2024/25 Taught Postgraduate Programme Catalogue

MA Religion

Total credits: 180

Entry requirements:

Entry Requirements are available on the Course Search entry

School/Unit responsible for the parenting of students and programme:

School of PRHS

Examination board through which the programme will be considered:

PRHS Examination Board

Programme specification:

The programme will allow students to deepen their critical understanding of the relevance and role of religion in the contemporary world. Through its different pathway options and optional modules it explores the variety of ways that religious practices, beliefs and traditions inform, encourage, contest, disrupt, or otherwise influence contemporary social, political and cultural life. Students will be able to learn about the importance of religions to phenomena such as protest movements, revolutions, nationalism, terrorism, global development, climate change, gender, sexuality and race discrimination, migration and diaspora. They will also be able to explore the ways in which different theological traditions inform ethical debates and social identities.

The core module, Religion, Politics and Society, critically interrogates the concept of ‘religion’ in the context of different theories of politics, policy and social change, engaging with hotly debated and contested topics such as secularisation and ‘post-secularism’, religious identity and representation, religion and the public sphere. A list of its indicative contextual ‘case studies’ includes religious representation in the UK; millennialist belief in the USA; religion and climate emergency; pentecostalism in Africa; religious nationalism in India; islamism in the Middle East. The module draws upon expertise across the School including theological, philosophical, sociological and anthropological approaches. Thus, the core module plays into the distinctive research strengths of Leeds TRS as reflected in the Centre for Religion and Public Life – and hence encourages and enables students to feel part of the wider academic community of Theology and Religious Studies at Leeds.

A distinctive feature of the programme is the option of designating a specialised pathway in one of three areas: Development, Gender, or Theology. Students who opt for one or other of these pathways are required to take an additional core module in the School of PRHS. Students opting for a Development pathway are allowed to take additional modules from the School of Politics and International Studies; those opting for a Gender pathway can choose additional modules from the School of Sociology and Social Policy; Students opting for the Theology pathway may choose additional Theology focused modules from PRHS.

In addition to these options, there are various module offerings across all pathways that make the programme distinctive: the possibility of learning to design and execute field research in the module Religion and Society: Research Process and Methods; the opportunity to undertake fieldwork or ethnographic research as part of a dissertation or one-to-one tuition via the Research Project module.

The programme is nationally and internationally unique, and will appeal to a broad range of people with a keen interest in the place of religions and theology in their social, political, ethical and cultural dimensions. Students may wish to use the programme as a stepping stone to further research; as a preparatory degree for work in the voluntary, advocacy, NGO, or policy sector; or to further their knowledge and literacy in this important area.

Year1 - View timetable

[Learning Outcomes, Transferable (Key) Skills, Assessment]

Candidates are required to study and pass 180 credits.

Compulsory modules:

Candidates will be required to study the following compulsory module:

Optional modules:

All candidates will be required to study one of the following dissertation modules:

Candidates opting for the DEVELOPMENT pathway will be required to study the following module :

Candidates opting for the DEVELOPMENT pathway will be required to study AT LEAST ONE of the following modules:

Candidates opting for the GENDER pathway will be required to study the following module:

Candidates opting for the GENDER pathway will be required to study AT LEAST ONE of the following modules:

Candidates opting for the THEOLOGY pathway will be required to study the following module:

Candidates opting for the THEOLOGY pathway will be required to study AT LEAST ONE of the following optional modules:

Candidates will be required to study 0 - 90 credits from the following optional modules:

Last updated: 29/08/2024 13:49:11

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