The Atlantic Monthly issue of 4 May 2010 contains an article on the comic The 99, a superheroes story inspired by Islamic history. Click on the image below to read:
The 99 appears to be part of a broader phenomenon also issuing from elsewhere in the Muslim World. In fact, Urdu culture lays claim to having launched the very genre of magical fantasy epics with the publication of Hoshruba, which allegedly can be traced back to two prose writers from late 19th-century Lucknow, one of northern India's main centres of traditional Islamic learning and literature.
This massive narrative is loosely based on The Adventures of Amir Hamza, a story cycle inspired by the biography of the Prophet Muhammad's uncle and very popular at the Court of Moghul Emperor Akbar (r. 1556-1605). An English translation, the first volume of which is published as Hoshruba: The Land and the Tilism, is the brainchild of Musharraf Ali Farooqi, and forms part of the Urdu Project, an initiative that seeks to introduce translations from Urdu to the North American market. Click here to read an excerpt from the translation.
For the better part of the twentieth century, Turkey was a country enforcing the strictest separation of religion and state in the Muslim world. From the 1920s until the mid-1980s, the state ideology of Kemalism -- named after the first president of the Turkish Republic, Mustafa Kemal (a.k.a. Ataturk) -- ensured that any expressions of religiosity were not only out of bounds in politics, but actually kept out of the public sphere altogether. In particular the military positioned itself as the guardian of the constitutional limitations on any form of political Islam. However, in two decades or so, Turkey has developed into one of the most interesting 'places to watch' in regards to new ways in which Islam is allowed to feature in the public sphere. Now religion even has found a new place in Turkish political life.
Turgut Ozal
Ironically, it was in the wake of the 1980 coup d'etat that the military itself allowed the creation of what Hakan Yavuz calls a 'new opportunity space' by acknowledging the link between national and religious identity in the form of a 'Turkish-Islamic Synthesis' (TIS). This major shift in political thinking was actively advocated by Turgut Özal (1927-1993), who served as prime minister from 1983 until 1989 when he took over the presidency from General Kenan Evren, leader of the 1980 putsch and the most senior military official to condone the TIS. Although Özal was often hailed as the most influential political figure after Ataturk, it was only three years after his sudden death in 1993 that the so-called Refah or Welfare Party, an overtly Islamic political party, was able to take real political control, even though this was short-lived. Quickly banned following a 'velvet coup' by the armed forces in 1997, it resurfaced first as the Virtue Party (1998) and then, in 2001, as the Felicity Party. But it was not until a younger generation of politicians redrew the map of Turkish politics by establishing the Justice and Development Party ( AKP, Adalet ve Kalkınma Partisi ) that an Islam-inspired party managed to make more enduring inroads into the country's political landscape.
Recep Tayyip Erdogan
Since 2002, Turkey has been governed by the AKP party, first under Prime Minister Abdullah Gül and then under Recep Tayyip Erdoğan (b. 1954), a former mayor of Istanbul and the real leader of the AKP (Gül first moved to the ministry of foreign affairs, before winning the presidential elections). In contrast to the Welfare, Virtue and Felicity Parties, the AKP does not promote an overtly Islamic agenda. Its ideological orientation has more parallels with Christian-Democratic parties in Western Europe than with its Islamist predecessors. Although Islam definitely provides AKP politicians with a moral compass, this is translated in decidedly pragmatic political programmes. Their prime focus is on economic policy, democratic reforms, active engagement in international diplomacy, mediation and conflict resolution. All these initiatives are geared towards securing EU-membership.
Aside from these drastic changes in political developments, perhaps an even more interesting development during the same time frame is the emergence of what can be called a Turkish 'civil Islam'. This is most prominently exemplified by the initatives deployed by the so-called Gülen Movement, led by Fethullah Gülen (b. 1941). This former mosque Imam gives direction to a somewhat amorphous and multifarious organisation involved in reshaping Turkish civil society through wide-ranging activities in the fields of education, media, charity and philantropy. His influence has been so pervasive that in a 2008 survey by Prospect Magazine, Gülen surfaced as the most influential global public intellectual. The movement does namely not limit its activities to only Turkey, but is also involved on the international scene, especially in Central Asia, Southeastern Europe, and Western countries with Turkish communities or substantial numbers of citizens of Turkish descent.
