Session 8: Religion, Human Nature and Violence

Session 8: Religion, Human Nature & Violence
Chair: Rob Fisher

Could Tanbazar Eviction in 1999 be Violence Against Women? Fundamentalism: a Form of Violence when it Risks Life in the Name of Religion
Rumana Hashem
Fellow, DFG-Postcolonial Study, University of Munich(LMU), Munich, Germany.

From a part of the global violation of women’s human rights, women in Bangladesh have been victimized and subjected to collective violence as often as the culture provokes conflict and the systematic suppression of oppression through male domination. Though the society, in general, is secular, nonetheless, in most cases Islam as the first religion leads the major policies e.g., gender, culture and education. Eventually, women have been caught by the cycle of violence and counter violence as a second gender whereas very often the circumstances of conflict are evoked by the fundamentalist forces. The discourses of violence against women and the policy of gender in Bangladeshi democracy could be acknowledged through an analysis of the incident of sex workers eviction in 1999 in Tanbazar, which, in respects of laws, was termed as an illegal step of state Government. The eviction of sex workers in 1999, in the name of rehabilitation, eventually, resulted a large scale of homelessness for the repressed and poor women, who were more or less, forced to submit themselves to such profession as sex work whilst the perpetrators who are, often, male have not yet been, accused in any aspect.
The paper seeks to understand and explores the complex forms of violence and there representation, the link between gender and sexuality dynamics and violence by putting a question whether the concept of fundamentalism could be understood as a dominant discourse of violent culture in terms of law and the theories of cultural anthropology. It is also intended to examine the case of eviction as a complete violation of women’s human right by the state. When issues of gender equality and peace should have been taken as prior concerns of the government, the government itself has been allegedly involved in acts of violence which women were subjected to.

American Evangelicals: Ministry Challenges and Enhancing the Quality of Theological Education
Brent Muirhead
Area Chair, MAED Curriculum & Technology, University of Phoenix Online, USA

The author will highlight how contemporary American evangelical churches have often embraced negative cultural beliefs and practices. The discussion will briefly examine how churches have often adopted ministry models that could potentially neutralize their influence in our local communities. The second portion of the paper will explore ways to improve theological education to better prepare ministers for pastoral leadership.

Living in the Shadow of Conflict: Reflections on the Topic ‘is Violence Part of Human Nature?
Ceri Bowen & Mauricio Garcia-Duran
Department of Peace Studies, University of Bradford, UK

The aim of this paper is to develop an holistic argument for peace and change, which accommodates reason/rationality with the emotional aspects to conflicts (sometimes neglected or disregarded). We know that there are biological explanations for incidents of violent behaviour executed by participants that border on the pathological, but these do not reflect or predict complex situations with protracted violent conflicts. We will formulate an analysis concerned with truth – but also as being true to wisdom – by questioning the very notion of conflict ‘resolution’.
Drawing on a psycho-structural perspective, we hope to shed light on the way different members position themselves in relation to the ‘other’ by emphasising their excessive and irrational demands. This creates a tenuous situation, close to breaking point and susceptible to over-reaction by all parties. We will use a dialectical model (Bowen, Madill, & Stratton, 2002) developed in family systems theory that focuses on a number of themes (beliefs about the problem, nature of relationships, communication style, power dynamics, awareness of others, negotiating responsibility, orientation in time) to highlight a conflict of ‘psychologies’, before elaborating on what this may tell us about the nature of the overt conflict. We will draw the attention of the reader to the contradictions, tensions and ambiguities that lead us to our conclusion. To illustrate the methodology, we will draw on the Colombian experience as one context to a protracted conflict that spans the individual, family, and community levels (García-Durán, 2003).