core module on contemporary islamic thinking

8/13/2019 Core Module on Contemporary Islamic Thinking

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CORE MODULE OUTLINE

AN INTRODUCTION TO CONTEMPORARY ISLAMIC THINKING

INTRODUCTION

This outline contains suggestions for an integral core module providing a foundation for amore thematic approach to further teaching and learning on contemporary Islamic thinking,

or for a set of introductory lectures and seminars as part of an expanded module on

contemporary Islamic thinking.

The materials are designed for students with some foundation in the study of Islam on

undergraduate and postgraduate level. The appropriate level of academic rigour can be

achieved by the inclusion and exclusion of the proposed materials.

AIMS AND OBJECTIVES

This core module is set up as an intellectual history of the contemporary Muslim world. It

provides a survey of the development of intellectual life throughout the present-day Muslim

world in order to come to an understanding of Muslim thinking from the final decades of the

20thcentury onwards. It takes care to highlight developments in different parts of the Muslim

world, focusing not only on the Arabic-speaking parts, but also taking specific notice of

developments in Turkey, Iran, and South and Southeast Asia. Upon completion students willhave a comprehensive overview of some core trends in contemporary Islamic thinking. It

provides a foundation for further explorations of selected themes. The core module can also

be expanded into an integral course on contemporary thinking drawing on the capita selecta

provided as part of this resources pack.

EDUCATIONAL AIMS OF THE CORE MODULE

To introduce students to the state of affairs in contemporary Muslim thinking on religion in

its various aspects, as well as the broader cultural and social-political history of the present-day Muslim world. As a survey of present-day Muslim intellectual history, it focuses on the

ways in which Muslims with varying outlooks, intellectual backgrounds, and ideological

convictions have engaged with Islam as a religious tradition and its broader civilizational

heritage. The course invites students to examine this subject matter on the basis of both

primary texts and secondary academic literature. Attention is also paid to (self)-reflexivityand the insider/outsider perspective.


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LEARNING OUTCOMES

Generic skills:

To engage competently and critically with primary and secondary scholarly sources forthe study of Islam and the Muslim world.

To present ideas in both written and oral form in accordance with academic standardsexpected of students in British higher education.

Course specific skills:

To come to an informed understanding of contemporary Islamic thinking within thecontext of the intellectual history of the Muslim world.

To think critically about the overall relationship of Islamic thinking and the broaderintellectual history of the contemporary Muslim world.

To develop the critical skills for identifying a variety of possible readings of the Islamicheritage and appreciate the multiplicity in interpreting Islams intellectual legacy.

To critically examine the Islamic intellectual tradition with a view to expose students toskills of cross-cultural dialogue and engagement.

To provide students with an intellectual historical framework and context in preparationfor engaging with a thematic approach to the further study of contemporary Islamic

thinking

To examine the cultural and ideological diversity within contemporary Islamic thinkingon various subjects and topics.

TEACHING PLAN

This course consists of a series of hybrid teaching sessions, combining lecturing and

classroom discussion of assigned readings. In order to ensure that this interactive approach is

effective, efficient and rewarding for all concerned, students are expected to attend these

sessions, take care to prepare the readings, and take active part in discussing the selected

texts.

Lecturers can make a selection from the orientational readings and material for classroom

discussion based on their own judgment. It is recommended that students used those texts not

selected for classroom discussion as background readings which will help them contextualize

the texts which will be subject of discussion. In addition, they will help them in selecting

subjects for both formative and summative essays. At the teachersdiscretion, texts can also

be used for classroom presentations by the students.


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1) Introduction to the contemporary intellectual history of the Muslim worldThis introductory session is intended to reconnoiter the field, focusing on a key feature of

contemporary Islamic thinkingthe collapse of dichotomies and binaries such as Islam

versus the West and Modernity versus Tradition. It will also address the related issue of

classifying or categorizing different types of contemporary Muslim strands of thinking. It isproposed to work with a very general division of contemporary intellectuals into

(neo)traditionalists, Islamic Revivalists, and New Muslim Intellectuals.

Orientational Readings and Material for classroom discussion

Eickelman, Dale F. (2000) The Coming Transformation of the Muslim World Current History

99(633), pp. 16-20

Eickelman, Dale F. and Jon W. Anderson (1997) Print, Islam, and the Prospects for Civic

Pluralism: New Religious Writings and Their Audiences, pp. 43-62

Feener, R. Michael (2007) Cross-Cultural Contexts of Modern Muslim Intellectualism Welt

des Islams47(3-4), pp. 264-82

Saeed, Abdullah (2007) 'Trends in Contemporary Islam: a Preliminary Attempt at a

Classification'Muslim World97:3, pp. 395-404.

