Public Sphere In Muslim Societies The

Multidisciplinary examination of the public sphere in “traditional” Muslim society.

"It is difficult to imagine a more thoughtful, balanced, or comprehensive treatment of this extremely elusive and difficult subject." —Digest of Middle East Studies This second edition of a widely acclaimed collection of essays reports on how new media—fax machines, satellite television, and the Internet—and the new uses of older media—cassettes, pulp fiction, the cinema, the telephone, and the press—shape belief, authority, and community in the Muslim world. The chapters in this work, including new chapters dealing specifically with events after September 11, 2001, concern Indonesia, Bangladesh, Turkey, Iran, Lebanon, the Arabian Peninsula, and Muslim communities in the United States and elsewhere. The extent to which today's new media have transcended local and state frontiers and have reshaped understandings of gender, authority, social justice, identities, and politics in Muslim societies emerges from this timely and provocative book.

This collection of essays examines how modern public spheres reflect and mask - often both simultaneously - discourses of order, contests for hegemony, and techniques of power in the Muslim world. It builds on scholarship that re-imagines theories and practices of the public in modern and contemporary societies. While examining disparate time periods and locations, each contributor views modern and contemporary public spheres as crucial to the functioning, and understanding, of political and societal power in Muslim majority countries.

In light of the ongoing public debate that focuses on differences between Islam and the West, this book suggests a change of perspective. It departs from the observation that both western Orientalists and Islamist activists have defined Islam similarly as an all-encompassing religious, political and social system. In shifting from differences to similarities, it leaves behind the increasingly circular debate about the "true" nature of Islam in which the Muslim religion has been represented either as intrinsically hostile to or as principally compatible with modern culture. Instead, it associates the evolution of a particularly essentialist image of Islam with a complex process of cross-cutting (self)-interpretations of Muslim and Western societies within an emerging global public sphere. Putting its focus on the life and work of a number of paradigmatic individuals, the book investigates the intellectual encounters and discursive interdependencies among western and Muslim intellectuals. In a historical genealogy it deconstructs the essentialist image of Islam in uncovering its conceptual foundations in the modern transformation of European and Muslim societies from the nineteenth century onwards. Thereby, the changing infrastructure of the global public sphere has facilitated the gradual popularization, trivialization, and dissemination of a previously elitist discourse on Islam and modernity. In this way, the idea of Islam as an all-encompassing system has been turned into accepted knowledge in the Western and Muslim worlds alike.

This exploration of the role of violence in the history of Islamic societies considers the subject particularly in the context of its implementation as a political strategy to claim power over the public sphere. Violence, both among Muslims and between Muslims and non-Muslims, has been the object of research in the past, as in the case of jihad, martyrdom, rebellion or criminal law. This book goes beyond these concerns in addressing, in a comprehensive and cross-disciplinary fashion, how violence has functioned as a basic principle of Islamic social and political organization in a variety of historical and geographical contexts.Contributions trace the use of violence by governments in the history of Islam, shed light on legal views of violence, and discuss artistic and religious responses. Authors lay out a spectrum of attitudes rather than trying to define an Islamic doctrine of violence. Bringing together some of the most substantive and innovative scholarship on this important topic to date, this volume contributes to the growing interest, both scholarly and general, in the question of Muslim attitudes toward violence

Anti-Muslim voices have become louder in many places in the midst of ongoing atrocities undertaken in the name of Islam. As a result, much of the creative participation of Western Muslims in the public sphere has become overshadowed. This tendency is not only visible in political discussions and the media landscape, but it is also often reflected in academia where research about Muslims in the West is predominantly shaped by the post 9/11 narrative. In contrast, European Muslims Transforming the Public Sphere offers a paradigm shift. It puts forward a new approach to understanding minority public engagement, suggesting that we need to go beyond conceptualisations that look at Muslims in the West mainly through the minority lens. By bringing into dialogue minority-specific and non-minority specific concepts, the book offers a relevant complement. Using young German Muslims engaged in media, the arts and culture and civil society as ten case studies, this book utilises the concepts of counterpublics and participatory culture to re-examine Muslims' engagement within the European public sphere. It presents a qualitative analysis, which has resulted from two years of ethnographic fieldwork and participant observation, in-depth interviews and primary source analysis of material produced by the research participants. This book is a unique insight into the outworking of multiculturalism in Western Europe. It illustrates the many-sidedness of young Muslims’ public contributions, revealing how they transform European public spheres in different ways. Therefore, it will be a vital resource for any scholar involved in Islamic Studies, the Sociology of Religion, Religious Studies, Cultural Studies and Media Studies.

