Muslim Cosmopolitanism Research Articles

Malay-Archipelago Ethnic Diversity in Mecca: Jawi Scholars in the Book of al-Jawāhir al-Ḥisān by Zakariyyā Bīlā

This study focuses on the ethnic diversity of the Malay Archipelago in Mecca. The object of this study is the compilation of Jawi scholars (ulema) in Mecca as documented in the book al-Jawāhir al-Ḥisān, written by Zakariyyā Bīlā (1329-1413/1911-1992), a prominent Arab scholar originating from the Bilah lineage in Labuhanbatu, North Sumatra. Zakariyyā Bīlā provided a comprehensive record of the scholars and teachers he met or heard in Mecca (299 people), Medina (21 people), and Jeddah (7 people) over the period spanning from the 19th century to the mid-20th century. The study results indicate that Indonesian scholars who pursued professional opportunities in the Middle East were exclusively located in Mecca, with no presence in Medina over those two centuries. Of the 299 list of Mecca scholars, 65 were Archipelago (Nusantara) scholars from Sumatra, Java, Kalimantan, Sumbawa, Patani, and Malaysia. The significance of Mecca as a prominent destination for the Jawi people stems from the Grand Mosque’s central role in the Hajj pilgrimage, in contrast to Medina. In addition, the Archipelago’s geographical variety impacts the ethnic diversity of Jawi scholars in Mecca. Indonesian Muslim cosmopolitanism is characterized by its ability to incorporate ethnic and linguistic variety into the largest Islamic worship center worldwide. This study offers new insight into the intellectual and spiritual interactions between Indonesian scholars and Islamic science centers in Mecca. This study contributes to the strengthening of the Nusantara Muslim cosmopolitanism that brings ethnic and linguistic diversity to the largest Islamic worship center in the world.

Learning Islam “ala Gaza”: Palestinian Shaykhs as Figures of Religious Authority in Indonesian Palestine Solidarity Practices

Abstract In recent years a variety of activities have emerged in Indonesia that invite Palestinian shaykhs as figures of religious authority. These practices are a by-product of humanitarian initiatives carried out by Muslim solidarity organizations of the Tarbiyya movement. Analyzing these practices through the lens of Muslim cosmopolitanism, I argue that they reflect a cosmopolitan patriotism, in which the umma and the nation are mutually constitutive frameworks of belonging. Mobilizing Indonesians for the Palestinian cause, while teaching them Qurʾan memorization skills that Gazans are believed to exceptionally possess, serves to create a pious generation as envisioned by the Tarbiyya movement.

Cosmopolitanism and the Scottish Working-Class Writer: John Parkinson/Yehya-en-Nasr and Islam in Ayrshire

Explores the grassroots cosmopolitan and international literary interests of Scottish working-class writers, through the writing of the Scottish poet and convert to Islam John Parkinson or "Yehya-en-Nasr" (1874-1918), in the Ardrossan and Saltcoats Herald, in the monthly The Islamic World and the weekly newspaper The Crescent, as a journalist in Rangoon, and in book form, notably his Lays of Love and War (Ardrossan, n.d.), arguing that Parkinson's "Muslim cosmopolitanism" and his local Ayrshire identity and contexts were inextricably intertwined.

Alternative Voices in Muslim Southeast Asia: Discourse and Struggles ed. by Norshahril Saat and Azhar Ibrahim