Shepard, William (2004) The Diversity of Islamic Thought: Towards a Typology. In: Taji-

Farouki, Suha and Basheer M. Nafi (eds.)Islamic Thought in the Twentieth Century. London

and New York: I.B. Tauris, pp. 61-103

Further readings

Abu-Rabi, Ibrahim M. (1996)Intellectual Origins of Islamic Resurgence in the Modern

Arab World.Albany: State university of New York Press

Abu-Rabi, Ibrahim M. (2004) Contemporary Arab Thought: Studies in Post-1967 Arab

Intellectual History. London and Sterling: Pluto Press

Boullata, Issa J. (1990) Trends and Issues in Contemporary Arab Thought. S.U.N.Y. Series

in Middle Eastern Studies. Albany: N.Y. State University Press

Daftari, Farhat (ed.) (2000)Intellectual Traditions in Islam. London: I.B. Tauris

Esposito, John L. and John O. Voll (2001)Makers of Contemporary Islam. New York:

Oxford University Press

Kassab, Elizabeth Suzanne (2010) Contemporary Arab Thought: Cultural Critique in

Contemporary Perspective. New York: Columbia University Press

Kurzman, Charles (1998)Liberal Islam: A Sourcebook. New York and Oxford: Oxford

University Press


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Said, Abdul Aziz, Mohammed Abu-Nimer and Meena Sharify-Funk (eds.) (2006)

Contemporary Islam: Dynamic not Static.London and New York: Routledge

Saeed, Abdullah (2006)Islamic Thought: An Introduction. London and New York:

Routledge

Taji-Farouki, Suha and Basheer M. Nafi (eds.) (2004)Islamic Thought in the TwentiethCentury. London and New York: I.B. Tauris

Vogt, Kari, Lena Larsen & Christian Moe (eds.) (2009)New Directions in Islamic Thought:

Exploring Reform and Muslim Tradition. London: I.B. Tauris

2) Contemporary Islamic Thinking and ModernityThe key challenge still facing contemporary Muslims is how to cope with the impact of

modernity in its Western guise. It has invited wide-ranging debates whether Islam is

compatible with Islam, or ratherfrom the Muslim point of view the reverse. It is possible todiscern three general dispositions towards modernity: Adopt; adopt and adapt; resist and

reject. This session will survey these various reactions and the strategies employed by

Muslim intellectuals in formulating these responses. It will also explore the possibility of an

Islamic version of modernity.


Abou el Fadl, Khaled (2003) The Ugly Modern and the Modern Ugly: Reclaiming Beauty in

Islam In: Safi, Omid (ed.)Progressive Muslims: On Justice, Gender, and Pluralism. Oxford:

Oneworld, pp. 33-77

Madjid, Nurcholish (2003) The Issue of Modernization Among Muslims in Indonesia: Froma Participatns Point of View In: The True Face of Islam: Essays on Islam and Modernity in

Indonesia. Jakarta: The Voice Center, pp. 19-34

Soroush, Abdolkarim (2009) The Changeable and the UnchangeableIn: Vogt, Kari, Lena

Larsen & Christian Moe (eds.)New Directions in Islamic Thought: Exploring Reform and

Muslim Tradition. London: I.B. Tauris, pp. 9-16

Further Readings

Azmeh, Aziz al- (2009)Islam and Modernities. 3rdEdition. London and New York: Verso

Bennett, Clinton (2005)Muslims and Modernity: An Introduction to the Issues and Debates.

London: Continuum

Berry, Donald (2003)Islam and Modernity through the Writings of Islamic Modernist Fazlur

Rahman. Lewiston etc.: Edwin Mellen Press

Binder, Leonard (1988)Islamic Liberalism: A Critique of Development Ideologies. Chicago

and London: Chicago University Press


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Boland, B.J. (1971) The Struggle of Islam in Modern Indonesia.The Hague: Martinus

Nijhoff,

Bruinessen, Martin van and Julia Day Howell (eds.) (2007). Sufism and the Modern in

Islam. London: I.B. Tauris

Cooper, John, Ronald Nettler and Mohamed Mahmoud (eds.) (2000)Islam and Modernity:Muslim Intellectuals Respond. London: I.B. Tauris

Fazlur Rahman (1982)Islam and Modernity: Transformation of an Intellectual Tradition.

