Are theology and religious studies important?
Departments under threat
Theology and religious studies departments at British universities could be facing the axe following the government’s decision to slash higher education spending. Bangor University has announced it will phase out theology entirely, while the Student Christian Movement (SCM) say they are ‘very concerned’ that other universities may follow suit. Funding cuts are likely to put all academic disciplines under strain, but there are particular fears for subjects such as theology, which are seen as having less commercial benefit. With rumours abounding across universities, one theology lecturer said that ‘all the universities are waiting for each other to jump’.
Critics are keen to refute suggestions that theology is not relevant to everyday life. Quaker theologian Rachel Muers, based at Leeds University, insisted that: ‘theology is about understanding what matters most to people and what makes them tick’. SCM’s Charlotte Thomson said: ‘decisions on higher education funding should not be based on narrow economic arguments but on what knowledge and learning we value as a society’.
This autumn will see the last intake of students in the School of Theology and Religious Studies at Bangor. It will merge with the equivalent department at Trinity St David’s, based in Lampeter and Carmarthen. A university spokesperson said that a number of staff will move immediately, but existing students will be able to complete their degrees at Bangor before theology is ‘phased out’ there.
Lecturers at Birmingham have been told to expect twelve or thirteen job losses in the School of Philosophy, Theology and Religion. The news follows similar cuts in the Department of Sociology. The university told the Friend that a number of changes would ‘provide an enhanced experience for students’ and that teaching for current students will not be affected.
This view is not shared by Martin Machon of the University and College Union (UCU), which represents academic and teaching staff. He said job cuts could leave remaining staff ‘subject to excessive workloads’. The union is opposing compulsory redundancies and trying ‘to get the university to re-think’.
Machon said that staff are making every effort to negotiate an agreement. But he added: ‘the University of Birmingham is running the risk that there will be strike action, not just in theology but in other parts of the university, and that is something we’re bearing in mind if we’re not able to achieve a satisfactory settlement’.
Disputes over higher education funding have become particularly bitter since the government’s budget last month. The business secretary, Vince Cable, has said repayment of student fees should be linked with income. He wants to see top universities taking more of their students from low-income backgrounds. The National Union of Students (NUS) argues that cuts will have the opposite effect.
‘The university sector will be broken, bloodied and battered by the time the government’s funding cuts have taken effect,’ said Chaminda Jayanetti, editor of A Thousand Cuts, a website that monitors the impact of public spending cuts.
He blamed both the current and the former government, saying, ‘Labour introduced swingeing university funding cuts while in office, which has given the coalition political cover to expand these cuts and make them more severe’.
Universities that attempt cuts may nonetheless have a fight on their hands. Last year, an attempt by Sheffield University to close its Biblical Studies Department was abandoned in the face of opposition.
Symon Hill
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