Faith

A church in Mexico came to my mind after listening to Kwame Anthony Appiah, called Iglesia de San Juan in Chamula, Chiapas.

The internal walls are lined with statues of Catholic saints adorned with mirrors to ward off evil, while pine needles cover the floor. No pews. Families sweep their personal ceremony spaces clear, stepping around piles of multicoloured candle wax which mark the time spent and the space used. The overlapping noises of Tzotzil prayer, unembarrassed wailing, chickens, guitar, the burping out of malicious spirits. All this, a result of 500 years of Catholic and indigenous beliefs in conflict and frictional connection.

There is deep mischief here, a practice of constructive resistance (Illich, 1972). Within a context of continual violent oppression, people here have taken a condoned Catholic space, and subverted it (de Certeau, 1984).

Appiah reminds me how the cannon of dominant religious ideologies arose from a European Imperialist quest for power. In similarity to Michel de Certeau’s work, he questions whether a singular definition for religion can even exist.

My students and collaborators in Mexico were active daily in showing me this*. Sharing how their beliefs and cultural rituals intertwined forming both collective and deeply personal faith. In contrast – in the writing of this post – it is the absence of faith discussion in the UAL classroom that is notable to me now.

Haifaa Jawad states that “revivalist movements demonstrate increasing numbers of people searching for religious and spiritual fulfilment globally in the 21st century” (Jawad, 2022). The significance of faith in young people’s lives should not be underestimated. But as explained by Jaclyn Rekis, epistemic injustice is particularly “deep” in academia because “credibility itself is not just deflated, but is removed from possibility” (Kidd 2017, 39). While Appiah has the privilege of being heard and validated on the Ted Talk stage. Rekis reminds us this is not unanimously the case for people whose faith intersects with academic life in the USA or Europe.

This piece helped me see how secularism in the UK marginalises religious ideas, diminishing their validity, and creating negative prejudices which cause people of faith to suppress their views. (Lee 2021, 567–68).

I am now thinking about the overlapping suppression felt by students of colour, or trans students for example who are already experiencing daily acts of aggression and oppression in this university.

Like ablism, an assumption that atheism is the norm in academic life clearly risks dismissing and/or eradicating the perspectives of our diverse student community.

I was interested to see that at least 30% of our students at UAL identify as religious. In our PGCert workshop it was discussed we should create an academic calendar that acknowledges this full range of religious holidays and sacred periods. We also talked about improving quality and availability of prayer space, and better investing in the multitude of student faith-based groups.

But on reflection – as we acknowledge the pluriversal nature of spiritual life – is a multilayered calendar (based on British imperialist ideas of time) even possible / appropriate / helpful? Similarly would one quiet room work for all forms of spiritual worship?

I shared the article by Haifaa Jawad with one of my students this week, and asked if they had reflections on how their intersecting identity finds a place here at UAL, and they kindly let me share*:

Our brilliant students show me how to open my eyes, ears and full-self to the wealth of hidden knowledges within our UAL community. The intersection of race, gender, disability and class along with faith will create many challenges for our students here (e.g. where do they see their future-selves in the vast white / able-bodied / capitalist / patriarchal design industry) until we start working more constructively and mischievously alongside our student community in the quest to dismantle epistemic (and all other) injustices.

///////////////////////////////////////////////////////////////

Image Credits

1. La Noche de los Rábanos, Night of the Radishes, Dec 22, Oxacca Mexico.
2. Quema de Judas, Burning Judas, Holy Saturday during Easter, Querétaro Mexico.
3. El Día de los Muertos, Day of the Dead Parade, Nov 1/2, Querétaro Mexico.
4. My Design Student building a design school in a parking space
5. Design students teaching me to weave with corn husk
6. My students making tomales and hot chocolate for the classroom as the seasons changed
7. Parades showcasing Cartonería / papier-mâché craft
8. Celebrations marked by Piñatas
9. The tiny baby Jesus I found inside a Rosca de Reyes cake on Día de Reyes Jan 6. A discovery which meant I was tasked with making Tomales for all my colleagues on Feb 2.

Sources of knowledges and inspiration for this post

• Kwame Anthony Appiah, Is religion good or bad? (This is a trick question)
• Iglesia de San Juan Chamula, Mexico
• de Certeau, M. The Practice of Everyday Life. trans. Steven Rendall, University of California Press (1984)
• Illich, I. Deschooling Society. Harper & Row (1972)
• Haifaa Jawad, Islam, Women and Sport: The Case of Visible Muslim Women
• Rekis, J. Religious Identity and Epistemic Injustice: An Intersectional Account. Cambridge University Press. (2023)
• Kidd, Ian James. 2017. Epistemic injustice and religion. In The Routledge handbook of epistemic injustice, ed. Ian James Kidd, José Medina, and Gaile M. Pohlhaus Jr. London: Routledge.
• Lee, J. Y. 2021. Anticipatory epistemic injustice. Social Epistemology 35 (6): 564–76.
• The art school students exposing university racism on Instagram
• UAL Equality, Diversity and Inclusion Annual report 2022/23

* Below is the full version of my students response to my question