# Transcript

Paul-François Tremlett, Senior Lecturer in Religious Studies and Head of Department:
Religious Studies is the most exciting subject on the curriculum - bar none. And the reason for that is, we address all the complexities – the real issues that are facing our world today: terrorism, climate change, race, gender, class.
All of the key issues, problems, questions that you have about the world around you, Religious Studies addresses those - because religion is implicated in all those issues.
Suzanne Newcombe, Lecturer in Religious Studies:
Our society is really complicated. What you learn in Religious Studies is how to use the best tools to answer whatever question you have. We use the tools of history, we use the tools of sociology, we use the tools of folklore, we use the tools of anthropology.
Religious Studies is a discipline which offers you a variety of tools to bring to whatever questions you have at hand – understanding how to relate to others better, how to think critically, write articulately, and to position yourself so that you can make a meaningful contribution to debates which are often on controversial subjects.
Stefanie Sinclair, Senior Lecturer in Religious Studies:
It’s all about finding out about more about how people make sense of the world. How they make sense of their own lives and those of others and of the world around them. In the Open University, it is particularly great because we are working with students from so many different backgrounds. I think in Religious Studies that works really well and if people have life experience they can bring quite a lot to their studies as well – quite often much more than they think they do.
David Robertson, Lecturer in Religious Studies:
Studying religion is a great way into seeing through the things we take for granted about our society and thinking about why we do certain things. Why certain rituals or beliefs or practices happen – in our own society as well as in other people’s.

Paul-François Tremlett, Senior Lecturer in Religious Studies and Head of Department:
Allow your mind to be open to the world around you. Study with us.