Reviewed by: Alternative Voices in Muslim Southeast Asia: Discourse and Struggles ed. by Norshahril Saat and Azhar Ibrahim Ahmad Fauzi Abdul Hamid Alternative Voices in Muslim Southeast Asia: Discourse and Struggles Edited by NORSHAHRIL SAAT AND AZHAR IBRAHIM. Singapore: ISEAS Publishing, 2020. 230pp. ISBN 978-981-4843-80-5 A major pitfall which many editors of volumes on Islam in Southeast Asia have failed to avoid is the recurring problem of essentialisation. Tapping on their own research expertise and bias, both local and foreign scholars have produced admirable works that capture specific segments and chunks within the whole array of topics that could be categorised under the cluster of Islam and Muslims in Southeast Asia. With Southeast Asia becoming ever more diverse in the light of globalisation and the region becoming increasingly integrated with the world economy via such projects as China's Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) and the Regional Comprehensive Economic Partnership (RCEP), one could not be faulted for expecting a smorgasbord of offerings depicting the vast expanse of Muslim cosmopolitanism in Southeast Asia. Bearing such an eye-catching title which begins with the word 'Alternative,' thus conveying the impression of bringing out hitherto neglected narratives and analyses of subaltern Muslim communities and figures of Southeast Asia, Norshahril Saat and Azhar Ibrahim's edited volume looks enticingly promising on first impression. One could imagine the appeal such a volume would have if it had explored such terra incognita as Muslims of Indochina and Timor Leste, resurgent sufi congregations in Southern Thailand of the types investigated by Chiengmai-based Christopher Joll, and Malaysia's and Indonesia's Chinese Muslims of the sort studied by Hew Wai Weng of Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia (UKM). Such adventurous detour allows us to debunk politically driven stereotypes, for example by disentangling us from the typical Malay aka pribumi-Chinese conflict paradigm of both Malaysia's and Indonesia's ethno-religious politics. Alas, the geographical essentialisation of Muslim Southeast Asia to only Malaysia, Indonesia and Singapore is disappointing to say the least, but is then probably not altogether unexpected, coming from a group of scholars who share past and present affinity if not professional affiliation with the Department of Malay Studies, National University of Singapore. Treated as practically synonymous with the Malay world, not only is the volume's conception of a Muslim Southeast Asia bereft of any examples from the 'unMalay' world, but Alternative Voices in Muslim Southeast Asia also marginalises voices whose discursive location are found beyond the cognitive domain of 'progressive Islam'—the overarching theme that occupies Norshahril Saat and Azhar Ibrahim in this book and which they take for [End Page 225] granted as the proxy for whatever is worthy of the label 'alternative voice' among Southeast Asian Muslims. The strand of thought calling itself 'progressive Islam,' while appearing in many aspects to be a post-colonial phenomenon as much as it is a reaction against the dominance of conservative stripes of Islam following the religious resurgence that enveloped Muslim Southeast Asia in the 1970s–80s, shares ancestral linkages with the Kaum Muda (Young Faction) movement of early twentieth century, as chronicled by Azhar Ibrahim in Chapter Four. However, if Kaum Muda's ideological rival was the then Kaum Tua (Old Faction), latter-day progressive Muslims have had to contend not only with the traditionalist ulama (religious scholars) who customarily control the Islamic officialdom of Muslim-majority countries, but they have also had to compete with thinkers from the ultra-conservative Wahhabi-Salafi school ascendant in contemporary Southeast Asia, even lately penetrating Islamic religious bureaucracies in Malaysia. Both conservative trends, namely the traditionalist school and the increasingly influential Wahhabi-Salafi puritanical strand, despite their separate intellectual genealogies,1 are wont to label progressive Muslims as purveyors of 'liberal Islam,' which within mainstream Southeast Asian Islam carries negative connotations implying deviation from the righteous path. These liberal-conservative tensions are brought out in Noor Aisha Abdul Rahman's Chapter 5 on Singapore and Norshahril Saat's Chapter 8 on Malaysia. Further, progressive Muslims are likened to the Mu'tazilites, the rationalist school once dominant in the early ninth century who, because of their fascination with Greek philosophy, prioritised usage of the reason...

A New Shahrazad

Abstract In 1945, Mahmooda Rizvia, a prominent Urdu author from Sindh, published a travel account of her journey across the Arabian Sea from British India to Iraq during World War II. In her travel account, Rizvia conceptualized the declining British Empire as a dynamic space for Muslim renewal that connected India to the Middle East. Moreover, she fashioned a singular autobiographical persona as an Urdu literary pioneer and woman traveler in the Muslim lands of the British Empire. In her writings, Rizvia focused on her distinctive observations of the ocean, the history of the Ottoman Empire, and her home province of Sindh's location as a historical nexus between South Asia and the Middle East. In contrast to the expectations of modesty and de-emphasis on the self in many Muslim women's autobiographical narratives in the colonial era, Rizvia fashioned a pious, yet unapologetically self-promotional, autobiographical persona. In conversation with recent scholarship on Muslim cosmopolitanism, women's autobiographical writing, and travel literature, this article points to the development of an influential project of Muslim cosmopolitanism in late colonial Sindh that blurred the lines between British imperialism, pan-Islamic ambitions, and nationalism during the closing days of World War II.

