Home / Publications / Podcasts / Maleiha Malik King S College London Problems Regarding The Category Religion
Podcast
MALEIHA MALIK [King’s College London]: Problems regarding the category “Religion”
20 April 12
Duration: 11.14.
Maleiha Malik welcomed the opportunity to address problems regarding the category “religion” and the notion of religious freedom. This would be of growing significance, as is evident, for instance, among young Muslims. While around 70% of children in Muslim households adopt a Muslim identity, what about the 30% who do not, and even among those who do but have a religious practice far less dependent on the mosque and religious institutions than that of their parents? On the boundary, what about those who choose publicly to be non-religious, but who retain some degree of personal religious affiliation?
The public discourse about religion is very poor at taking into account what is actually happening. It fails often to see the difference between one religion and another. And it fails to recognise the growing category of the “religious non-religious”. For instance, a growing number of Muslims will also endorse humanism and secularism. Our legal categories are crude.
“Our legal concepts of religion are not fit-for-purpose”.
The law is very conservative and is dominated by an old institutionalism. It fails to recognise growing individualism. “Our legal concepts of religion are not fit-for-purpose”. The concept of religious freedom needs deconstructing at an academic level, and we need more sophistication in our thinking.
Click here to read more about and access other podcasts from the event.
Watch and listen to Maleiha Malik contributing to the Westminster Faith Debate on religious freedom a few days beforehand here.
Download podcast
To subscribe to our mail list please e-mail:
p.ainsworth@lancaster.ac.uk