Some exploratory thoughts on decolonizing the teaching of religious education (RE)
In what ways should questions about decolonizing have an impact on the teaching of ‘Religious Education’ in schools in the UK? How in particular to the issues of curriculum reform in history teaching impact on provision of RE?
With reference, in particular, to the Scottish Qualifications Authority’s (SQA) guidelines and requirements for the teaching of RMPS (‘religious, moral, and philosophical studies’), I have come to the conclusion that despite my experience of teaching the study of religion for nearly three decades in higher education, I could and would not wish to teach such a curriculum. The parameters of the subject as it is framed by the SQA (and other English education boards) seem to be stuck somewhere back in a set of assumptions about the subject area that pre-date my own entry to the field in the late 1980s.
I appreciate that the debate on the teaching of RE has not been static, and indeed there has been considerable movement in recent years, such as the RE Commission of England and Wales’ report in 2018 on ‘Religion and Worldviews’. But despite the many developments on curriculum reform for the teaching of History as a subject area, which have come to public attention through the Black Lives Matter protests of spring 2020, very little of this has filtered through to questions about how Britain’s (and individually Scotland’s and England’s) histories of colonialism, empire, and slavery have impacted on what is taught in scholars as Religious Education.
And so, as an initial exploration of some of these questions, I am discussing below a few of the issues that I see most problematic about how the teaching of RE in schools in Scotland, England, and Wales need to begin to address the issues of decolonizing.
I have written elsewhere in detail about some of these issues as they relate to debates and teaching in higher education in the study of religion. Some pointers to my and others’ discussion of these issues can be found at the end of this paper. I do of course recognise that this is a very wide topic, and all I am writing here is a very sketchy overview that needs considerable refinement and further discussion.
I have in particular seven issues that I think need to be addressed, which are:
1. The use of the ‘world religions paradigm’
There is an extensive debate on the prevalence and the pedagogic use of the widespread assumption of ‘world religions’. Obviously this is a big one, which now has considerable academic literature (see for example Owen, Cotter & Robertson, and Masuzawa) — but the world religions assumption still has considerable traction in higher education. So it is not surprising that it is the go-to paradigm for school teaching. Trainers of RE teachers in higher education need to develop strategies for teaching against (and encouraging thinking against) the WRP. This is not an easy task.
2. The idea/approach of religion as entity not process
Again this is common in higher education/academic literature. But it is far too easy to talk of religion/religions rather than religious traditions. Much of this leads to my third point that such traditions are taught/thought of as homogenous (eg as Islam, Buddhism, etc). But also deflects away from an idea of (what gets called) ‘religion’ as aspects of human life/culture. This feeds back to the work of Fitzgerald and others, that the idea of religion as a thing is a theological idea, it upholds a particular (unseen white Protestant Christian) ideology of normative human/religious behaviour.
3. The approach based on idea that religions are singular not diverse
Part of the WRP relies on the assumption that if the teacher is not teaching Christianity (as an entity — often through the particular lens of forms of historical Protestant thinking), then they are teaching another religion, such as Islam or Buddhism or Sikhism, etc. Of course this obscures the major variations within such traditions (some more visible than others), based on worldviews/doctrines, organisations, geographies, histories, etc. Where do variations of tradition fit into the normative homogeneous picture (e.g., Shi’i, Sufis, Ahmadiyyas, etc in the category of ‘Islam’; what is the normative in Buddhist or Hindu diversity)? Like much else, these questions are difficult to frame at school level, but are no means impossible. What is harder is to develop structures that can be rolled out through an education system.
4. The framework that assumes religion as a cognitive structure
Although the term ‘practices’ is used and taught — as festivals, rituals, ‘religious life’, etc) within a general rubric of religion as ‘beliefs and practices’ — the overall approach is still very much based on an ideological position that religion provides thought systems (such as explaining evil, justifying war, etc). This permeates so much of the syllabus that it is largely invisible (ie, it is hidden in plain sight). It is also significantly assumed for approaches beyond Christianity — again mirroring much academic scholarship. It is also baked into the idea that RE/RS can be extended to include ‘worldviews’ (incorporating non-religion). I would argue that without this assumption of religion as belief/cognitive system, the current concept of ‘religion’ is largely meaningless — it would probably fold into other areas that could be studied instead (such as politics, history, culture, etc).
5. The lack of perspective on colonial history
If it is important to teach both slave/colonial history and Black history elsewhere, then it is equally important to teach it within the study of religion. Where history and society is taught in RE syllabuses, it is often very bland and ahistorical (in areas such as general migration, general politics, ecumenicism, or specific debates such as abortion or euthanasia). But the subject of religion and its reason for being on the curriculum — and having dedicated syllabuses, departments, and teachers — is because of this colonial history. This should require a rethinking both of history (by mainstreaming Black and colonial history) as well as rethinking the study of religion.
6. This leads into the lack of framework on history and current issues formulating contemporary religious debates
There is a common tendency to frame big questions about non-Christian religions in simple terms, such as on jihad and gender in Islam, on Buddhism and war, or on issues of Christianity in Africa (eg on LGBTQ+), Asia, and south America (and north America). Without discussing any of these without contextualising both colonial and Black histories, the discussion becomes very simplistic (and pointless, verging on stereotypical). Or to put this another way, teaching religious education is an example of how to teach decolonizing histories, to show students how the decolonizing approaches give us an understanding of major issues that become bound up with what gets called religion in today’s world.
7. The significance of including race in the study of religion
Decolonizing involves a recognition of how ‘we’ (ie, the people learning together in the classroom) got to where they are. In order to do that there needs to be an honest and frank exploration of the past. Colonialism is part of that, as is the concept of race and the racialization of people who were colonized (and racialization of themselves as colonizers as white). The idea of religion did not emerge separate from that history, but has been an integral part of it — thus colonization was justified as a ‘civilizing mission’. Religion and race are not separate categories, they blend and merge in many ways — and the teaching of religion (as RE) is strongly racialized. In present days, issues such as Islamophobia are heavily impacted by certain assumptions of race (as it is claimed ‘Islam is not a religion’). The job of teaching around these topics is not to prop up the justifications of race, racialization, and racial discrimination, it is to give students a means to unpack such ideas.
I must stress that I write all this not as a teacher of religious education, but as a scholar with considerable experience of teaching students who have emerged from the current system. My position is that the system and in particular the curriculum is in need of reform, as with much of the teaching in humanities across the various UK education systems. If the current Black Lives Matter movement in the UK is to have a lasting impact, it is in the recognition and opening up of the school curricular to colonial history and Black history, to more honestly educate students and prepare them for the world and the societies in which they live.
Religion Bites is edited by Malory Nye, an academic and writer who is currently recovering from a major health crisis in 2019. He can be found on Twitter (@malorynye).
He produces two podcasts: Religion Bites and History’s Ink.
Malory Nye is also the author of the books Religion the Basics (2008) and There Shall be an Independent Scotland (2015). He is currently working on a new edition of the Religion the Basics book, together with a new book on Race and Religion, which will be published by Bloomsbury Academic.
