Often when a religious minority challenges mainstream customs, the phrase "reasonable accommodation" is at the centre of the ensuing debate. But what exactly is reasonable accommodation? Does it achieve its goal of integrating the rights of religious minorities with those of mainstream society – or does it emphasize inequality?
Reasonable Accommodation features eight essays that seek to define the meaning of reasonable accommodation within Canada and abroad. These probing explorations touch on current hot-button topics such as women's right to wear the niqab in public, religious diversity in prisons, and accommodating sexual diversity. Woven throughout are questions and commentary about whether there really is a religious majority in Canada, how the idea of "shared values" obscures debate, and how tolerating religious differences simply isn't enough to guarantee equality. Reasonable Accommodation provides a much-needed critical assessment of this phrase and theorizes religious diversity and freedom of religion beyond the meaning of "tolerance" as it sometimes implies.
Contents
Introduction: Exploring Reasonable Accommodation / Lori G. Beaman
1 Religion and Immigration in a Changing Canada: The Reasonable Accommodation of "Reasonable Accommodation"? / Peter Beyer
2 Religion in Court, Between an Objective and a Subjective Definition / Solange Lefebvre
3 Identity Quietism and Political Exclusion / Avigail Eisenberg
4 Veiled Objections: Facing Public Opposition to the Niqab / Natasha Bakht
5 Public Responses to Religious Diversity in Britain and France / James A. Beckford
6 Beyond Reasonable Accommodation: The Case of Australia / Gary D. Bouma
7 One of These Things Is Not like the Other: Sexual Diversity and Accommodation / Heather Shipley
8 Religion as a Multicultural Marker in Advanced Modern Society / Ole Riis
Conclusion: Alternatives to Reasonable Accommodation / Lori G. Beaman
List of Contributors
Index
Produktdetaljer
Biografisk notat
Lori G. Beaman is Canada Research Chair in the Contextualization of Religion in a Diverse Canada, director of the Religion and Diversity Project, and a professor in the Department of Classics and Religious Studies at the University of Ottawa.
Contributors: Natasha Bakht, James A. Beckford, Peter Beyer, Gary D. Bouma, Avigail Eisenberg, Solange Lefebvre, Ole Riis, and Heather Shipley.