Young people’s talk about religion and diversity: a qualitative study of Norwegian students aged 13–15

This paper focuses on how young people talk about religion and diversity in a multicultural society. More specifically, it focuses on how students speak about Islam and Muslims. In analysing interviews with students, a main interest has been to examine the relationship between the students’ speech and dominant discourses in Norwegian society represented in the media and public debates. This paper has the following structure. First, the theoretical basis of the research is explained and how Gerd Baumann’s terms ‘dominant’ and ‘demotic’ discourse are understood and employed in this study. Then, the project is contextualised within the Norwegian debate about plurality. Further, methods and analysed data are presented. In the main analysis, there is a focus on some of the students’ statements and the discourses they seem to activate. In conclusion, the consequences that the analysis has for school and the subject of religion in general, and for religious education teachers in particular, are discussed briefly.