Chicago: Chicago University Press

Jahanbegloo, Ramin (ed.) (2004)Iran: Between Tradition and Modernity. Lanham etc.:

Lexington Books

Kamrava, Mehran (ed.) The New Voices of Islam: Rethinking Politics and Modernity

Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press

Lee, Robert D. (1997) Overcoming Tradition and Modernity: The Search for Islamic

Authenticity. Boulder: Westview Press

Martn-Muoz, Gema (ed.) (1999)Islam, Modernism and the West.London and New York:

I.B. Tauris

Mirsepassi, Ali (2003)Intellectual Discourse and the Politics of Modernization: Negotiating

Modernity in Iran.Cambridge and New York@ Cambridge University Press

Ramadan, Tariq (2004)Western Muslims and the Future of Islam. Oxford: Oxford University

Press

Saleh, Fauzan (2001)Modern Trends in Islamic Theological Discourse in 20thCentury

Indonesia: A Critical Survey, Leiden/Boston/Kln: Brill.

Salvatore, Armando (1997)Islam and the Political Discourse of Modernity. Reading: Ithaca

Press

Tapper, Richard (ed.) (1991)Islam in modern Turkey: Religion, Politics, and Literature in a

Secular State. London and New York: I.B. Tauris

Tibi, Bassam (2009)Islams Predicament with Modernity: Religious Reform and Cultural

Change

3) Islamic Revivalism/IslamismThe Muslim rejectionist response to modernity is represented by a strand of thought which is

presented under many names. It is suggested to use the characterization Islamic Revivalism

as a gloss category accommodating other designations such as Salafism and Islamic

Fundamentalism. The generic political transposition of Islamic revivalist thought is known

as Islamism, manifesting itself in a variety of guises, including Wahhabism and


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Jihadism. The lecture will be geared towards problematizing all these terms and introduce

the students to the wide-ranging debates involving Muslims and non-Muslims on the subject.


Bin Laden, Usama (2009) Declaration of War against the Americans Occupying the Land of

the Two Holy Places In: Euben and Zaman (eds.), pp. 425-259

Haykel, Bernard (2009) On theNature of Salafi Thought and Action & Appendix: Al-

Qaedas Creed and Path. In: Meijer, Roel (ed.) Global Salafism: Islams New Global

Movement. London: C. Hurst & Company, pp. 33-57

Nafi, Basheer (2004) The Rise of Islamic Reformist Thought and its Challenge to

Traditional Thought. In: Taji-Farouki, Suha and Basheer M. Nafi (eds.)Islamic Thought in

the Twentieth Century. London and New York: I.B. Tauris, pp. 28-60

Ruthven, Malise (2002) The Aesthetics of Martyrdom In:A Fury for God: The Islamist

Attack on America. London and New York: Granta Books., pp. 72-98

Further Readings

Euben, Roxanne L. And Muhammad Qasim Zaman (Eds.) (2009)Princeton Readings in

Islamist Thought: Texts and Contexts from al-Banna to Bin Laden. Princeton and Oxford:

Princeton University Press

Hansen, Stig Jarle, Atle Mesy and Tuncay Kaerdas (eds. (2009) The Borders of Islam:

Exploring Samuel Huntingtons Faultlines from Al-Andalus to the Virtual Ummah. London:

Hurst and Company

Kepel, Gilles (2002)Jihad: The Trail of Political Islam. Cambridge (Mass.): The Belknap

Press of Harvard University Press

Lacroix, Stphane (2011)Awakening Islam: The Politics of Religious Dissent in

Contemporary Saudi Arabia.Cambridge (MA): Harvard University Press.

Meijer, Roel (ed.) (2009) Global Salafism: Islams New Religious Movement. London: Hurst

and Company

Zakariyya, Fouad (2005)Myth and Reality in the Contemporary Islamic Movement.

Translated and with an introduction and Bibliography by Ibrahim M. Abu-Rabi. London and

Ann Arbor: Pluto Press

3) (Neo-)Traditionalists

Traditional Islam, and its representatives known as Ahl al-Sunna wal-Jamaah,face challenges

from within and without. The latter in the form of the onslaught of modernity, originating in

the West, and the former by Islamic reformists insisting on returning to the scriptural sources of

Islam in order to defy western-introduced modernity by reviving Islamic tenets and doctrineswithout being encumbered by traditional learning or taqlid.This session will examine how


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traditional Muslims have responded to this double challenge and how they present the relevance

of taqlidfor contemporary Muslims. A central issue is question of religious authority of the

guardians of traditional Islamic learning, the ulam. Aside from consolidating traditional

Islamic learning attention will also be paid to persistence of Islamic spiritual thought and

practice, or Sufism, in present-day Muslim world.


