The course aims to explore a variety of approaches to conflict management in contemporary conflicts, by third parties and parties in conflict, and critically assesses their effectiveness and potential. The course draws its theoretical foundations from peace and conflict research but is aimed at enabling students to learn to assess the scope for conflict management and peace- building in practice. The module includes both academic literature as well as policy relevant papers.

The focus of the course is on analysing peace processes and practical problems of conflict prevention, conflict management and peace-building in a range of contemporary international, internal, ethnic, community and environmental conflicts.

Students will be divided up into groups of two or three, and each group will take responsibility for identifying and investigating a specific approach to conflict management in a conflict of their choice. The choice of cases will vary with the interest of students. In recent year topics included Afghanistan, Chechnya, Georgia, Kashmir, Kosovo, Macedonia, Northern Ireland, Liberia/Sierra Leone, Timor Elste, conflict prevention and the emergent global climate change negotiations, and peace-building in contemporary Africa and Asia.

The course is taught in 10 2-hour lecture seminars, with the first half devoted to the lecture and the second half dedicated to substantial presentations by the student / group.

The module involves the negotiation, design and delivery of a research project whose precise topic will be determined by the student and the project supervisor.

The dissertation will be up to 20,000 words in length. The process of producing it is designed to provide students with the opportunity to consolidate their existing knowledge and skills base while developing new knowledge and skills made possible by its project-orientated nature.

This module aims to support existing taught modules in religious studies by introducing research methods and approaches from various disciplines and working to understand theoretical and practical issues in the study of religions. It introduces cross-cultural and cross- religious examination of research topics in religious studies. The module will also give students the opportunity for developing generic skills in library research, essay writing, ethics in research, dissertation planning, and presentations.

Aims and Objectives

• Induction into the study of religions Research methodologies: case studies and examples selected from anthropological, sociological, philosophical approaches as well as from the study of texts
• Theoretical approaches to the study of religion: examples selected from the disciplines of the humanities and social sciences
• Dissertation workshop: finding a topic and supervisor, completion plan, case studies

Assessment is by 5,000 word essay.

This module serves to consolidate postgraduate research and learning support by enabling students to engage with theories, methods, and skills relevant to your studies. The module is core for all PPR PGT politics students and complements core subject and discipline-specific provision in religious studies and philosophy. Through this module we aim to equip you with the ability to reflect upon the processes and implications of research project planning, design and execution in Politics, Philosophy and/or Religion.

The first part of the module examines the principles of research, including different disciplinary traditions of knowledge production. It goes on to set out the process of structuring a research project and explores how to develop and apply theory. The second part of the module examines a range of methods for conducting research, including interviews, surveys, and case studies. The final section covers questions of ethics and goes through how to write up and present research. Through the module, students will design research projects, develop writing and critical evaluation skills, and have the opportunity to present their research ideas as part of the annual MA conference. The module involves a combination of lectures, small group discussion, and presentations covering the following areas:

• The academic research process.
• Project planning, design and process management.
• Ethics in postgraduate research.
• Resource identification and review processes.
• Data acquisition techniques and issues.
• Analytical and interpretative approaches.
• Academic conventions (e.g. making an argument, writing, referencing).

Assessment is by 5,000 word research proposal.

Introduction

Week 1 Introduction to the study of Gender, Religion and Islam: This session is devoted to getting to know each other and discussing key issues in the study of gender and religion in light of feminist and post-colonial approaches.

Gender in the Tradition: Weeks 2-5

Week 2 Women in Qur'anic Narratives: This session introduces students to the study of the Qur’an with a focus on the representation of gender in Qur’anic narratives.

Week 3 The Construction of Gender Norms: This session investigates the moral boundaries of gender relations in the Qur’an, Hadith and early Muslim interpretation with a focus on the model of the Prophets’ wives and its extension to Muslim women in general.

Week 4 Sexuality and Modesty: This session continues to investigate the moral boundaries of gender relations in the Qur’an and Hadith with a focus on the question of sexuality and the dress code.

Week 5 Authority and power: This session will explore premodern Muslim views about the status of women and male authority, particularly in light of the central text Q. 3:34 (Male guardianship and the so-called beating verse)

Week 6 Individual Tutorials

Feminist Approaches and Contemporary Movements: Weeks 7-10

Week 7 Feminist Approaches to the Islamic tradition: Deconstructing Patriarchy: This session will look at the reform discourses which led to new approaches to the Qur’an with a focus on feminist interpretations that aim to deconstruct ‘patriarchal’ readings of the Qur’an.

