A multicultural society that equates Christian and humanist values with human rights denies pluralism, placing human rights culture at risk. We examine Norwegian education policy discourses, noting human rights as a key feature of national identity, said to underpin schooling. Education policy maintains distinctions between those who embody…

The debate about Norwegian religious education, since the change towards a more multi-faith and non-confessional school subject in 1997, has often touched upon issues of impartiality, using concepts such as neutral, objective, descriptive, critical and pluralistic. Still, international Human Rights bodies have criticised Norwegian regulations for…

The article presents a method for analysing recurring curriculum documents using discourse theory inspired by Ernesto Laclau and Chantal Mouffe. The article includes a presentation of the method in seven practical steps, and is illustrated and discussed throughout using the author's recent case study on religion, identity and values in Norwegian…

The "purpose" of this article is to illustrate how potential learning is related to hegemonic speech genres. This we do through examples from two religious education (RE) classrooms, one Norwegian and one Swedish. By presenting important dimensions of speech genres used in RE classrooms, the article also contributes to developing theory.…