Abou el Fadl, Khaled (2009) Islamic Authority In: Vogt et al (eds.), pp. 129-44

Bula, Ali (2006) The Most Recent Reviver in the UlamaTradition: the Intellectual Alim.Fethullah Glen In: Hunt and Aslandoan (eds), pp. 85-101

Saritoprak, Zeki (2003) Fethullah Glen: a Sufi in His Own Way. In: M. Hakan Yavuz and

John L. Esposito (eds.), pp. 156-69

Van den Bos, Mathijs (2007) Elements of Neo-Traditional Sufism in Iran In: van

Bruinessen and Howell (eds.), pp.61-75

Zeghal, Malika (2007) The Recentering of Religious Knowledge and Discourse: The Case

of al-Azhar in Twentieth-Century Egypt In: Hefner and Zaman (eds.) pp. 107-30

Further Readings

Abou El Fadl, Khaled M. (2001) Speaking in Gods Name: Islamic Law, Authority and

Women. Oxford: Oneworld Press

Abou El Fadl, Khaled M. (2001)Rebellion and Violence in Islamic Law.Cambridge:Cambridge University Press

Graf, Bettina and Jakob Skovgaard-Petersen (eds.) The Global Mufti: The Phenomenon of

Yusuf al-Qaradawi. London: Hurst & Company

Khuri, Richard K. (1998)Freedom, Modernity, and Islam: Towards a Creative Synthesis.

London: The Athlone Press

Qaradawi, Yusuf al- (1987)Islamic Awakening: Between Rejection and Extremism.London:

Zain International

Sirriyeh, Elizabeth (1998) Sufis and Anti-Sufis: The Defence, Rethinking and Rejection of

Sufism in the Modern World.London: Curzon Press

Van Bruinessen, Martin and Julia Day Howell (eds.) (2007) Sufism and the Modern in

Islam. London: I.B. Tauris,

Yilmaz, Ihsan, Jean Michael Cros etc/ (ed.) (2007)Peaceful Coexistence: Fethullah Glens

Initiatives in the Contemporary World. Leeds: Leeds Metropolitan University

Yilmaz, Ihsan, Eileen Barker etc. (2007) (eds.)Muslim World in Transition: Contributions ofthe Glen Movement. Leeds: Leeds Metropolitan University


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Zaman, M. Qasim (2002) The Ulama in Contemporary Islam: Custodians of Change.

Princeton: PrincetonUniversity PresS

4) New Muslim Intellectuals: Heritage (Turath)ThinkersThe final decades of the 20thcentury saw the emergence of a new strand of thinking about the

place of Islam in the contemporary Muslim world. Exponents of this discourse advocate a

comprehensive and inclusivist view of the Islamic tradition by understanding it as a

civilizational heritage or turath. These turathiyunor heritage thinkers combine an intimate

familiarity with the Islamic tradition with an equally solid understanding of recent

developments and advances in the human sciences, using it for a critical engagement with


Abu-Rabi, Ibrahim (1996) Turth Resurgent? Arab Islamism and the Problem of Tradition

In:Intellectual Origins of Islamic Resurgence in the Modern Arab World. Albany: StateUniversity of New York, pp. 40-61

Khosrokhavar, Farhad (2004) The New Intellectuals in Iran, pp. 191-202

Kersten, Carool (2009) Indonesias New Muslim IntellectualsReligion Compass3(6), pp.

971-985

Meeker, Michael E. (1991) The New Muslim Intellectuals in the Republic of Turkey, pp.

189-219

Further Readings

Alam, Rudy Harisyah and Ihsan Ali-Fauzi (eds.) (2003) The True Face of Islam: Essays on

Islam and Modernity in Indonesia. Jakarta: Voice Center

Arkoun, Mohammed (2002) The Unthought in Contemporary Islamic Thought. London: Saqi

Book

Armajani, Jon (2004)Dynamic Islam: Liberal Muslim Perspectives in a Transnational Age.

Washington: University of America Press

Hanafi, Hasan (2000)Islam in the Modern World. 2 Vols. 2ndedition. Cairo: DarKebaa

Bookshop [1995]

Jabri, Mohammed Abed al- (1999)Arab-Islamic Philosophy: A Contemporary Critique.

Translated from the French by Aziz Abbassi. Austin: The Center for Middle Eastern studies,

The University of Texas at Austin

Jabri, Mohammed Abed al- (2009)Democracy, Human Rights and Law in Islamic Thoughts.

London and New York: I.B. Tauris


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Kamrava, Mehran (2009)Irans Intellectual Revolution. Cambridge: Cambridge University

Press

Kersten, Carool (2011) Cosmopolitans and Heretics: New Muslim Intellectuals and the Study

of Islam. London and New York: Hurst Publishers & Columbia University Press

Majid, Anouar (2007)A Call for Heresy: Why Dissent is Vital to Islam and America.Mineapolis and London: University of Minnesota Press

core module on contemporary islamic thinking

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