Religious
Education (RE) is a term that conveys diverse and often incompatible meanings
to different constituencies. For some, ‘RE’ means religious nurturing, either tailored
to parental views or meant to inculcate a uniform religiosity. For others, RE
means learning about the many religious and non-religious world-views and
secular ethics that exist, not promoting one religion or another. Some seek to avoid
the ambiguous term ‘religious education’, replacing it with terms such as
‘education about religions and beliefs’ or ‘the religious dimension of
intercultural education’.
The
RE21 – Religious Education in a Global-Local
World conference starts from two assumptions: (a) that RE has and will
continue to have multiple and contested meanings and (b) that local
interpretations of RE are increasingly in negotiation with each other as a
consequence of globalisation. The RE21 conference
emphasises a student-centred approach, viewing any kind of ‘RE’ (or indeed its
absence) as a formative lived experience for pupils. It stresses a bottom-up, sociological
and ethnographic/anthropological research-based approach to the study of RE,
rather than the ‘top down’ approaches which often start from prescriptive
legal, ideological or religious standpoints.
One
aim of this conference is to further international academic research into the
diverse past, present (and possible future) forms of RE and we hope to publish
selected papers from the conference. A second aim is through discussion and debate
at the conference to enhance public and professional understanding, in Ireland
and beyond, of the complex issues and debates surrounding RE in the wider
world.