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Exploring the influence of Christian religious belief systems on community interaction within critical citizenship education in South Africa

ABSTRACT Christian religious belief systems may influence higher education teaching and learning. We investigated how this manifests in relation to critical citizenship education at the Department of Visual Arts of Stellenbosch University. During the facilitation of a Visual Communication Design course, which included community interaction (CI), students often referred to their Christian religious beliefs even though the design of this critical citizenship course was not based on any specific religion. Within CI, ‘helping behaviour’ and ‘charity’ were common. We draw on theoretical perspectives of critical citizenship education, the impact of belief systems, and the psychology behind ‘helping behaviour’ to examine the comments made by students about their Christian religious beliefs and community interaction. We consider the history of Christianity and the role it played in apartheid and ask how ‘helping behaviour’ and Christian privilege should be addressed in critical citizenship education in South African higher education institutions.