Dr. Kevin Flatt, professor of history and associate dean of humanities, has spent the last 14 years researching and teaching history at Redeemer. His excitement for history and his passion for teaching from a Christian perspective still shows.
鈥淚 can鈥檛 believe I get to teach students this stuff!鈥
Part of this passion flows from the fact that Flatt gets to teach and lead a program that is uniquely balanced and distinctly Christian.
鈥淥ur Christian worldview is the standpoint that鈥檚 woven through the whole program, no matter what the topics of the courses are,鈥 says Flatt. 鈥淭hat鈥檚 really the foundation. We鈥檙e more intentional about including courses in the history of the church, the history of Christianity.鈥
We鈥檙e more intentional about including courses in the history of the church, the history of Christianity.
But the intentionality of the program doesn鈥檛 stop there. Flatt recently completed a comparison of the program with history programs in public universities in Ontario, as well as Reformed Christian universities in the US. He found that compared with public universities, Redeemer鈥檚 history program was designed to more intentionally provide students with a broad foundation on which to build. He also found that most other university history programs tend to have a heavier emphasis on Western history and a heavier modern bias. Redeemer鈥檚 program is more chronologically and geographically balanced, in particular offering a higher percentage of courses that cover non-Western history.
Professor of History, Associate
Dean of Humanities
鈥淲e live in an increasingly global world. Our world is very interconnected. Canada itself is home to new Canadians who have recently come from everywhere,鈥 Flatt says. 鈥淭hey鈥檙e our neighbours, and they鈥檙e increasingly also our students. So we want to address those kinds of history.鈥
Flatt says learning about the history of other cultures also helps us to understand ourselves. 鈥淚t helps you notice the things that are actually unusual about your culture that you would not otherwise notice.鈥
Some of the program鈥檚 focus on non-Western history comes from Flatt鈥檚 own interest and specialization in Islamic history, which he gained while completing his PhD at McMaster University in the early 2000s. It was also here that he gained a greater appreciation for how his Christian faith leads him to teach with more purpose and intentionality.
鈥淲e want to be able to say why we are doing this and I think ultimately those kinds of deep questions in all of the disciplines at Redeemer drive us back towards our Christian worldview, drive us back to Scripture. So we actually aren鈥檛 afraid of those questions. We ask those questions intentionally and try to help students to think that way.鈥