This book highlights perspectives from religious traditions worldwide, in conversation with other communities who promote, critique, or question the idea of human rights. It shows how human rights can provide a platform for dialogue among groups of people from diverse backgrounds who seek to address pressing issues of human well-being.
In each chapter, readers will be introduced to religious and human rights perspectives on specific global issues. Intersecting with these issues, the work examines history and philosophy of human rights, for a generally accessible overview of human rights theory, foundations, and critique. Specific case studies woven through the book will also help both students and advocates – whether they are part of religious communities or not – engage more deeply with particular areas of concern.
This volume is a useful resource for undergraduate students who are learning about the relationship between religion and human rights in a classroom for the first time, as well as upper-level and graduate students looking for a broad basis of knowledge and a starting point for digging deeper into specific areas of scholarship.
Acknowledgments
Commonly Used Acronyms
Text of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights
Introduction
1. History of Religion and Human Rights
2. Debates and Discussions about Human Rights
3. Religion, Family Ties, and Rights Across the Lifespan
4. Religion, Human Rights, Gender, and Sexuality
5. Racial Discrimination, Religious Nationalism, and Human Rights
6. Violence, Coercion, Conflict, and Peacebuilding
7. Religion and Economic Rights
8. Religion, Health, and Human Rights
9. Migrants and Refugees
10. The Rights of the Earth? Human Rights, the Natural Environment, and Other-Than-Human Persons
11. The Future of Religion and Human Rights.
Index
Biography
Laura E. Alexander is an Associate Professor of Religious Studies and Executive Director of the Goldstein Center for Human Rights at the University of Nebraska at Omaha, where she also previously served as inaugural holder of the Goldstein Family Community Chair in Human Rights.
