Etiken i praktiken: En kvalitativ studie om religionslärares syn på etik som en del av religionskunskapsämnet.

Abstract

Abstract

Historically speaking, the Swedish school system has a long history of being under the purview of the Church of Sweden – thus the subject of religious studies has had a strongly normative function of not only educating students about Christianity, but also to teach them Christian ethical values as defined by the church. However, today the Swedish school system, and therefore the subject of religious studies, explicitly secular and non-denominational. The purpose of religious studies is no longer to educate students in Christian ethics, but ethics still remain as a major component of the subject, despite its emancipation from religion as such. Teachers of religion thus must meet the challenge of weaving together two components (education about religions and education about ethics) that under the current definition no longer have a clear connection to one-another. The purpose of this study is to examine how teachers relate ethics as a component of the subject of religious studies, based on Zygmunt Bauman’s theory of post-modern ethics. The data is made up of several semi-structured qualitative interview with five gymnasie-level (college or upper secondary) teachers active in western and middle parts of Sweden. The data is analysed through the lens of Bauman’s theories, specifically to see how the teachers relate to ethics as part of their subject, as well as whether the teachers themselves show signs of a post-modern ethical mindset in their approach. Through this study, we discover clear indications that the purpose of ethics in religious studies is not clear-cut and thus teachers must apply various strategies to meet this challenge.