Religious Holidays in U.S. Schools

Dominant/Ideological Inclusion

According to Rita Verma, the dominant interpretation of what constitutes religious knowledge to be acquired in schools is ethnocentric. The dominant approach to inclusion often claims that mainstream Christianity should be privileged in schools, including the need to fully celebrate and sanction Christian-based holidays. Most public schools align winter break and spring break with the Christian calendar's holidays of Christmas and Easter. Warren Blumenfeld maintains that those who hold dominant perspectives often oppose learning about diverse religions on the grounds that the inclusion could potentially dilute the validity of a mainstream Christian interpretation of the world. Diana Eck argues that the United [Page 1824]States is becoming religiously diverse, yet the religiously heterogeneous nature of the society is often absent in public discussions. Fearing controversies, schools are often silent on how to incorporate diverse religious holidays in relation to religions such as Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism, and American Indian religions. Thus, as a number of writers point out, schools often follow the status quo approach to learning about religions in an attempt to avoid unwarranted attention; in doing so, they essentially marginalize religious holidays that are considered to be nonmainstream.

Given that school holidays and informal events associated with school holidays (e.g., the performances of school plays or musicals during winter season) often have overt or subliminal Christian references, some students who negotiate religions other than mainstream Christianity struggle to understand how schools could privilege one religion over others. Jasmin Zine points out that students who do not observe Christian holidays often have to prove that they indeed have legitimate reasons to be excused from attending school in order to take part in religious and cultural events. Awatif Elnour and Khadar Bashir-Ali describe how Muslim girls often find it difficult to negotiate the norms of schools that are often reluctant to recognize their religious identities.

Within an ideological framework that is inclusive, recognition of religious holidays is often framed within a two-part construction of religious belief systems. Binary logic categories are used to determine who are believers and nonbelievers, and which religious holidays are legitimate or authentic. Khyati Joshi argues that the dominant perspective renders the spiritual beliefs of the Other socially, theologically, and morally illegitimate and inferior. Joshi contends that because mainstream Christianity is often viewed as the authentic religion, those who negotiate belief systems other than mainstream Christianity are often viewed as inferior and are marginalized. The dominant perspective also equates secularism with naïveté or false consciousness and maintains that it has little productive value in schools and in society.

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