Fethullah Gulen with Pope John Paul II
One such international exponent is the UK-based Dialogue Society. Established in 1999, it recently celebrated its ten-year anniversary. During the first decade of its existence it has been highly successful in networking with the political establishment, supporting the foundation of a number of private schools, deploying initiatives towards community cohesion, and organising academic seminars, workshops, and round-table discussions in which politicians, civil servants, academics, social activists and journalists are brought togehter to discuss issues affecting pluralist societies such as those emerging in the UK, in particular in the London area.
The Dialogue Society also facilitates trips enabling participants in its various activities to gain first-hand experience of current developments in Turkey. During a recent visit to Istanbul, I was thus in a position to become acquainted with some of the projects initiated, supported or inspired by the Gülen Movement. Meetings and discussions were held with, for example, representatives of the charity organisation Kimse Yok Mu ('Is Anybody Out There?'), which had started out as a TV programme to raise funds for earthquake victims and quickly developed into a prominent disaster and poverty relief agency.
Media form a very important part in the network of Gülen Movement-associated organisations. These include the Samanyolu TV Station and Zaman Media group. Samanyolu operates a network of satellite stations in Kurdistan, Istanbul and the United States, where it broadcasts as Ebru TV.
The Zaman group publishes an English-language edition known as Today's Zaman. Numerous leading political commentators and academics, includingŞahin Alpay,Kerim Balci and Ihsan Yilmaz write columns for this periodical.
On the intellectual front, the Journalists and Writers Foundation connects a plethora of forums and platforms engaged in such activities as interfaith dialogue, gender issues, and the facilitation of relations between Turkey, Eastern Europe and Central Asia. One of its most prominent initiatives is the Abant Platform, envisaged as an alternative to the annual Davos World Economic Forum.
Perhaps the most visible aspect of the Gülen Movement is its worldwide network of private schools, ranging from nurseries and primary education to academically rigorous and highly successful high schools and colleges, and even universities, such as Fatih University on the outskirts of Istanbul. The entire system is privately funded, not only relying on fees, but also on large-scale donations from an increasingly affluent and assertive middle class, with roots in the socially conservative provincial cities and towns of Anatolia and the Black Sea area.
Alparslan Acikgenc
Reflective of this connection with a professional middle class is the fact that these primary and secondary schools are very much geared towards the three 'R's (reading, writing, arithmetic). On the tertiary level too, the curricula focus on the natural sciences, engineering, medicine and law. Fatih University, though, offers also courses in history and languages. Religion is markedly absent from all programmes. The explanation given for this is that it is assumed that religious and moral values are instilled in the home environment. Interestingly, though, very recently Fatih University was actually requested by the education ministry to start developing a programme in divinity. Responsibility for this new venture rests with the vice-rector, Alparslan Acikgenc. A philosopher trained at the University of Chicago under the direction of Fazlur Rahman, he taught at Middle Eastern Technical University (METU) in Ankara, where he supervised in ther late 1980s the PhD research of M. Amin Abdullah, rector of UIN Sunan Kalijaga in Yogyakarta. Before being appointed to Fatih University in 1999, he spent eight years teaching in Malaysia.
Ihsan Yilmaz
(Photo above) Dr Ihsan Yilmaz during a frank discussion on the careful navigations required for operating a private university associated with the Gülen Movement in Turkey. (Photo below): Final reflection and discussions with political commentator Kerim Balci.
Kerim Balci (R) and Carool Kersten (L)
Recommended readings on recent developments in Turkey and on the Gülen Movement:
NRC Handelsblad was the first to report on it, now it has also been picked up by the Qantara, the Germany-based website offering news on the Muslim world and Muslim communities in the West.
