Examination arrangement

Course content

When peoples, including those of Muslim faith, move across countries and continents, religious institutions follow and provide one of the most effective societal structures for settlement and interaction with society. Consequently, Norwegian Islamic institutions organise primarily according to the Islamic global and historical schools, “brotherhoods”, and movements, and secondarily into other organisational models negotiated with majority society. Change takes place continuously and is deliberated and communicated through the Islamic disciplines, i.e. the systematically produced knowledge about Islam as faith and practice.
This course contributes to knowledge of Islamic institutions in Norway, through historical study of the main Islamic disciplines and schools, and their significance in everyday life, including art, literature and architecture. Since the earliest and largest Norwegian Muslim communities originate in Pakistan, special attention is devoted to their institutions and histories.

Analytical focus is on how theories and methods shape knowledge, with corresponding practices. This approach applies to the Islamic disciplines, other academic disciplines that produce studies of Islam and Muslims, and state policy.

Learning outcome

According to the course curriculum, a candidate who passes this course is expected to have the following learning outcome (defined as knowledge and skills):

Knowledge:
The candidate has attained
- core knowledge about the Islamic disciplines and schools of Qur’an exegesis, Prophetic tradition, law and legal reasoning, theology/dogma, ritual, ethics, history, rhetoric, and the theories and methods that pertain to them.
- in-depth knowledge about how the Islamic disciplines and schools have developed in the Norwegian context, including artistic and material expressions.
- analytical understanding of relationships between state policy and knowledge production, in Islamic and other academic disciplines and studies.

Skills:
The candidate has acquired skills to
- identify and describe the Islamic disciplines and schools in institutional contexts.
- analyse the Islamic disciplines, and academic studies of these, regarding theories, methods, and relationship with state policy.
- write the history of Norwegian Islam, viewed through the lens of the Islamic disciplines and schools, of academic studies, and of state policy.

Learning methods and activities

The teaching consists of lectures and seminars. The lectures and seminars aim at outlining broad frameworks for thinking about the issues which are treated in the course readings, and raising the policy issues touched upon. The lectures may be held in English.

In order to take the exam the students have to attend at least 80 % of the teaching, and pass one obligatory activity of three assessment thresholds, subject to the lecturer’s evaluation.

The obligatory course requirements can only be approved in the semester when the course is taught, but are valid in this and the subsequent term.

Compulsory assignments

• Presentation
• 80 % attendance

Further on evaluation

The exam consists of a written assignment (8000 words).

Specific conditions

Recommended previous knowledge

Skills equivalent to one year of university studies, including basic courses in religious studies, especially RVI1010 Theories of Religion and RVI1030 Religions of the Middle East.

Required previous knowledge

RVI1030 Religions of the Middle East

Course materials

The required reading list will be available at the beginning of the semester.