Social and Political Sciences

School of Social and Political Sciences

 

As part of the university review of small programmes, changes will be occurring to the Religious Studies Programme.  From 2010 Religious Studies will no longer be offered as a major in undergraduate qualifications. In 2011 new courses involving the study of religion will be developed in tandem with the School of Social and Political Sciences and the study of religion will become integrated into other programmes. This is a positive initiative for all involved and enables the study of religion to be developed in new ways, situated within major disciplines. The way we study religion at Canterbury is changing, but the study of religion will continue.

The following changes to RELS will occur from 2010:

  1. From 2010 RELS will no longer be offered as a subject for a major for the BA nor as a subject for the Grad Dip Arts.
  2. RELS will remain a subject for the CERT ARTS and as a MINOR for the BA in 2010. The future of these (2011 and beyond) will be decided in 2010.
  3. Students who have enrolled in a major in RELS prior to 2010 will be able to complete their major in 2010 or 2011. A smaller number of RELS courses at 100, 200 and 300 level will be available for this purpose.
  4. RELS will continue to offer a BA Honours programme.  This will comprise two 400 level RELS papers, a RELS research paper and one Honours paper taken from another cognate subject.
  5. RELS will continue to offer a MA and PhD programme.

Click here to see the courses being offered by Religious Studies in 2010.

For further information please contact:
Dr Mike Grimshaw, RELS Programme Co-Ordinator
Email: michael.grimshaw@canterbury.ac.nz
Phone: 03 364 2390


Religious Studies: learning how to think and talk about religion and its impact on the world.

Religious Studies at Canterbury is the only Rels programme in New Zealand located in the social sciences. This means we approach religion as human socio-cultural constructions and claims and so do not follow a more traditional comparative religion or traditions based approach. A central focus is how do we think and talk about 'religion' and what are the issues that religion causes in our contemporary world. This involves critically breaking down divisions between East and West by looking at processes of exchange, overlap and transformation rather than promoting 'monolithic' notions of culture and religion. We concentrate on two distinctive areas. The first is how the question of human identity is construed from the perspective of religions in an historical and contemporary, post-colonial context. The second is what can be termed 'the necessary problem of religion' for the modern, postcolonial world. We are therefore the only Rels programme with a integrated and cohesive
programme concentrating on cultural and religious theory.