Week 8 Feminist Approaches to the Islamic tradition: Reconstructing Islamic law: In this session, we take a closer look at the transnational Muslim Musawah (Equality) movement associated with Sisters in Islam and its effort to reconstruct Gender norms and laws in Islam.

Week 9 Politics and Piety: Reconstructing Islamic Practice: In the final two sessions we move to look at women’s involvement in changing religious practices through political action. This session looks at the British and US contexts and the emergence of the women-led mosques.

Week 10: Politics and Piety: The Revival of the Tradition and Critiques of Feminist Approaches: This session focuses on the revivalist, more traditionally-oriented mosque movement in the Middle East with reference to Egypt. The primary aim, however, will be to critically reflect upon and assess feminist approaches to Gender in Islam.

This module will examine some of the major debates in religious and atheistic thought, looking in particular at the way in which these debates are framed by a specifically modern epistemological framework, and the ways in which religious thought and atheistic thought might be though to be mutually constitutive and mutually implicated rather than simply oppositional.

The aim of this module is to examine and evaluate some of the most central issues in Enlightenment and post-Enlightenment Western religious and atheistic philosophical debates. The module will begin by looking the philosophy of G W F Hegel and its implications for subsequent religious and atheistic thought. It will then proceed to consider the thought of the post-Hegelian masters of suspicion: Feuerbach, Marx, Freud and Nietzsche. After this, it will look at ways in which religious and atheistic thought have been brought together, as manifested in various forms of Christian atheism. Finally, it will consider postmodern critiques of modern atheism and the nature of the associated return of religion.

Whether global, national, ethnic or ethical, conflicts frequently involve religion. Between themselves, in their relations with secular states and ideologies, and even at the level of sects or denominations, religions engage in conflict arising from deeply held beliefs and values, as well as in struggles for power, status and legitimacy. Understanding how and why religious groups contribute to global and regional conflicts and civil wars – from terrorist attacks, through historically embedded disputes in Israel/Gaza and Northern Ireland, to Christian/Muslim violence in Nigeria, Uganda and India – is vital for development, humanitarian intervention, international relations, diplomacy and conflict resolution.

This module provides the knowledge and skills to help students understand and analyse why conflict happens within and between religious groups, and to assess the positive and negative contributions that religions make to wider struggles – from local disputes through to global terrorism.

Week 1: An Historical Introduction to 'Religion and Conflict' Week 2: Religion and Secularism in the West

Week 3: Religion and Secularism in India Week 4: Religion and Ethnic Conflict

Week 5: Conflict, Religion, and International Relations Week 6: Religion and Violence

Week 7: Religion and Protest: Mohandas Gandhi Week 8: Religion and Protest: Martin Luther King Week 9: Religion and Society: Islam in Britain Week 10: Consolidation Lecture

The module is designed to introduce students to key concepts and issues in scholarship on religion and conflict: e.g. on the relationship between conflict and violence, religion and ethnicity, the ‘clash of civilizations’, intra-religious as well as inter-religious conflict, jihad and martyrdom. Equal attention will be given to the importance of context – historical, social, geographical and political. Analysis and debate about religion and conflict will be situated in particular cases, from the UK and Europe, the US, the Indian sub-continent and sub-Saharan Africa. Lecture podcasts and online discussion activities will be complemented by online talks by experts and short films. There will be plenty of opportunities for online interaction with peers and tutors.

Assessment is by 5,000 word essay.

In this module we will encounter some of the most foundational religious and philosophical texts of the Hindu and Buddhists traditions. Texts will vary from year to year, but may include: the ?g Veda, Upani?ads, Mahabharata, Bhagavad Gita, or the Yoga Sutra from the Brahmanical/Hindu tradition, and the Nikayas, Vinaya, Jatakas, Lotus Sutra, and The Bodhicaryavatara from the Buddhist tradition. Through close readings, we will examine some of the core religio-philosophical ideas of early Indian thought as well as pay close attention to the composition, style, and structure of the texts themselves. We will also attempt to situate Hindu and Buddhist textual material within a social and historical context, paying close attention to who participates in the religio-philosophical world of ancient India and in what types of social circumstances religio-philosophical ideas are discussed. Alongside reading the primary sources, we will also situate our engagements within scholarly debates about methods of interpretation such as text-historical criticism, hermeneutics, phenomenology, orientalism, and post-colonial theory.

Assessment is by 5,000 word essay.