The Ahmadiyya in the Gold Coast: Muslim Cosmopolitans in the British Empire, written by Hanson, John H.

The Ahmadiyya in the Gold Coast: Muslim Cosmopolitans in the British Empire, written by Hanson, John H.

John H. Hanson. The Ahmadiyya in the Gold Coast: Muslim Cosmopolitans in the British Empire.

John H. Hanson. The Ahmadiyya in the Gold Coast: Muslim Cosmopolitans in the British Empire.

John H. Hanson, The Ahmadiyya in the Gold Coast: Muslim cosmopolitans in the British Empire. Bloomington IN: Indiana University Press (hb US$85 – 978 0 253 02619 4; pb US$35 – 978 0 253 02933 1). 2017, 288 pp.

John H. Hanson, The Ahmadiyya in the Gold Coast: Muslim cosmopolitans in the British Empire. Bloomington IN: Indiana University Press (hb US$85 – 978 0 253 02619 4; pb US$35 – 978 0 253 02933 1). 2017, 288 pp.

Intersectional cosmopolitanism: Muslim women’s engagement with polygamy on Malaysian and Indonesian screens

ABSTRACTThis article interrogates how the diverse realities of Muslim women fray the concept of ‘Muslim cosmopolitanism’ in Southeast Asia. By comparing how Malaysian Muslim women interpret polygamy in Malaysian and Indonesian screens, this article problematises the idea of a unified cosmopolitanism experienced by Muslims from the Malay world. Based on findings from interviews with 25 educated women, this article shows that media representations of polygamy and Muslim femininity can differ even between two Southeast Asian countries sharing common gendered and religious practices. It argues that the women’s understanding of polygamy is based on the intertwinement of their ethnic, gendered and classed subjectivities that are not necessarily informed by their religious beliefs per se but rather by the broader socio-political contexts in which they live. Through this embodiment of intersectional cosmopolitanism, they not only disrupt existing notions of ‘Muslim cosmopolitanism’ but highlight the heterogeneous experiences of Muslims within Southeast Asia.

Book review: Muslim Cosmopolitanism in the Age of Empire

Book review: Muslim Cosmopolitanism in the Age of Empire

Muslim Cosmopolitanism in the Age of Empire by Seema Alavi

<i>Muslim Cosmopolitanism in the Age of Empire</i> by Seema Alavi

Muslim Cosmopolitanism in the Age of Empire, written by Seema Alavi, 2015

Muslim Cosmopolitanism in the Age of Empire, written by Seema Alavi, 2015

Muslim cosmopolitanism in the age of empire

Muslim cosmopolitanism in the age of empire

Muslim Cosmopolitanism

On November 8, 2013, Syed Muhd Khairudin Aljunied (National Universityof Singapore; Fulbright Fellow, Columbia University) addressed the topic of“Muslim Cosmopolitanism.” The event was held at the IIIT headquarters inHerndon, Virginia.He began his talk with a personal example: He is the child of an Arab fatherand an Indian mother, his culture is Malay, he prefers to talk in eitherMalay or English, and he understands Chinese. Thus, he is a living exampleof his assertion that “being Muslim is part and parcel of being able to appreciate many cultures … We are all hybrids,” and therefore it is only natural forMuslims to embrace diversity. While this was true for the first millennium ofIslamic civilization, it is, unfortunately, “not the case today.”Aljunied cited several examples of how contemporary Muslims have putthis reality aside. For example, he raised the question of why, when a Muslimengages in something that is clearly wrong, do Muslims apologize by sayingthat he/she is a “bad Muslim,” instead of a “bad person,” or become offensiveby saying that the action was somehow justified. He noted that this is “an unhealthydevelopment in the world in general, and especially in the UnitedStates” – one that Muslims should abandon. Instead, Muslims need to studytheir history and understand exactly who they are. With this goal in mind, hepraised AbdulHamid AbuSulayman’s Crisis in the Muslim Mind (IIIT: 1993)for its analysis of such concerns ...

