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THE AGENCY OF CHILDREN IN LIBERATION THEOLOGIES IN INDIA AND CHILDREN-RELATED THEOLOGIES: A CONTRAPUNTAL LIBERATIVE ANALYSIS

Gideon, Rohan Prabhakar

[Thesis]. Manchester, UK: The University of Manchester; 2015.

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Abstract

This thesis answers the question: How does a contrapuntal reading of the agency of the colonised in Indian liberation theologies and the agency of children in children-related theologies help to understand the agency of children for a relevant children-related theology in India? Liberation theologies in India have been adult-centric discourses and have not explored the possibility of understanding the agency of children in their methodologies. These methodologies are methodological exclusivity, methodological inclusivity and praxis. By contrast, many children-related theologies are currently attempting methods and explanations that seem to advance the agency of children. Of them, two significant streams, Child theologies and Holistic Child Development, have been impacting theological thinking in India to claim the subjecthood of children with the aim of advancing the centrality of children and their agency. Children-related theologies have claimed to develop the concept of the agency of children by drawing methodological insights from liberation theologies. However, these children-related theologies have not adequately explored the hermeneutical principles of liberation theologies, thus falling short of contributing to an explanation of the agency of children. I deploy contrapuntal methodology, a critical tool of postcolonial criticism, to engage liberation theologies in India and children-related theologies to achieve a renewed understanding of the agency of children. Contrapuntality as a postcolonial methodology decentres the role of the dominant and still sees a constructive role of the dominant in a postcolonial engagement in the light of the experiences of the colonized. The colonizer and the colonized engage in a conversation with different perspectives on the need to negotiate an agreeable resolution. This resolution could be short-term and context-specific. In my quest to understand what constitutes the agency of children in an Indian context by contrapuntally analysing concept of the agency of the colonised in liberation theologies in India and children-related theologies, I have analysed the themes of the agency of the children, the advocacy of adults, and the immanent mystery. The agency of children I propose is a positive notion of agency that theoretically includes children’s view and expressions. They have to be strongly supported by authentic advocacy of the adults and by recognising the immanent mystery in children. I draw these themes by analysing the methodologies of methodological exclusivity, methodological inclusivity and praxis as in liberation theologies in India and the themes of Child-in-the-midst and Child theologies as liberation theologies in contemporary children-related theologies.