America at a Crossroads, Kennedy and Public Reason
Last night I watched two installments of PBS’s series, America at a Crossroads. I highly recommend it. The episodes that were airing on my station included Irshad Manji’s “Faith without Fear” and an investigation of Indonesian Islam, “Struggle for the Soul of Islam.” I do think there could be a little bit more theological exploration–just what separates the moderates from the fundamentalists in why they read the Koran differently? Pointing out that they differ is useful, but limited in educational value.
Still, I’m thinking about using online excerpts of the second episode with my students when we get to Islam. It’s a good introduction to non-Arabic Islam (which many will assume is the minority, rather than the majority), to questions of women/gender and the state’s role in religion. We’ll be doing a few comparative, topical lessons, so it could be a good transition.
The only problem in using this series in a classroom is that it is politically charged. There is analysis of the Bush administration’s actions, mention of the war in Iraq–topics which, while relevant, are not the focus of my class. It’s a fine line to walk, between keeping your students engaged in ideas that are reflected in current events and turning the classroom into a debate about political ideology. What’s essential, I think, is to constantly bring the focus back to the religious beliefs and practices underlying those questions.
Turning to policy debate from educational approaches, this is, I think, a central problem: how much should religious reasons be infilitrating public discourse about policy? A few days ago, I interviewed Kathleen Kennedy Townsend for The Vital Voice, about her new book, Failing America’s Faithful. I’ll have a full book review on Arbitrary Marks with a link to the article, when it appears. Without scooping myself, I can say that this is one of the questions I asked her.
It was a tough question to answer. (You’ll have to wait until next Friday to see what she said–about that and comparisons between her father, Robert Kennedy, and Barack Obama).
Anyway, my first vlog went well enough (note to the commenters coming from BlueGal–I do teach, which is why it sounded a bit like a lecture) that I think I’m going to do another on Sunday, with this as the topic. Stay tuned–and let me know what you think about public discourse and religion. Should we frame our arguments to avoid referring to underlying theologies? Or is that disingenuous? Can we ever expect agreement if we do explicitly include our religious presuppositions? Or will that inevitably lead to polarization and drastically different languages about the same issues?
Image from: http://pow.reonline.org.uk/islam.htm
(I provide originating links to all images and will gladly remove them if asked.)