As South Africa emerges from the years of struggle against apartheid, the education system is characterised by fragmentation, inequity, racism and a culture of intolerance. This study tests the experiences and challenges of learners, educators and relevant stakeholders in a multicultural setting: The study was conducted at five multicultural schools in the Ethekwini Region in the province of KwaZulu-Natal in South Africa. Literature is based on historical background of multicultural education and sketches the concept of culture, equality and multiculturalism. The methodology of choice was an empirical research. The first stage involved the gathering of information through questionnaires, observations and interviews. In the second stage: the analysis indicates the roles played by principals, educators and learners in multicultural schools. The findings of this study reveal that learners, educators and principals face serious problems in multicultural schools and are unable to deal with learner diversity. Firstly, in a multicultural country like South Africa it is important that learners reach high levels of proficiency in at least two languages. Secondly, the Constitution of the Republic of South Africa (Act 108 of 1996) provides the basis for curriculum for transformation and development. Lastly, there is a need for educator training so that educators can handle diverse learners. Religion and education brings about moral values and contributes to create an integrated community that affirms in diversity therefore religious diversity needs to be facilitated by trained professionals. This study seeks to build on the new direction in education and proposes numerous strategic recommendations for a new approach in multicultural education in South Africa. Finally, the study provides useful insights and guidelines to the general public, educators, policymakers, lectures and managers of the institution of learning. / Thesis (M.A.)-University of Durban-Westville, 2004.

<p> This study explored the roles of graduate theological students' religious faith and degree program affiliation in their information behaviors, particularly their degree-related research behaviors. In 2015, religious intolerance continues to stratify barriers between communities. One domain where faith significantly affects student life is in graduate studies of religion and theology. This study's purpose was to explore problems in information action inherent to the dichotomy between academic study of theology that leads to Master of Arts (MA) and Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) degrees and professional study of theology that leads to Master of Divinity (MDiv) and Doctor of Theology (ThD) degrees. To locate the most appropriate research subjects for qualitative inquiry, this study first investigated the content of PhD and ThD dissertation acknowledgements using bibliometric analysis. The frequency with which the PhD and ThD dissertations' acknowledgements acknowledge affiliates within their authors' own degree programs and religious faith traditions guided the research design for subsequent interviewing of MA and MDiv students about the roles of their religious faith, degree program affiliation and interpersonal information sources in their research processes. Data were collected, coded and analyzed as a lens into the relationships between authors, affiliations and acknowledgements. The qualitative component - intensive interviewing about Master's students' research processes - qualified the results of the quantitative analysis of PhD and ThD students' interpersonal information source preferences manifest in their dissertations' acknowledgements. The study found that information behavior does relate to degree program affiliations and students' religious faith, thus degree program affiliation and religious faith background should be considered in research consultations and bibliographic instruction in theological libraries.</p>

This thesis is a study of the conceptualization and implementation of an aspect of Canadian Indian policy which can best be described as the repression of indigenous religious systems anong Indians residing in the prairie region. Subsequent to the Potlach Law of 1885, a number of amendments to the Canadian Indian Act were passed to discourage the persistence of specific ceremonial activities. Both missionaries and administrators contended that such practices were not only immoral from the perspective of Victorian Euro-Canadians, but were also serious obstructions to the assimilative objectives of federal Indian policy. It is postulated in this study that these repressive measures were not simply indicators of Euro-Canadian intolerance of non-Christian religions, but rather, were implemented because of the correctly perceived relationship between religious ideology and ceremonial life with indigenous social, political, and economic values and structures. The destruction of these values and concommitant behaviour was viewed as a prerequisite for the integration of collective Native kin-based modes of production into the competitive and individualistic white-dominated capitalist mode. While this study is an administrative history of the repression of indigenous religious practices, it is equally an analysis of Indian responses to the attempts by the Department of Indian Affairs to undermine this important aspect of their culture. Through the use of an ethnohistorical approach on the more general issue of religious persistence and change, some of the major forms of Indian resistance have been identified and examined. In addition to challenging the legitimacy of the terms of the Indian Act and the manner in which anti-ceremonial regulations were implemented, prairie Indians also accommodated to these measures by altering their ceremonial life in terms of space, time, content, and participation. The historical experienCe of one major group - the Plains Cree, has been presented as a case study to explore religious persistence and change as means of accommodation and resistance to colonial administrations. To what degree these reactions in turn influenced the development of Canadian Indian policy with respect to religious repression from the period 1895 to the post World War One period forms a major part of this dissertation. In the conclusions of this study it is argued that paradoxically, it was the very system which had been developed to systematically destroy the political economies of prairie Indians that insured at least some degree of indigenous ideological persistence reformulation and perpetuation of a belief in the ideology of socio-economic collectivism (and its associated ceremonial practices) were forms of resistance to imposed assimilation programs as well as realistic accommodations to the exigencies of survival in economically marginal underdeveloped reserve communities.

