Summer 2018  

FORTY YEARS OF REVOLUTION:  UNDERSTANDING STATE AND SOCIETY IN THE ISLAMIC REPUBLIC OF IRAN, THEN AND NOW

June 11-15, 2018

SEMINAR SYNOPSIS

The religion of Islam has been at the center of political discourse in recent years. Issues of terrorism, the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the debate over the proposed Park 51 Islamic Center, “the Arab Spring” and the rise of ISIS/ISIL in Iraq and Syria have focused attention on Muslims and their religion. The ways in which Islam has been discussed within the media and certain corners of the academy since the tragic and morally inexcusable events of September 11, 2001, have often been problematic. Over the last decade there has been a veritable explosion of books and articles on Islam, many of which decry what they see as a lack of intellectual debate and moral discourse in the Islamic world. Pundits on cable news networks continually assert that "it is a shame that there are no anti-terrorist, pro-democratic voices within Islam." Muslims are regularly accused of "whitewashing" the negative aspects of their faith by journalists and commentators who have little or no scholarly knowledge of Islamicate culture, history or languages and often no personal experience of the Muslim world. These same opinions are also found in academic circles.

These kinds of opinions are at best rooted in ignorance and, at their worst, in prejudice and hostility. While it is true that there are "fundamentalist" voices within Islam which resist complex and multi-vocal interpretations of the basic sources of the tradition, they do not now, nor have they ever, represented the mainstream of Muslim thought. Islam has always maintained a variety of philosophical, theological and mystical expressions. It is Islam's diversity and ability to adapt to changing historical and cultural circumstances that is one of its primary characteristics and greatest strengths. This remains true today as Muslim intellectuals trained both in the West and in the Islamic world continue to address the complexities of the contemporary world. Among the numerous problems and issues that have drawn the attention of today's Muslim intellectuals has been the rise to prominence of "fundamentalists" and "Islamists" willing to use violence to achieve their goals. "Political Islamism" it must be noted is only one strain of thought in the Muslim world and it is rarely violent. More importantly, it is actively challenged by numerous alternative perspectives. Not only are "traditional" Muslims critiquing and challenging movements like the Taliban, Al-Qaeda, and ISIS/ISIL as theologically incorrect readings of Qur'an and hadith, but there are also vibrant "progressive" movements which draw upon feminist theory and liberation theology to develop radical new expressions of Muslim piety and political action.

ABOUT THE CONVENERS

Arang Keshavarzian is associate professor and director of graduate studies in NYU’s department of Middle Eastern and Islamic Studies. His general fields of research and teaching are comparative politics of the Middle East with a focus on issues related to political economy, authoritarianism, and social movements. Much of his writing focuses on modern Iran, although Keshavarzian has studied, conducted research, and taught in several other countries in the Middle East and North Africa. Keshavarzian’s research has revolved around questions of change and continuity as reflected and produced by socioeconomic hierarchies, political imperatives, and collective solidarities. His book, Bazaar and State in Iran (2007), traces the structure of the Tehran Bazaar under the Pahlavi monarchy and Islamic Republic, and sheds light on the organization and governance of markets as well as state-society dynamics. His current research examines the Persian Gulf in order to analyze the processes of late imperialism and globalization from the perspective of local circuits of trade and transnational alliances. Keshavarzian’s essays have appeared in Politics and Society, International Journal of Middle East Studies, Economy and Society, and Geopolitics, in addition to a number of edited volumes. He is on the editorial committee of Middle East Report and a member of the Board of Directors of the Middle East Studies Association.

Summer 2015  

CONTEMPORARY VOICES OF ISLAM   

JUNE 8 - 12, 2015

SEMINAR SYNOPSIS

The religion of Islam has been at the center of political discourse in recent years. Issues of terrorism, the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the debate over the proposed Park 51 Islamic Center, “the Arab Spring” and the rise of ISIS/ISIL in Iraq and Syria have focused attention on Muslims and their religion. The ways in which Islam has been discussed within the media and certain corners of the academy since the tragic and morally inexcusable events of September 11, 2001, have often been problematic. Over the last decade there has been a veritable explosion of books and articles on Islam, many of which decry what they see as a lack of intellectual debate and moral discourse in the Islamic world. Pundits on cable news networks continually assert that "it is a shame that there are no anti-terrorist, pro-democratic voices within Islam." Muslims are regularly accused of "whitewashing" the negative aspects of their faith by journalists and commentators who have little or no scholarly knowledge of Islamicate culture, history or languages and often no personal experience of the Muslim world. These same opinions are also found in academic circles.

These kinds of opinions are at best rooted in ignorance and, at their worst, in prejudice and hostility. While it is true that there are "fundamentalist" voices within Islam which resist complex and multi-vocal interpretations of the basic sources of the tradition, they do not now, nor have they ever, represented the mainstream of Muslim thought. Islam has always maintained a variety of philosophical, theological and mystical expressions. It is Islam's diversity and ability to adapt to changing historical and cultural circumstances that is one of its primary characteristics and greatest strengths. This remains true today as Muslim intellectuals trained both in the West and in the Islamic world continue to address the complexities of the contemporary world. Among the numerous problems and issues that have drawn the attention of today's Muslim intellectuals has been the rise to prominence of "fundamentalists" and "Islamists" willing to use violence to achieve their goals. "Political Islamism" it must be noted is only one strain of thought in the Muslim world and it is rarely violent. More importantly, it is actively challenged by numerous alternative perspectives. Not only are "traditional" Muslims critiquing and challenging movements like the Taliban, Al-Qaeda, and ISIS/ISIL as theologically incorrect readings of Qur'an and hadith, but there are also vibrant "progressive" movements which draw upon feminist theory and liberation theology to develop radical new expressions of Muslim piety and political action.

ABOUT THE CONVENERS

Vernon Schubel is Professor of Religious Studies at Kenyon College where he teaches a variety of courses on Islam, including Classical Islam, Islam in Central Asia and Sufism; and religions of South Asia.

His primary research interest is Islam in Central and South Asia. He spent seven months as a Fulbright scholar in Multan, Pakistan, in 1989, where he conducted research on centers of Sufi pilgrimage and in 1996 he spent seven months of research in Uzbekistan. His book, Religious Performance in Contemporary Islam, was published by the University of South Carolina Press in 1993.

Nurten Kılıç-Schubel is Associate Professor of History at Kenyon Colleges. Her areas of research focuses on Islamicate history, especially political culture, state-building and gender in medieval and early modern Central Eurasia. She has spent significant amounts of time in Turkey and Central Asia, most recently as a Fulbright scholar in Kyrgyzstan in 2010. 

Kilic-Schubel is currently working on two research projects. The first is a book-length project entitled "A State with Many Heads: Culture and State-Building in Early Modern Central Asia." The second explores women's writing and literary culture in early modern Central Asia. She teaches a wide range of courses related to Central Eurasia and the Middle East in both the pre-modern and modern periods including Ottoman Empire, Islamicate World and women and gender in the Middle East.