Religious literacy: how do we recognize it when we see it, and then what? : Arguments for a reformed use of religious literacy in RE research, international knowledge transfer and teacher training programs

To facilitate and strengthen teacher training knowledge transfers, certain theoretical andanalytical concepts must be scrutinized, one of which is religious literacy. This chapterstarts with a short survey on the use of religious literacy in different international contexts,from which it was found that religious literacy is far from a coherent concept. Despite this,religious literacy is not a redundant term. Quite the opposite. This chapter argues thatreligious literacy could prove useful in several research areas if there were a transformedunderstanding and use of religious literacy as a concept. The main objective of this chapteris to initiate this endeavour and suggest a new framing that could assist in a more cohesiveand practical use of religious literacy in its own right. The first step is to tie religious literacycloser to its origin in new literacy studies. One important distinction, on the other hand, isto demarcate religious literacy from other established RE research concepts, such aslearning about religions. Finally, it is argued that religious literacy should be understood inrelation to interpretative repertoires and used to study different linguistic and commu-nication capacities. If we follow the trajectory set out in this chapter, we will enhance ourtheoretical and explanatory toolbox and our possibilities to develop children and youngpeoples’ sense making in relation to religion in schools