Jonathan Y. Tan, Australian Catholic University

Jonathan Y. Tan joined the Australian Catholic University School of Theology as senior lecturer in theology in July 2011. Previously, he taught at Xavier University from 2002–2011. He is the author of Introducing Asian American Theologies (Orbis Books, 2008) and fifty articles, book chapters, and encyclopedia/dictionary entries on a broad range of intersecting topics in the study of religion and theology. Tan is especially interested in integrating technology, web 2.0, and social media tools in teaching and learning in higher education. A continuously updated listing of links is available here.

Teaching in a Globalized — and Digitized — World

In a world that is rapidly becoming global, intercultural, and interconnected, the impact and implications of migration, globalization, transnationalism, and the World Wide Web on religious and theological education can no longer be ignored. Specifically, these transformational shifts necessitate a rethinking of how the teaching and learning of religion and theology can be broadened beyond the printed page to include online resources that encompass global, intercultural, interreligious, and transnational perspectives. At the same time, today’s instructors often marvel at how the Generation Y or “Millennial” students that populate today’s classrooms are highly adept at navigating online and digital resources, while at the same time bemoaning the reality that these students often lack the skills to differentiate between the wheat and the chaff among the bewildering range of online resources on religion and theology. Hence, there is also the need to guide these students to use online resources critically and judiciously.

What follows in this article is an exploration of the variety of intercultural and transnational resources that are available online for both classroom use and student research. This list is not meant to be exhaustive, but rather offers a snapshot of the variety of online resources I have discovered and used in a variety of ways in my own classroom teaching (see www.jonathantan.org/classes.html). Moreover, online resources are often evolving, with new perspectives and approaches supplanting earlier discussions and presentations. Hence, the online resources cited below should be seen not merely as examples of resources that could work in your classroom, but also as an encouragement and invitation to seek out similar or related online resources that could also work for you.