Professor Esther D. Reed
Head of Theology and Religion, Associate Professor
BA (Hons), PhD (Dunelm)
Extension: 3249
Telephone: 01392 723249
Director of the Network for Religion in Public Life http://www.centres.exeter.ac.uk/nrpl/
Esther D. Reed joined the Department of Theology in 2007. Previously, she taught for ten years at the University of St Andrews including one semester as the visiting O'Connor Professor at Colgate University, NY (Spring 2007).
Her current research projects include:
1. Theology and International Law
Whilst Christian theology is familiar with questions about the relation of Church and state, divine and human law, little attention has been devoted to questions of international law. Esther's new book, Theology for International Law (T and T Clark, forthcoming 2013), provides a systematically theological and applied engagement with contemporary issues of international law, including questions about the authority of international law, the meaning of 'universality' in human rights discourse, how better to effect peace through law, sovereignty, global poverty, the ethics of territorial borders, the use of force, militarised humanitarian intervention, and more.
2. Narrative Theology in Religious Education
Esther is working with Rob Freathy, Graduate School of Education, to advocate a pedagogy of Religious Education (RE) based upon a narratival framework informed by both narrative theology and narrative philosophy. Supported by Bible Society UK, their work addresses existing difficulties in how biblical texts are handled within RE, and moves away from a ‘proof-texting’ approach to the Bible towards one in which pupils are enabled to think about the significance of biblical narratives for both Christians and themselves.
3. Theology of Work
She delivered The Sarum Theological Lectures 2007 in Salisbury Cathedral. The lectures, entitled 'God at Work: Christian Ethics in the Workplace' centred around the question of how God is at work in the work of believers, and have been published .
