Search results

"This comparative approach to the various uses of the ethnographic method in research about Islam in anthropology and other social sciences is particularly relevant in the current climate. Political discourses and stereotypical media portrayals of Islam as a monolithic civilisation have prevented the emergence of cultural pluralism and individual freedom. Such discourses are countered by the contributors who show the diversity and plurality of Muslim societies and promote a reflection on how the ethnographic method allows the description, representation and analysis of the social and cultural complexity of Muslim societies in the discourse of anthropology"--Provided by publisher

Established in London in 2002, the Aga Khan University, Institute for the Study of Muslim Civilisations aims to strengthen research and teaching about the heritages of Muslim societies as they have evolved over time, and to examine the challenges these societies face in today's globalised world. It also seeks to create opportunities for interaction among academics, traditionally trained scholars, innovative thinkers and leaders, in an effort to promote dialogue and build bridges

From the Prophet's family tree to the present, ideas about kinship and descent have shaped communal and national identities in Muslim societies. So an understanding of genealogy is therefore vital to our understanding of Muslim societies, particularly with regard to the generation, preservation and manipulation of genealogical knowledge. These 9 case studies link genealogical knowledge to particular circumstances in which it was created, circulated and promoted. They stress the malleability of kinship and memory, and the interests this malleability serves

1. Introduction: Cosmopolitanisms in Muslim Contexts --- 2. Freeborn Villagers: Islam and the Local Uses of Cosmopolitan Connections in the Tanzanian Countryside --- 3. Interrogating Cosmopolitanism in an Indian Ocean Setting: Thinking Through Mombasa on the Swahili Coast --- 4. Translators of Empire: Colonial Cosmopolitanism, Ottoman Bureaucrats and the Struggle over the Governance of Yemen, 1898-1914 --- 5. Islampolis, Cosmopolis: Ottoman Urbanity Between Myth, Memory and Postmodernity --- 6. Cosmopolitan Cursing in Late Nineteenth-Century Alexandria --- 7. Kebabs and Port Wine: The Culinary Cosmopolitanism of Anglo-Persian Dining, 1800-1835 --- 8. Abdur Rahman Chughtai: Cosmopolitan Mughal Aesthetic in the Age of Print --- 9. Cosmopolitanism and Authenticity: The Doctrine of Tashabbuh Bi'l-Kuffar ("Imitating the Infidel") in Modern South Asian Fatwas

Current popular and academic discussions make certain assumptions regarding Islam and its lack of compatibility with pluralism. Some notable liberal thinkers have even argued that pluralism itself is inherently antithetical to Islam. This volume addresses these assumptions by bringing clarity to some of its key suppositions and conjectures

"The publication of this essay in Egypt in 1925 took the contemporaries of Ali Abdel Razek by storm. Challenging fundamental ideas about political power, it was the focus of much attention and the seed of a heated debate. It was especially potent as at this time the Muslim world was in great turmoil over the questiion of the abolition of the caliphate by Mustapha Kemal Ataturk in Turkey. The essay gave rise to a series of "refutations" and unleashed the Arab world's first great public debate with polemics supporting or refuting Ali Abdel Razek's ideas published all over the press. Eventually he was tried by the al-Azhar court, denounced, stripped of his title of 'alim and barred from future employment in education and the judiciary."--jacket