered proper for them.

White religious educators and unlearing racism: can we find a way?

Abstract: Emerging work in the fields of critical cultural theory and feminist epis‐temology suggests ways in which contemporary versions of foundational knowledges have shaped and sustained cultural constructions of “whiteness” that promote the intemalization of dominance among white people in the U.S. Religious educators who seek to nurture transformative educational experiences for white people must work on “unlearning” the racism such constructions support. As a doctoral student in religious education, I propose to begin “at home” to determine how graduate programs in religious education may be contributing to such constructions, and what we can do about it.

Religious Education for Liberation: A Perspective from Paulo Freire

Abstract: Paulo Freire (1921‐1997) is famous for the development of his literacy method and, perhaps, is best remembered for his earlier books ‐ Pedagogy of the Oppressed (1972), Cultural Action for Freedom (1972) and Education: the Practice of Freedom (1976). Although he continued to write and develop his thought into his later years,1 Freire's fundamental thesis that education was either for domestication or freedom remained the same. He did not invent the term ‘conscientisation’, but its introduction into educational and theological vocabulary is often attributed to him. In a keynote speech at The Royal Society of Arts in 1995, the then Archbishop of York, Dr John Habgood, recommended an approach to religious education characterised by ‘critical solidarity’. Having outlined Freire's ‘education for liberation’ and his central concept of conscientisation, the article demonstrates the surprising commonality between Freire's early writing and the Archbishop's recent development of the concept of critical solidarity....

David Carr on Religious Knowledge and Spiritual Education

Abstract: This paper is a reply to David Carr's two recent articles on religious education in this Journal. It argues that the examples Carr cites as distinctively religious are not, and that the present emphasis in schools on education about (rather than in) religion is justified.