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A study of data from 85 undergraduate and graduate students involved in church youth groups revealed a significant relationship between degree of religious belief and drug using behavior and attitudes. Highly religious subjects disapproved of drinking alcoholic beverages and used cigarettes and alcohol less than subjects professing lower religiosity. Protestant subjects had more negative attitudes and less personal use of tobacco and alcohol than Catholics. Similar findings pertaining to drug using behavior and attitudes were reported between groups for all other substances.

The Islamic dress code has been forcibly imposed on the women in Sudan, since 1983, and many feminists researchers have criticized the practices of the veil as a tool to oppress women. This study aimed to explore a group of Sudanese women, currently living in South Africa, experiences and perceptions of the veil, whether the veil is a religious dress code or a tool that has been used to exercise inequality.

No abstract available. / Thesis (M.A.)-University of KwaZulu-Natal, Pietermaritzburg, 2012.

This thesis was later published by University Press of America in 1994. Please contact the ICS library if you would like to view this work.

This thesis will enter into the discussion about the relationship between religion and politics to examine the proposals made by Robert Audi attempting to resolve perceived incompatible and incongruous tensions arising from politically active religion. Utilizing the work of Paul Weithman, Christopher Eberle, Nicholas Wolterstorff, Jeffrey Stout, and others, this essay examines Audi's epistemological and empirical arguments for justifying restraints upon religiously-based political advocacy. Contesting the viability of Audi's notion of a "secular reason," and his generalization that religiously-based political advocacy threatens the health and strength of a free and democratic society, I conclude that the types of restraints being put forward by Audi will likely hinder rather than help bring about more healthy and just societies. Nonetheless, Audi has helped identify a key lacuna within the arguments of those advocating the legitimacy of religiously-based and religiously motivated political advocacy and action. As such, this essay aims to provide a 'complementary' approach - one which works to clarify and situate concerns expressed by Audi regarding unrestrained religiously-based political advocacy and those of his critics desiring a more religiously-inclusive public political sphere.Ascribing to the political community the task of discerning the common good or some variant thereof (Audi speaks briefly of "political justice"; this essay proposes "public justice") is widespread within the academic literature. Few theorists, however, have allowed substantive reflection on what the political common good entails to significantly shape their considerations of and proposals regarding democratic legitimacy, appropriate restraints and guidelines for public-political dialogue, and ideals of citizenship. To that end, the thrust of the complementary approach will involve grounding and framing a religiously inclusive conception of the public-political sphere within what is being called the "institutional imperative" of the political community to pursue "public justice." Part and parcel of this institutional grounding involves re-examining concerns for civic respect, restraint, and dialogue in light of the guiding institutional norm of "public justice."

Permission from the author to digitize this work is pending. Please contact the ICS library if you would like to view this work.

Permission from the author to digitize this work is pending. Please contact the ICS library if you would like to view this work.

The extent to which Jewish and Christian lifestyle actions were portrayed in 62 children's books of accepted literary worth was studied. The researcher read the Newbery award book and one Newbery honor book for each year in search of actions that Jewish and Christians active in their faiths deemed important. The sample consisted of the Newbery award book and one Newbery honor book for each year from 1960 to 1990. A content analysis of 13 action categories found that the five most common actions were (1) compassionate/ charitable deeds, (2) telling others about God, (3) prayer, (4) worship attendance and (5) reading the Bible. No significant change in the frequency of the 13 actions was found over time. However, the researcher found that Jewish and Christian lifestyles were portrayed only nominally in the Newbery books. The sample distribution shows that 65 percent of the sampled books contained fewer than the mean of 4.9 actions per 100 pages. Only six books contained strong Jewish or Christian characters - that is, main characters whose faith in God was portrayed as playing an important role in everyday life. Jewish characters of any kind (prominent or obscure) were found in only three books. Of the eight books that contained more than 10 actions per 100 pages, only one was about people in a contemporary setting: The Great Gillv Hopkins (1979). Actions were recorded regardless of which character committed them. In four books, characters' actions seemed inconsistent with the rest of the character's portrayed lifestyle. Some books contained a large number of actions contrary to Judeo-Christian lifestyles, with portrayals of hate and cruelty far outweighing portrayals of Jewish or Christian lifestyle actions. The most extreme of these wereThe Tombs of Atuan (1972) and The Witches of Worm (1973). Other studies have asserted that multicultural literature should be preferred because children need positive exposure to all cultures. This study concludes that portrayal of the cultures of committed Jews and Christians has not been common of the Newbery books since at least 1960. / Department of Journalism

This study attempts to show that an appeal to the 'perspective of the witness' is essential to better understand the way Sankara makes sense of the richly diverse Vedanta material. It goes beyond the general understanding that Sankara 'conveniently' arranges such material into the categories of the conventional and the absolute placing texts speaking of the Absolute (Brahman) with properties in the conventional/relative category. It suggests that the fundamental properties associated with a theistic conceptualisation of the Absolute, which all authoritative texts attest to, need not be seen as dogmatic tenets that Sankara has to contend with while expounding his non-dual system of thought. Instead, it argues that they should be regarded as meaningful devices that have for their sole purpose to lead the spiritual seeker to the realization of the absolute unity of being, a result that the Advaita tradition holds as the highest goal of life. Three key conceptions of Brahman are explored: Brahman as the cause of the world, as an entity who is gracious towards his devotees, and as an object of devotion. It is argued that all three can be better understood and appreciated when considered in their proper and larger pedagogical context, whose climax is 'the perspective of the witness.' The first three chapters of this thesis are mainly concerned with epistemological and didactic means that are associated with demonstrating the 'perspective of the witness.' The fourth and fifth chapters evaluate how much help such a standpoint can provide us in our appraisal of these three aspects of the Absolute in the context of Sarikara's writings.