Full Description
In recent years there has been a renewed interest in textbooks, partly because they have maintained their position as an important genre. Not too many years ago - and perhaps currently as well - many considered textbooks outdated or archaic compared with technological advances such as the Internet and different kinds of educational software. Despite these changes, textbooks for school subjects and for academic studies continue to be in demand. Textbooks seem to constitute a genre in which established truths are conveyed, and may thus represent stable forces in a world of flux and rapid changes. Textbook Gods offers perspectives on representations of religion and religions in textbooks. The contributions emerge from different contexts, ranging from European countries, to North America, Japan and Australia.
Contents
Bengt-Ove Andreassen Introduction - Theoretical perspectives on textbooks / textbooks in religious studies research 1 - Torsten Hylen (Dalarna University) Closed and open conceptions of religion: The problem of essentialism in teaching about religion 2 - Satoko Fujiwara (University of Tokyo) Establishing Religion through Textbooks: Religions in Japan's "Ethics" Program 3- Katharina Frank (University of Zurich) Bad Religions and Good Religions: The Representation of Religion and Religious Traditions in a New Swiss Textbook 4 - Sivane Hirsch (University of Montreal) To Learn about the Other and to Get to Know Him: Judaism and the Jewish community of Quebec as represented in Ethics and Religious Culture textbooks 5 - Barbara Wintersgill Researching materials used to teach about world religions in schools in England 6 - Carole M. Cusack (University of Sydney) Representations of Indigenous Australian Religions in New South Wales (NSW) Higher School Certificate Studies of Religion Textbooks 7 - Mary Hayward Visual engagement: textbooks and the materiality of religion 8 - Suzanne Anette Thobro (University of Tromso) Cartographic representations of religion(s) in Norwegian textbooks 9 - Bengt-Ove Andreassen A reservoir of symbols. On the conceptualization of "religion" in introduction books for RE in Teacher Education in Norway 10 - James A. Lewis Stones and Bones: Indigenous African Religions and the 'Evolution' of World Religions 11 - Annika Hvithamar (University of Southern Denmark) "Christianity" or "the Christianity - that is the question 12 - Jens Andre Herbener (University of Southern Denmark) School Bible in the service of The Danish National Church - A Case Study