The place of religion in the public realm is the subject of frequent and lively debate in the media, among academics and policymakers, and within communities. With this edited collection, Solange Lefebvre and Lori G. Beaman bring together a series of case studies of religious groups and practices from all across Canada that re-examine and question the classic distinction between the public and private spheres. Religion in the Public Sphere explores the public image of religious groups, legal issues relating to “reasonable accommodations,” and the role of religion in public services and institutions like health care and education. Offering a wide range of contributions from religious studies, political science, theology, and law, Religion in the Public Sphere presents emerging new models to explain contemporary relations between religion, civil society, the private sector, family, and the state.

Die Reihe MAECENATA SCHRIFTEN ist eine interdisziplinäre wissenschaftliche Buchreihe zur Zivilgesellschaftsforschung. Von 2007–2015 erschien sie im Verlag Lucius & Lucius, Stuttgart; seit 2016 erscheint sie im Verlag De Gruyter Oldenbourg, Berlin. Sie wird von Rupert Graf Strachwitz, Eckhard Priller und Siri Hummel herausgegeben. Für eine Aufnahme in die Reihe kommen Monographien und Sammelbände in Betracht, die einen thematischen Bezug zu den Themenfeldern Zivilgesellschaft, Bürgerschaftliches Engagement, Philanthropie und Stiftungswesen aufweisen. In die Reihe können Qualifikationsarbeiten ebenso aufgenommen werden wie Studien, Ergebnisse von Forschungsprojekten, Tagungsbände oder Gutachten. Die Reihe steht grundsätzlich jeder Autorin und jedem Autor offen; ein unmittelbarer Arbeitsbezug zum Maecenata Institut für Philanthropie und Zivilgesellschaft ist nicht erforderlich. Veröffentlichungen sind in deutscher und englischer Sprache möglich. In der Regel ist für eine Veröffentlichung ein Druckkostenzuschuss erforderlich. Zuschussgeber können auf dem Umschlag mit Namen, auf der Innenseite auch mit Logo genannt werden. Texte zur Veröffentlichung können jederzeit eingereicht werden. Sie werden in der Regel durch die Herausgeber begutachtet, diese behalten sich die Einholung externer Gutachten vor. Diese kann auch auf Wunsch der Autorinnen und Autoren erfolgen. Bei Qualifikationsarbeiten sind auch die entsprechenden Gutachten für die Entscheidung über die Aufnahme maßgeblich. Zielgruppe Die Reihe richtet sich vornehmlich an die wissenschaftliche Fachwelt und an Publizisten, Praktiker und Entscheidungsträger. Manuskripteinreichungen Informationen zur Einreichung von Proposals erhalten Sie direkt beim Maecenata Institut für Philanthropie und Zivilgesellschaft, Berlin, Tel.: +49 30 2838 7909, E-Mail: [email protected], Website: www.maecenata.eu Die Herausgeber Dr. phil. Rupert Graf Strachwitz studierte Politikwissenschaft, Geschichte und Kunstgeschichte in den USA und in München, ist seit über 30 Jahren ehren- und hauptamtlich, beratend, forschend und lehrend mit Zivilgesellschaft, bürgerschaftlichem Engagement, Philanthropie und Stiftungswesen befasst. Er war Mitglied der Enquete-Kommission „Zukunft des bürgerschaftlichen Engagements" des Deutschen Bundestags. Er ist Direktor des Maecenata-Instituts für Philanthropie und Zivilgesellschaft, Berlin. Dr. sc. Eckhard Priller studierte Soziologie und Ökonomie an der Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin und war seit 1992 wissenschaftlicher Mitarbeiter am Wissenschaftszentrum Berlin für Sozialforschung (WZB). Von 2008 bis 2014 leitete er dort die Projektgruppe Zivilengagement, die u.a. 2009 den „Bericht zur Lage und zu den Perspektiven des bürgerschaftlichen Engagements in Deutschland" erstellt hat. Eckhard Priller ist wissenschaftlicher Co-Direktor des Maecenata Instituts für Philanthropie und Zivilgesellschaft. Dr. Siri Hummel ist stv. Direktorin des Maecenata Instituts für Philanthropie und Zivilgesellschaft und ist Politik- und Kommunikationswissenschaftlerin. Ihre Forschungsschwerpunkte sind Demokratie und Zivilgesellschaft, sowie Gleichstellung in der Zivilgesellschaft und Stiftungsforschung. Zusätzlich ist sie Lehrbeauftragte im Studiengang Nonprofit Management and Public Governance an der Hochschule für Wirtschaft und Recht. Vor ihrer Arbeit bei Maecenata war Siri von 2011-2017 wissenschaftliche Mitarbeiterin am Alfried Krupp Wissenschaftskolleg Greifswald. 2018 promovierte sie an der Universität Greifswald zum Thema Demokratieförderung durch Stiftungen.