This thesis is a study of the conceptualization and implementation of an aspect of Canadian Indian policy which can best be described as the repression of indigenous religious systems anong Indians residing in the prairie region. Subsequent to the Potlach Law of 1885, a number of amendments to the Canadian Indian Act were passed to discourage the persistence of specific ceremonial activities. Both missionaries and administrators contended that such practices were not only immoral from the perspective of Victorian Euro-Canadians, but were also serious obstructions to the assimilative objectives of federal Indian policy. It is postulated in this study that these repressive measures were not simply indicators of Euro-Canadian intolerance of non-Christian religions, but rather, were implemented because of the correctly perceived relationship between religious ideology and ceremonial life with indigenous social, political, and economic values and structures. The destruction of these values and concommitant behaviour was viewed as a prerequisite for the integration of collective Native kin-based modes of production into the competitive and individualistic white-dominated capitalist mode. While this study is an administrative history of the repression of indigenous religious practices, it is equally an analysis of Indian responses to the attempts by the Department of Indian Affairs to undermine this important aspect of their culture. Through the use of an ethnohistorical approach on the more general issue of religious persistence and change, some of the major forms of Indian resistance have been identified and examined. In addition to challenging the legitimacy of the terms of the Indian Act and the manner in which anti-ceremonial regulations were implemented, prairie Indians also accommodated to these measures by altering their ceremonial life in terms of space, time, content, and participation. The historical experienCe of one major group - the Plains Cree, has been presented as a case study to explore religious persistence and change as means of accommodation and resistance to colonial administrations. To what degree these reactions in turn influenced the development of Canadian Indian policy with respect to religious repression from the period 1895 to the post World War One period forms a major part of this dissertation. In the conclusions of this study it is argued that paradoxically, it was the very system which had been developed to systematically destroy the political economies of prairie Indians that insured at least some degree of indigenous ideological persistence reformulation and perpetuation of a belief in the ideology of socio-economic collectivism (and its associated ceremonial practices) were forms of resistance to imposed assimilation programs as well as realistic accommodations to the exigencies of survival in economically marginal underdeveloped reserve communities.

Thesis (MPhil (Political Science))--Stellenbosch University, 2006. / Sudan, Africa’s largest country has been plagued by civil war for more than fifty years. The war broke out before independence in 1956 and the last round of talks ended in a peace agreement early in 2005. The war started as a war between two different religions embedded in different cultures. The Islamic government constitutionalised their religious beliefs and imposed them on the whole country. This triggered heavy reaction from the Christian and animist people in the South. They were not willing to adhere to strict marginalising Islamic laws that created cleavages in society. The Anya-Anya was the first rebel group to violently oppose the government and they fought until the Addis Ababa peace accord that was reached in 1972. After the peace agreement there was relative peace before the government went against the peace agreement and again started enforcing their religious laws on the people in the South. This new wave of Islamisation sparked renewed tension between the North and the south that culminated in Dr John Garang and his SPLM/A restarting the conflict with the government in 1982. This war between the SPLA and the government lasted 22 years and only ended at the beginning of 2005. The significance of this second wave in the conflict is that it coincided with the discovery of oil in the South. Since the discovery of oil the whole focus of the war changed and oil became the centre around which the war revolved. Through this research I intend to look at the significance of oil in the conflict. The research question: how religious is Sudan’ Religious war? asks the question whether resources have become more important than religion.

