Islam in the Modern World

ANTH 310 (3 credits) - Dr. Anderson

Spring 2008

Tuesday 3:35 - 6:05 in PANG 302

Today, the Muslim world seems to many to be in crisis over who speaks for Islam, how – or even whether - Islam should be fit to modern conditions, and to which ones. This course aims to retrieve more of the spectrum of contemporary Islam than appears on the nightly news or in political talk. It focuses on how core beliefs of Islam are translated into practices and institutions, into regional variants, and into "political" issues in the modern world. From the terminology of Muslim religious belief and practice, we will proceed to examining social institutions and cultural expressions of religious community, identity, experience and in the contemporary world, major issue areas (such as gender, education, political activism), and their contexts.  

The goal of this course is to assist students to acquire familiarity with contemporary Islam, contemporary Muslim diversity, and issues about being Muslim in the modern world.  It has no prerequisites, counts as an "area" or as a "topics" course for Anthropology majors, and satisfies social science distribution requirements.

Readings (General texts, required):

Esposito, John. Islam: The Straight Path. 3rd edition. Oxford University Press,1998.
Shadid, Michael. Legacy of the Prophet. Westview Press, 2001.
Blank, Jonah. Mullahs on the Mainframe. University of Chicago Press, 2001.
Mottahadeh, Roy. The Mantle of the Prophet. Simon & Schuster, 1985.

(recommended):
Gilsenan, Michael. Recognizing Islam. Revised edition. I B Tauris & Co, 2000.

Online Material for this course:
Four films are available as online reserves to CUA students enrolled in the course. You can watch or review these at any time over the campus network:
- The Story of Islam
- The Secret Mecca
- I am a Sufi
- SOS in Tehran

Additional On-Line Course material is available on a Blackboard (bb.cua.edu) for this course with required readings and links to important resources on the Internet, plus a current version of this syllabus and guides for completing assignments.

Topics we will deal with (general course outline):

1. Islam as religion and as culture: methodology
- alternative problematizations of Islam (in the West, among Muslims, in politics, in the disciplines)

2. Islam and Modernity
- What is modernity and how is it a problem, an opportunity

3. Pious history and religious practice
- Getting the Believers’ point(s) of view
- ‘Fundamentals’ and their (renewed) significance

4. Divergent discourses in/about Islam
- ‘Schools’ & Traditions

5. Models of Community & Authority
- Fitting Islam to Society, Society to Islam
- Muslim cultures in the world today

6. Gender as an issue focus
- Identity and reframing it

7. Education's continuing centrality
- The place(s) of schooling in Muslim communities
- Islamic socialization and the life-cycle

8. Islamic political activism
- Roots and branches of Islamist parties and movements
- Islamist intellectuals

9. Globalisation, Islam in the West
- Muslim migrations, past and present
- Media Islam

Grades are based on

• Initial paper (10%)
• mid-term exam (20%),
• 2 short papers that develop themes introduced in readings and films in class (35% each), or
• optional take-home final or research paper (35%) in place of one of these papers. 

Graduate students may enroll in ANTH-610, which requires a research paper.