Human rights, Islam and the failure of cosmopolitanism

The rise of global human rights has been presented as compelling evidence for cosmopolitan progress, especially in Europe, with particular benefits for ethnic and religious minorities. New conceptions of citizenship – post-national, de-nationalized, disaggregated and cosmopolitan – have been used to show how minorities have created and profited from European cosmopolitanism. Some theorists have pointed to human rights activism, especially around the foulard affair, to illustrate the arrival of cosmopolitan justice. However, this paper suggests that cosmopolitan optimism has misjudged the magnitude of the impact of human rights. European cosmopolitanism’s commitment to ‘cool’ attachments has difficulty with ‘thick’ religious attachments. Muslim cosmopolitanism – expressed for example though religious pilgrimages – makes Muslims ‘bad’ cosmopolitans in the European version. This clash needs to be reconciled before Europe can define itself as the unrivalled source of cosmopolitan justice.

Introduction to Special Issue: Muslim Cosmopolitanism: Movement, Identity, and Contemporary Reconfigurations.

Introduction to Special Issue: Muslim Cosmopolitanism: Movement, Identity, and Contemporary Reconfigurations.

Prophetic Cosmopolitanism: Islam, Pop Psychology, and Civic Virtue in Indonesia

AbstractIn contemporary Indonesia, a new generation of Muslim pop preachers and self‐help gurus tap into, and trade on, the symbolic and economic capital of Islam, science, and media technologies. Through television sermons and elaborate Power Point presentations, these pop preachers and self‐help gurus summon the Prophet Muhammad's life and teachings in ways that resonate with the civic concerns, consumerist desires, and aspirational piety of the Muslim middle classes. These sermons and seminars often portray the Prophet Muhammad as the ultimate measure of what it means to be cosmopolitan. In this article I explore “prophetic cosmopolitanism” as a vernacular Muslim cosmopolitanism, but one which is not isolated from, or necessarily prior to, Western liberal‐secular ideas about civic virtue. I argue instead that prophetic cosmopolitanism is both informed by, and offered as an alternative to, global discourses about psychology and self, citizen and believer, nation and umma.

Siddiq Hasan Khan (1832-90) and the Creation of a Muslim Cosmopolitanism in the 19th century

AbstractThe essay highlights the role of one individual, Nawab Siddiq Hasan Khan (1832-90), in writing the cultural and intellectual history of imperialisms. It brings his biography, journeys and intellectual forays together to show how he used the temporal moment of the mid 19th century ‘age of revolts’, and the spatial connectivity offered by British and Ottoman imperialisms and re-configured them to his own particular interests. Locating Siddiq Hasan in the connected histories of the British and Ottoman Empires, it views his in-house cosmopolitanism as a form of public conduct that was shaped by Islamic learning that cultivated urbane civility as Muslim universalist virtuous conduct. This was a form of cosmopolitanism enabled by imperial networks, informed by pre-colonial webs of interaction between India and West Asia, and deeply rooted in the scriptures.

Muslim Cosmopolitans? Transnational Life in Northern Pakistan

This article explores the importance of transnational forms of Muslim cultural identity in northern Pakistan. By documenting the dynamism of a transnational form of Muslim identity that encompasses people belonging to a wide range of ethnic communities and Islamic doctrinal traditions, as well as extending across countries whose Muslim peoples have experienced the differential effects of their incorporation into both the Soviet Union and British India, the author seeks to challenge the work of Islam specialists who emphasize the centrality of “globalizing modernity” to the making of contemporary forms of Muslim identity. In contrast, this article builds on historical accounts of premodern forms of Muslim cosmopolitanism, notably Engseng Ho's study of Hadrami Muslim scholars who saw themselves as active creators of a universal world structured around the transregional ideals of their faith in the expansive Indian Ocean trading world. Building on this and other work on cosmopolitanism, the author documents the ways in which older experiences of mobility in this politically sensitive region of the world influence villagers' present-day engagements with globalizing processes. The ethnographic focus is on the ways in which Sunni and Shi'a Ismai'li Chitrali Muslims interacted with refugees into their region from Afghanistan and Tajikistan between 1979 and 2002, a time when both countries were experiencing violent civil and international conflict.