What are we to make of the religious diversity present in our world? There are two main views in the face of such diversity. The religious exclusivist (RE) holds that the truth claims of only his or her tradition are the correct claims. Alternatively, the religious pluralist (RP) asserts that the truth claims of all traditions are correct in some sense. In this paper I explore several philosophical arguments in favor of each view including: Alvin Plantinga, William P. Alston, and John Hick. I argue that the distinction between the RE and the RP is actually based in different domains. The RE is posing a solution in the domain of the individual practitioner, while the religious pluralist is offering a solution in the global domain. These two views are distinguished by the distinct set of concerns defining each domain. The main concern defining the individual practitioner domain relates to the genuine belief of the practitioner, and the global domain defining concern is the problem of epistemic peers. Finally, I argue that it is possible to consistently be a RE in one domain and a RP in another, so long as the agent can successfully navigate the differences between domains.

Introduction Studies examining outcome in schizophrenia have either not considered religion as a relevant variable; or else they have failed to disentangle religious delusions from normal religious beliefs. Method. The measures were developed. The psychometric properties of the Religious Life Inventory modified for use in patients with schizophrenia were examined (study 1). A reliable categorisation procedure was developed for separating religious delusions from normal religious beliefs. A cross sectional investigation (study 2) established the prevalence of religious delusions, and categorised them into meaningful categories. Response to treatment and satisfaction with treatment was evaluated (in study 3) using a quasi-experimental approach. Results. The prevalence of religious delusions was 24%. The most common examples were the delusion of being God or Jesus and the interpretation of an auditory hallucination to be the voice of God or the Devil. Religious delusions were most commonly found in religious people, especially those who have had alterations in their level of religiosity in the past and who hallucinated. Those with religious delusions had higher scores on psychotic symptom measures than those who did not have religious delusions on admission. There was no difference between the religiously deluded and not religiously deluded, or religious and not religious patients in their response to routine treatment. Conclusion Religiosity is not a relevant factor in response to routine treatment for patients with schizophrenia.

Il paesaggio sacro dell'Epiro al di fuori dei centri di fondazione coloniale si caratterizza per una grande uniformità, determinata dall'esclusiva adozione delle forme templari non periptere. La ricerca si concentra sugli aspetti propriamente architettonici (planimetrici, tecnico-costruttivi, decorativi e formali) e sulle articolazioni funzionali dell'edilizia di culto regionale, troppo spesso trascurati nella storia degli studi a vantaggio di altre dimensioni dello spazio santuariale come quella religiosa o politico-istituzionale. / The sacred landscape of Hellenistic Epirus, outside of colonial centers, shows an absolute prevalence of non-peripteral temples (closed-front oikoi, prostyle naiskoi, naiskoi in antis). Even the only supposed peripteral temple in the region, the so called “Temple of Zeus Areios” at Rodotopi (Ioannina) appears to a close analysis to be the product of the Roman monumentalization of a previous prostyle temple. This research focuses namely on the architectural aspects of this “peripheral” cultic landscape, which have generally been neglected by scholars when compared with other aspects such as religious or political ones.