Abdelaziz Aouragh opened the world's first halal shop for sexual enhancement products. It is but one indication that many young Muslims are charting their own course in managing adherence to a faith whose sexual morals historically have been interpreted by arch conservatives.
Aouragh, a 29-year old Amsterdam-born practicing Muslim of Moroccan heritage with the instincts of a Dutch trader, hardly fits the profile of a purveyor of sex articles such as capsules that "increase male performance, desire and pleasure," pills to heighten women's desire, stimulators for him and her and cocoa butter, water and silicon-based lubricants.
Not knowing whether his religion would allow the trade in sex products, Aouragh visited an imam, who in turn consulted a Saudi sheik. It was allowed, he learned, as long as the products were halal and meant to improve sex within marriage. "There is even a fatwa on the subject."
Yet, in a faith community perceived as repressive of women and severely restrictive of intimate gender relations, Aouragh's online El Asira webshop – the world's first halal (religiously-endorsed) shop for sexual enhancement products – is a booming success. So popular in fact, that Aouragh had to take the shop offline four days after its launch and move it to a new Internet service provider because his original California-based host GreenGeeks was unable to accommodate the traffic volume it generated – 60,000 hits a day.
El Asira – Arabic for The Society – is but one indication that many young Muslims like their counterparts in other monotheistic religions are charting their own course in managing adherence to a faith whose sexual morals historically have been interpreted by arch conservatives.
While Aouragh errs on the side of caution relying on conservative interpretations by Saudi religious authorities, a host of contemporary Muslim artists, many of them women, have recently opted to paint naked models despite widespread belief by Muslims that the Koran bans nudity as well as life-like portraits of human beings. "We are promoting this dialogue," Aouragh says although he asserts that Muslim artists who portray nudity lack a correct understanding of Islam.
While earning money and building an empire, Aouragh hopes that his business will contribute to cross-cultural understanding. "Everybody is talking about Islam in a negative way. I am trying to get something positive out of the dark," he says. The El Asira website adds: "Muslims have to deal with stereotypical prejudices by some non-Muslims on the topic of sexuality within the Islam. We want to share with other Muslims in a positive way our contribution to a broader view of sexuality and eroticism within the Muslim community for Muslims themselves, as for others."
Initiatives like these are not limited to the West. In Morocco women host discrete 'tupperware parties' catering to the needs and desires of their friends. Read more on casawaves.
Tariq Ramadan, the Swiss-Egyptian Muslim publicist and academic who was banned from entering the United States for six years has made his first visit to the United States since 2004. In that year Ramadan had accepted a job to become a tenured professor at the University of Notre Dame, but nine days before he was set to arrive, the Bush administration revoked his visa,invoking a provision of the PATRIOT Act. Now the Obama administration has reversed this as Secretary of State Hillary Clinton lifted the travel ban earlier this year. This week, Ramadan arrived in New York for a visit and media appearances.
Initially the media did not give it very much coverage. According to The New Yorker's George Packer who hosted Ramadan during a discussion in Greenwich Village the only other print medium to pay attention to the event was the Jewish periodical Tablet. In his own blog, Packer showed himself a critical observer, as noted how Ramadan struggled to establish a rapport with the audience:
Ramadan seemed wrong-footed in those opening remarks. He didn’t have a sense of where he was, of his American audience. It was as if he were speaking to disaffected young second-generation immigrants in a working-class mosque in Lille or Leicester, which is how he spends much of his time. Multiple identities, the value of diversity—not exactly news in this city, in this country. Many of his sentences amounted to buzz words strung together, without reaching a point. It seemed a missed opportunity: his first address in America since becoming an international figure, and he hadn’t prepared, hadn’t thought it through.
