Decolonising religious education through the prism of affect theory: analytical perspectives for approaching Islamophobia in curriculum and pedagogy

ABSTRACT

This paper outlines a set of analytical perspectives grounded in affect theory for decolonising religious education. In particular, these perspectives are: recognising the role of religious feelings; examining the extent to which decolonial affective spaces can be created in the classroom; and, understanding how contemporary public discourses about multiculturalism and religious difference are affectively experienced by students and educators in their everyday lives. It is argued that these perspectives contribute to push further the uncovering of colonial legacies within contemporary religious education, especially in relation to Islamophobia. Further, it is emphasised that it is imperative for the project of decolonising religious education to pay attention to the affective dimensions of decolonisation; this implies not only interrogating the affective legacies of coloniality such as Islamophobia, but also producing decolonised affective communities in classrooms and schools.

KEYWORDS:

• Religious education
• decolonisation
• affect theory
• islamophobia

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Michalinos Zembylas

Michalinos Zembylas is Professor of Educational Theory and Curriculum Studies at the Open University of Cyprus, Honorary Professor at Nelson Mandela University, South Africa, and Adjunct Professor at the University of South Australia. He has written extensively on emotion and affect in relation to social justice pedagogies, intercultural and peace education, human rights education and citizenship education. His recent books include: Affect and the rise of right-wing populism: Pedagogies for the renewal of democratic education, and Higher education hauntologies: Living with ghosts for a justice-to-come (co-edited with V. Bozalek, S. Motala and D. Hölscher). In 2016, he received the Distinguished Researcher Award in ‘Social Sciences and Humanities’ from the Cyprus Research Promotion Foundation.