La tesi indaga, attraverso un percorso di ricerca qualitativa, la relazione tra appartenenza religiosa e scelte professionali dei membri e dei dirigenti di cinque associazioni d’ispirazione cattolica impegnate sul tema del lavoro e di un sindacato. Il percorso di ricerca teorico si è svolto su due filoni: uno che prendeva in esame i temi propri della Sociologia del lavoro, le tesi attorno alla fine dell’epoca del lavoro e il ruolo del lavoro nella costruzione dell’identità; il secondo di Sociologia della religione e dunque la persistenza della religione nella sfera pubblica tra paradigma della secolarizzazione e nuove teorie, ma anche alcuni approfondimenti storici sul movimento cattolico e dottrinari sul lavoro nella dottrina sociale. L’indagine empirica ha evidenziato la difficoltà di parlare del significato e del valore personalmente attribuito al lavoro, ma anche il ruolo di mediazione di significati svolto dall’associazione: dalle interviste infatti è emerso che proprio nella mediazione della mission associativa si trova la chiave del rapporto fede-lavoro. Alla luce di tali risultati è stata ipotizzata una classificazione delle associazioni in base alla visione del lavoro che propongono. / The thesis investigates, through a qualitative search, the relationship among religious affiliation and professional choices of the members and the executives of five associations of Catholic inspiration and a labor union. The theoretical research had been developed on two seams: one based on themes proper of the Sociology of the job, the theses around the end of the epoch of the job and the role of the job in the construction of the identity; the second of Sociology of the religion and therefore the persistence of the religion in the public sphere between paradigm of the secularization and new theories, but also some historical close examinations on the movement Catholic and on the theme of "work" in the catholic social doctrine. The empirical investigation underlined the difficulty of speaking about the meaning of the job and the value personally attributed to the job, but also the role of mediation of meanings developed by the association: interviews reveal that is in the mediation of the associative mission the key of the relationship faith-job.

L’ordinamento giuridico e il diritto penale non possono rimanere estranei alle dinamiche del multiculturalismo, per poter garantire effettivamente la pacifica convivenza. Il sentimento religioso e quello di appartenenza culturale, che sono modalità cognitive e presupposti per la formazione identitaria, caratterizzano la società multiculturale e plurireligiosa. L’analisi di tali sentimenti in rapporto con i principi dell’ordinamento liberale e del diritto penale, come elaborati dalla dottrina italiana e tedesca, dimostra la loro tutelabilità a livello penale. Sul versante sanzionatorio lo studio giunge per tali reati a prevedere un percorso di restorative justice. Il diritto penale deve affrontare anche il problema dei reati che sono orientati dall’appartenenza culturale (cultural offence) o religiosa. Nell’esperienza statunitense il reato culturalmente orientato è stato disciplinato mediante la cultural defense, ovvero l’applicazione di diversi istituti di diritto positivo in funzione attenuante o di esclusione della responsabilità. Il presente lavoro si propone di individuare i caratteri essenziali di una riforma legislativa per attribuire riconoscimento all’orientamento culturale o religioso nelle categorie del diritto penale italiano. Elemento essenziale in questa valutazione è la considerazione dell’orientamento culturale o religioso come una delle finalità proprie dell’ordinamento, caratteristica che permette di valutare l’illiceità dei reati culturalmente o religiosamente orientati. / The legal system and criminal law can not remain strangers to the dynamics of multiculturalism, if they want to effectively ensure the peaceful coexistence. The feeling of religious and cultural belonging, which is both a cognitive procedure and a prerequisite for the formation of identity, does characterize multicultural and multireligious society. This feeling has been considered in relation with the principles of the liberal legal system and of the criminal law, as developed by the Italian and German doctrine. The research has shown that it can be protected by criminal law itself. From the sanctionatory point of view the analysis leads to deem appropriate paths of restorative justice. Criminal law also needs to face the problem represented by crimes which are caused by cultural or religious affiliation (so called cultural offences). The American experience has dealt with such crimes through the so called cultural defences. This means that various institutions of positive law are used in order to mitigate or even exclude liability. This work aims to identify the essential characteristics of a legislative reform in order to give recognition, within the categories of Italian criminal law, to the cultural or religious orientation. An essential element in this evaluation is the consideration of the cultural orientation or religious order as one of the true purposes of the legal system, which would help to assess the wrongfulness of crimes which are culturally or religiously oriented.