RELIGION & COMMUNICATION
Year:2014 | Volume:20 | Issue:2 (44) |Papers Count:6

Gender gap is one of the most important phenomena in every society which causes differences in the people's values, views, and behaviors. Among the important differences are the degree of religiousness and the kind of media consumption in both men and women. However, the relationship between religious identity and the kind of media consumption has not been sufficiently surveyed. The present article, through survey and cultural methods, has investigated into the religious identity of male and female high- school students of Marvdasht and its relationship with the kind of media consumption (TV and satellite). The results indicate that girls have shown to be more religious- bound than boys regarding the three dimensions of religious identity, i.e. emotion, belief and practice. Also, girls mostly watched TV while boys mostly watched satellite programs. In other words, there was a model of gender-based media consumption. The correlation of TV and satellite variables with the dimensions of religious identity was positive and negative respectively. The independent variables of the research, media consumption and gender, could determine more than 50% of the variance of the respondents' religious identity and its three dimensions. Variance analysis of both sides showed that although TV and satellite have some effects on the religious identity, the effect of the gender variable on the three dimensions, especially the emotional one, is significantly more. TV mostly modifies the effects of gender on belief and emotion, while satellite programs mostly modify the effects of gender on practice.

Today, the act of propagating lies in the media as the major institution of displaying the Islamic Government positions has surpassed its previous simple character. Therefore, by a mere reference to jurisprudential texts that deal with issues concerning personal interactions by discussing the above problem and even heretical concepts, we cannot reach a definition of the pertinent religious rules and a comprehensive jurisprudential analysis especially in the field of the media. This article intends to respond to challenging areas in regard to propagating lies as one manifestation of forbidden acts in the field of media and tries to prove some hypotheses: 1- Propagating lies through news media and in public domain is permitted exclusively in compelling circumstances and is not permitted for solving groups' and parties' relations, or for Muslims' interests, or deceiving the enemies provided it confuses the public mind.2- All media production whether news or non-news could be bearers of lies.3- Spreading dubious news is permitted in some cases.4- Some exaggerations in media should not be confused with propagating lies.

Social trust is a necessary part of social life and it is integrated into social capital. This article studies the relation between the degree of one's religious identity and social trust among students. This survey has used interviews and classified sampling consisting of 400 students in Mazandaran University in 92-93 academic year. The results show that there is a direct and meaningful relation between the ideological aspect of religious identity and total social trust and institutional trust. There is a direct relation between the experimental dimension of religious identity and the whole social trust. The consequential aspect of religious identity is in a direct and meaningful relation with institutional trust. The same relation exists between the ritual aspect of religious identity and social identity in all its aspects. In general, religious identity is in a direct and meaningful relation with social trust in its totality. Besides, 24% of interpersonal trust changes, 20% of extended trust changes and 18% of institutional trust changes are explained through religious identity.

The fundamental significance of free will and determinism in religion, and its role in people's daily lives, and the consideration of the media potential in capturing people's interpretation of the existential system of causes has led the researcher to answer this question: What kind of conceptual representation of free will can the audience receive from the serial Key to Mysteries. The first thing to offer is therefore a brief presentation of free will in Islamic thought and its signifiers which provide the possibility of the recognition of the antagonism between absolute determinism and absolute free will in the practical domain of our study. With adopting a representational theory approach, a combination of discourse analysis approaches has been used for analyzing the film dialogs relating to human free will and also Grimas Functional Model for analyzing functionalism structure in the film. A schematic diagram of initial and final stages of the serial shows that both its narrative and discourse are tended to a deterministic outlook. By bringing the divine power into focus in the overall structure and characters' dialogs, the film shows a tendency to determinism so that this signifier attracts the others to itself and renders them meaningful. Signifiers such as dream, retributive nature of hardships, rewarding nature of joys, fatalism, and comprehensiveness of religious textual ordinances, cosmic order and social traditions are all endorsed, and on the contrary, those concerning curiosity, intellectual and philosophical methodology, and also the effectiveness of social structures are renounced, thus negating philosophical discourse and free will premises. The relation between each of these signifiers with free will discourse is discussed in data analysis section.

Purpose: This study aims to determine Howza Ilmya Qom's students' familiarity with and use of Web 2 technology.Methodology/ Approach: This has been an applied research that used a survey method and descriptive approach. The statistical population included 180 individuals from the Howza.The tool was researcher designed questionnaire based on the research basic questions and a review of related literature.Findings: The findings show that the students' knowledge of Web 2 technology was less than average (43%) and their use of that technology was also less than average (38%).From the students' perspective the necessity of using that technology for teaching and learning was low (29.1%). Moreover, their view on the use of Web 2 technologies for upgrading access to information and promoting the educational and research content was high.Practical implications: The use of Web2 technology in Howza Ilmya depends on the students' knowledge of its tools and facilities. Therefore, holding workshops and offering training courses and lectures, giving seminars, including Web 2 technology program in the curriculum, inviting experts in the field and encouraging students to learn and use the technology, are among the issues that need to be addressed.

Distinguishing civilization from other forms of human social entities on the basis of Islamic philosophy and mysticism is what is done in an expert manner in this article. It is concluded that civilization as a social unit is indeed, in the existential sense of the word, not arbitrary but an authentic one. This is because there exists an inseparable link between civilization's cultural background and its various social interactions in the sense that this latter signifies the emergence of the society's deep cultural possibilities, which dismisses any notion of arbitrariness as compared to other forms of human entities.To prove this, we have first offered an argument to explain the existential necessity of a particular kind of society, using Mulla Sadra's principle of subject-object identity and existential universal. Furthermore, to complete the argumentation by resolving a surrounding doubt, we have explained the status of social arbitrariness with a mystical and new basis in which human nature is used in an Islamic mystical manner.In the end, based on the explanation given about the nature of civilization, we have offered an ontological argument to prove the ultimate supremacy of the Islamic civilization centered upon velayat.