Hefner Gives Keynote Address in Indonesia on Best Models of Islamic Education
On June 24, 2024, Robert Hefner, Professor of Anthropology and of International Relations at Boston University’s Frederick S. Pardee School of Global Studies and Director of the School’s Center for the Study of Asia gave the keynote address at an international conference on Islamic education held at the Indonesian International Islamic University in Jakarta, Indonesia.
The talk was entitled, “Islamic Education in Southeast Asia: What is a ‘Best Model’?” The conference was attended by several hundred educators from across the Muslim-majority world. Hefner’s address highlighted the unique ways in which Islamic higher education in Indonesia has succeeded in integrating religious learning with general education, including civic education. In so doing, Indonesia’s Islamic universities have worked to provide cultural support for the notion that Islam can work in support of democracy and religiously-inclusive citizenship.
Robert Hefner has directed 19 research projects and organized 18 international conferences, and authored or edited nineteen books. He is the former president of the Association for Asian Studies. At CURA, he directed the program on Islam and civil society since 1991; coordinated interdisciplinary research and public policy programs on religion, pluralism, and world affairs; and is currently involved in two research projects: “The New Western Plurality and Civic Coexistence: Muslims, Catholics, and Secularists in North America and Western Europe”; and “Sharia Transitions: Islamic Law and Ethical Plurality in the Contemporary World.” Read more about Professor Hefner on his faculty profile.