COMPARATIVE RELIGION
Department of Cultural Studies University of Turku
What is comparative religion?
Comparative religion is an academic field of study aiming to examine religion, religious ideas and institutions as an integral part of human cognition and behavior in any sociocultural context in the course of history. It encourages the analysis and understanding of religion, ideologies, world-views and forms of belief and practice in any given society through archeological, oral and written source materials. In addition to comparative and historical approach the study of religion is a social and behavioral science focusing on the symbolic construction of meanings by which individuals and social groups create and express their identities.
Teaching and research
In Turku University comparative religion is an anthropologically oriented discipline. In methodological training a great importance is attached to both on the theory and methods of training in ethnographic field research. Anthropological approach in collecting and analysing empirical data can be carried out in reference to religious traditions, but also in reference to secular world views and ideologies not only in Europe but in other parts of world, too. Comparative religion in Turku University offers basic instruction that present mythologies, popular religion and ethnic processes among the Finnic peoples in the Baltic Sea culture area in particular and among other Finno-Ugric peoples in Northern Scandinavia, Russia and Siberia in general.
Studies and professional prospects
Annually 20 new students are selected to study comparative religion at Turku University through an entrance examination. The modes of teaching are mainly lectures and seminars. Along with examinations students are expected to prepare essays and reports. The focus of these works is to learn critical thinking and developing their literal skills. Studying antropological field work methods with excercises is important, too. Due to this, many M.A. theses are based on individual field work projects. In principal M.A. in comparative religion qualifies for a research career. It is, however, useful in many other fields, too. In Finland people with an education in comparative religion are employed, for instance, by council offices of cultural affairs and media. Also integrating refugees and immigrants into Finnish society has created jobs for specialists in comparative religion. Choosing one's profession is naturally dependent to choosing minors, too, during the studies. Popular branches of knowledge for the student of comparative religion are history, psychology, communication studies, sociology and philosophy. Orienting to the international tasks preconcieves naturally studies in foreing languages, too. Many of the student in comparative religion study to be humanistically oriented religion teachers for schools.
The teaching program includes lectures or seminars by foreign teachers whenever it is possible. The faculty members maintain international contacts contributing to the publications abroad and by participating conferences and seminars.
TKU archive
Comparative religion maintains together with Folkloristics the archive of ethnographic materials. The collections include for instance data on religious traditions and folklore from Ingria (area close to St. Petersburg, Russia) and India (mostly Kerala area), ethnomedicine of Peruvian Amazon, laments of the Baltic Sea Finns and village projects in Lappland. Since the early 1970's information of religious groups in Turku area have been collected systematically, too. This is characteristically an audiovisual research and teaching archive. The TKU archive in Turku University is the second largest tradition archive in Finland and the vast audiovisual materials have been catalogued using the means provided by data-base techniques. Due to the fieldwork-oriented production of research data, the majority of the students and researchers frequently utilize and add to the collections.
Comparative
Religionp