Iran plans sweeping changes to university courses to make them more compatible with Islam, the official IRNA news agency reported on Friday. Deputy Minister of Science for Research and Technology Mohammad Mehdi Nejad Nouri, quoted by IRNA, said at least 36 courses would be changed by September after revision by a group of university and seminary experts.
The report did not name the subjects that would be changed, but officials said last year Iran would review 12 disciplines in the social sciences, including law, women’s studies, human rights, management, sociology, philosophy, psychology and political sciences, as their contents were too closely based on Western culture. Iran’s Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei called for modification of these studies in August, saying that many humanities subjects are based on principles founded in materialism rather than divine Islamic teachings.