Even more significant is his assessment that Ramadan is 'not a philosopher, or an original thinker', but that he has only been cast in that role 'by recent historical crises and his own ambition'. In Packer's view, Ramadan's positions on most issues are those of 'garden-variety European leftism', while he tries to act as a 'reconciler' when it comes to the place of Islam in the West. Although admitting that here Ramadan is at his best, Packer maintains that: 'I don’t think this calling leaves him with very much to say to audiences here. An American Tariq Ramadan would likelier be talking to groups of young blacks or Hispanics.'
Contrary to many critics who have accused Ramadan of being double-tongued or two-faced, Packer thinks he 'has no hidden agenda, he’s an open book, and it’s essentially moderate'. However, he found Ramadan much less forthcoming about the tensions between an open society and Islamic revivalism, conjecturing that in this respect Ramadan is hampered by his pedigree, accusing his maternal grandfather, Muslim Brotherhood founder Hasan al-Banna, of holding totalitarian and anti-Semitic views. On these grounds he concluded that Ramadan was 'building a worthy bridge on a rotten foundation'.
For an extensive TV interview on the Democracy Now! programme, click here
A study of the extent and allegely also the content of Islamic blogs in the UK, commissioned by the country's Home Office to its Research, Information and Communications Unit (RICU) has been criticized by observers for its lack of profundity and rigour.
In a commentary on a headline article appearing in The Guardian of 23 March 2010, Brian Whittaker questions the value of the exercise and less than exciting conclusions of the report's author, Dr. David Stevens of the University of Nottingham.
Even more incisive is the critique by blogger Jillian York, who is associated with the Berkman Center for Internet and Society at Harvard University. York's criticism zeroes in on Stevens' reliance on link analysis and keywords, with no apparent attention for content. Based on her experience at the Berkman Center, York argues that this kind of research cannot be carried out without a 'human touch'. There a study of the Arabic-language blogosphere covering more than 35,000 blogs, led to a mapping of 6,000 sites, '4,000 of which were hand-coded by Arabic-speaking researchers'. Compared to that approach, the Home Office project seems indeed rather shallow. York also rightly questions the credentials of author David Stevens. Apparently a specialist in Anglo-American normative political philosophy, one wonders indeed why he was selected to conduct this research, and not a more recognized figure from the field of Islamic Studies who actually specialises in 'cyber Islam', such as Gary Bunt from the University of Wales at Lampeter, who has a track record of publications on the subject, and whose website Virtually Islamic already contains a wealth of information.
For a recent study of the role of media in today's Muslim societies and communities, which also adds a useful comparative perspective, see the special issue of the academic journal Contemporary Islam of April 2010.
NEW! A GENERAL INTRODUCTION TO ISLAMIC THINKING TODAY
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Introducing critical Muslim thinkers
Critical Muslims introduces innovative and creative thinkers from the contemporary Islamic world. In many Muslim countries the political climate is not conducive to free and open debate. Consequently, these intellectuals have often difficulties in finding a forum to expound their ideas, or face severe criticism and even outright oppression and persecution. Not surprisingly, quite a few have sought refuge abroad.
Although there is at present a considerable interest in things Islamic outside the Muslim world, as a result of a series of deplorable events and developments, media coverage — and much scholarship too — is predominantly geared towards radical and extremist exponents of political Islam.
This site is intended as a platform for presenting alternative currents of thought.
Carool Kersten is Research Professor in Islamic Studies at KU Leuven (Catholic University Leuven) and Emeritus Reader in the Study of Islam & the Muslim World at King's College London
Contemporary Thought in the Islamic World Book Series
I am the editor for a book series published by Routledge, entitled Contemporary Thought in the Islamic World. This series promotes new directions in scholarship in the study of Islamic thinking aiming to take the field beyond the usual historical-philological concentration found in Islamic studies or the area studies approach dominating in the social sciences. It will introduce pioneering thinkers, public intellectuals, academics and their ideas
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, is the brainchild of Musharraf Ali Farooqi, and forms part of the Urdu Project, an initiative that seeks to introduce translations from Urdu to the North American market. Click here to read an excerpt from the translation.
