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Terror and Religion - GENL1063

Faculty: Faculty of Law

School: Faculty of Law

Course Outline: See below

Campus: Kensington Campus

Career: Undergraduate

Units of Credit: 6

EFTSL: 0.12500 (more info)

Indicative Contact Hours per Week: 3

CSS Contribution Charge: 1 (more info)

Tuition Fee: See Tuition Fee Schedule

Further Information: See Class Timetable

Available for General Education: Yes (more info)

View course information for previous years.

Description

The aim of Terror and Religion is to explore the historic and contemporary links between religion and terror and to help students understand the complexity of religious violence in the late 20th and early 21st centuries. The course investigates legal and other definitions of terrorism and the development of modern doctrines of terror. It examines topics such as religious motivation, and the justification and legitimisation of the use violence in a number of major religious belief systems. It identifies the differences between mainstream and extremist teachings. It analyses significant acts of religiously motivated violence, and explores background issues such as secularisation, modernism and globalisation, as well as more personal ones, such as the nature of religious conviction and its influence on behaviour.

Recommended Prior Knowledge

None

Course Objectives

The course aims to ensure that students become familiar with the complexity of the issues involved in contemporary religious violence. Students will be shown how contemporary religious violence has its roots in the history of religion and how the modern doctrines of terror have evolved. They will learn how religion acts a powerful motivation for attitudes and behaviour and how religious extremists have reinterpreted the mainstream teachings of their religion to justify the use of violence. They will learn how to analyse contemporary acts of religiously motivated terror in a number of religions. They will become familiar with current approaches to counter terrorism.

Main Topics

Historic and contemporary examples of religious terror in religions such as Christianity, Islam, Judaism, Sikhism, Buddhism and new religious movements;
The evolution of modern doctrines of terror and their influence on religiously motivated violence;
Mainstream teachings on the use of violence in a number of religions and the reinterpretations of these teachings by extremist thinkers;
Analytical tools for understanding contemporary religious violence, including aims, goals, and personal, social and political background factors.

Assessment