Religious Studies Preparation

Thinking of taking R.S at A level?

Here are a range of texts and websites for you to explore and investigate.  Be sure you want to study the course by knowing what is on the course. Perhaps speak to friend who may already be doing the A level to get a sense of what it’s like and what is required.

Research, Plato and the cave, Aristotle and the Final Cause, Descartes idea of ‘I think therefore I am and other Philosophers. Look at different ethical theories such as Utilitarianism, Natural Law, Virtue Ethics and Situation Ethics.

You will need to read a variety of resource materials across the three components papers.  It is important that not only are these read, and you make detailed notes, but also that their content is as familiar to you as breathing, eating and drinking! Those of you with aspirations of the highest grade (that’s you!) should aim to read much more extensively. The more you read, the more your mastery of the language of this subject, and ability to argue coherently and perceptively, will develop.

Books

The specification lists suggested reading for each topic. In addition, there are some general books that you will be expected to read and make use of:

• Oxford A Level Religious Studies for OCR: L Ahluwalia and R Bowie
• OCR Philosophy of Religion for AS and A2: M Taylor
• The Philosophy of Religion: P Cole
• OCR Philosophy and Ethics AS: Taylor, Eyre, Knight
• OCR Religious Ethics for AS and A2: J Mayled
• Ethical Theory: M Thompson
• Ethics Matters: P and C Vardy
• Understanding Religious Ethics: R Wright
• Christianity – A Very Short Introduction: Linda Woodhead
• History of Christianity: Nick Page
• Teach Yourself Christianity: John Young

Websites

There are a number of excellent websites and online resources that you should make use of. The official OCR A level RS page is:

http://www.ocr.org.uk/qualifications/as-a-level-gce-religious-studies-h173-h573-from-2016/

http://www.bbc.co.uk/religion/religions/  BBC Religion and Ethics website – a good clear start on any religious topic

www.manybooks.net Downloadable philosophy books – includes a number of key thinkers named on the specification

https://www.audiopi.co.uk/ Audiopi – free access to podcasts on Christian beliefs and practices (ask for the username and password if you have forgotten it)

https://thepanpsycast.com/ Pan Psycast – philosophy and ethics podcasts

http://www.nigelwarburton.typepad.com/philosophy_bites/ Philosophy and ethics podcasts – one of ITunes most popular picks

http://www.open2.net/ethicsbites/ Open University resource – podcasts on ethical theories and applied topics

https://rationalreligion.co.uk/ Rational Religion – various articles and videos responding to atheist criticisms of religion

https://ethics.academyconferences.com/ Academy Conferences – Q&A videos on various philosophy, ethics and DCT topics at the bottom of the page

http://www.cmf.org.uk/students/  The Christian Medical Fellowship is a useful place to research medical ethics, from an evangelical perspective (type a keyword into the search engine)

http://www.andygustafson.net/net/Businessresources.htm Thorough on Business Ethics

Trustworthy encyclopaedias

www.newadvent.org   The Catholic Encyclopedia

http://www.utm.edu/research/iep/   The Internet Encyclopedia of Philosophy

http://plato.stanford.edu/  The Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy

http://www.epistemelinks.com/index.aspx   A comprehensive ethics and philosophy site

http://www.classicspage.com    Guide to Roman and Greek thinkers

Aimed at A Level Students

www.philosophicalinvestigations.co.uk An exceptional site aimed at AS/A2 students

http://www.missbadgersphilosophysite.com/blog/tag/evolution Another exceptional site aimed at AS/A2 students

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCtOLJIWPWAcxFa37iQOUtOA Engaging revision videos on a range of philosophy topics

http://www.mel-thompson.co.uk/Ethics.htm  

http://www.rsrevision.com

http://www.philosophyofreligion.info/ Good overview of key ideas

www.tutor2u.net Range of A Level revision notes (don’t rely on this though!)

University websites

http://ethics.sandiego.edu/   Ethics Updates

http://www.jcu.edu/philosophy/gensler  Ethics exercises

http://www.cep.unt.edu/  Environmental Ethics

http://users.ox.ac.uk/~worc0337/phil_topics.html   Philosophy sites by topic

http://highered.mcgraw-hill.com/sites/0072878274/student_view0/chapter5/theories.html

For a library of links on all parts of our theory syllabus

http://www.justiceharvard.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=category&layout=blog&id=9&Itemid=5#ep2 Michael Sandel's excellent lectures are available online, covering most of our course. Click this link to access a summary of the lectures

http://www.lancs.ac.uk/users/philosophy/courses/100/100menu.htm There are some excellent materials on free will and determinism, Aristotle, Kant and issues surrounding relativismIn ethics, there are two main type of relativism. Descriptive ethical relativism simply claims as a matter of fact that different people have different moral beliefs, but it takes no stand on whether those beliefs are valid or not. Normative ethical relativism claims that each culture’s (or group’s) beliefs are right within that culture, and that it is impossible to validly judge another culture’s values from the outside.  from the University of Lancaster Philosophy and Ethics course.

http://ocw.mit.edu/courses/linguistics-and-philosophy/24-231-ethics-fall-2009/lecture-notes/

The Massachusetts Institute of Technology have an excellent online course on ethics - more than you need for A level, but brilliant nonetheless

General interest

http://www.unco.edu/philosophy/clinic.html  The Argument Clinic

http://www.philosophersnet.com/  The Philosopher’s Magazine online (has some excellent articles and engaging interactive philosophy games)

http://www.aldaily.com/  Arts and Letters Daily tackles up to date philosophical issues

http://www.trincoll.edu/depts/phil/philo/philpics.html  Pictures of philosophers!

http://www.wadsworth.com/cgi-wadsworth/course_products_wp.pl?fid=M20b&product_isbn_issn=9780495502357&discipline_number=10  Download a complete set of summary notes (28 sides) on Louis Pojman's excellent ethicsThe explicit, philosophical reflection on moral beliefs and practices. The difference between ethics and morality is similar to the difference between musicology and music. Ethics is a conscious stepping back and reflecting on morality, just as musicology is a conscious reflection on music.  book (Ethics:Discovering Right and Wrong) by clicking on this link. (click on chapter outlines on the left hand side menu)

http://www.learningscientists.org/ The Learning Scientists (specialists in strategies for effective study)

To Google or not to Google…

There are also lots of different search engines students like to search for information. The better ones for academic study are:

Google Scholar

This is the academic arm of Google.  Google have deals with a number of academic publishers and Google Scholar allows users to search across their content.  The results can be a mix of citation details, abstracts and entire journal articles.

Benefits – reliable, good academic standard.

Drawbacks – Can’t always get access to full articles.  Some of the results are just links to the books.

Google Books - Google have worked with a number of large research libraries to scan their books and make them freely available to the world.

Benefits – No cost, list of relevant books, dated, books will have been through editorial process which websites may not have been.

Drawbacks – sometimes only a preview, not current books.  

KEY CHECKS YOU NEED TO MAKE IN ORDER TO EVALUATE A WEBSITE FOR ACADEMIC USE:

• CURRENCY
• RELEVANCE
• AUTHORITY
• ACCURACY
• PURPOSE