"Jag trodde det skulle vara mer regler" : Gymnasieelevers erfarenheter av elevledda intervjuer med religiösa utövare i religionsundervisningen

Sammanfattning

The aim of this study is to examine upper secondary school students' understanding of lived religion and religious identity after conducting student-led interviews with religious practitioners in RE. Furthermore, the study analyzes the didactic potential of this method in the challenging of stereotypes and promoting students' existential self-reflection. The study relied on a qualitative methodology, utilizing interviews with five students who participated in the teaching module, followed by a thematic analysis of the collected data. The theoretical framework combines Robert Jackson’s interpretive approach with Meredith McGuire's sociological perspective on lived religion. The findings indicated that the student-led interviews successfully challenged and deconstructed students' initial expectations of religious individuals as strict and rule-oriented. Through the encounter, the students’ understanding of religious identity expanded and deepened, from initially viewing it as a static institutional obligation to understanding it as a dynamic, fluid, and interpretative process of identity construction. Additionally, the method fostered a process of edification, where students critically reflected on their own previous positions and expressed didactic critique against traditional textbook representations for lacking humanization and individual perspectives. However, the study also identifies a didactic dilemma where secular individualism may act as a filter of understanding and acceptance. This risks leading to the assimilation of lived religion into a norm of Western autonomy in order to make it comprehensible for secular non-religious students, thereby overshadowing the actual influence of the religious tradition and community.