Education and Belonging to a Subject Matter

This chapter sets out a pedagogy of ‘belonging’ for religious education. It draws on the perspective of philosophical hermeneutics to elaborate the intentional relation of teacher, student and subject matter in the event of understanding. It is proposed that dialogue as an existential form has an educational significance that is further complicated when transferred into the ‘ontic’ situation in which the roles of teacher and student are formally assumed. The possibility of belonging as an educational ‘ethic’ is considered. Finally, it is acknowledged that the model of belonging applies as much to the encounter with the ‘curriculum’ as to the classroom situation, and some implications are drawn out for the ‘questionability’ of religious education.