Ziauddin Sardar Research Articles

Postformal priorities for postnormal times: A rejoinder to Ziauddin Sardar

This essay is a postformal rejoinder to Ziauddin Sardar's Welcome to Postnormal Times. I have no quarrel with Sardar's conclusion that these times are postnormal, nor do I disagree with many of his observations, but our standpoints regarding implications are somewhat contradictory. Paradoxically, rather than jump into an old paradigm form of debate with Sardar's interpretations of postnormalcy, this rejoinder is a playful postformal response. I celebrate our complementary views as expressions of the complex truths of multiperspectivality. First I question the meaning of normal and postnormal in the context of such notions as “the pathology of normalcy.” Secondly I begin to explore the postnormal circumstances from a postformal perspective. This involves discussion of notions of progress, development, evolution and co-evolution from different points of view as an opener to coming to terms with complexity. I then explore how concepts such as complexity and paradox can be understood as paths to wisdom; how active imagination can be engaged in the service of life; and how engaged imagination can unfold new normative narratives of alternative futures. Such imaginaries of hope are vital for the wellbeing of young people. The essay closes with a call to embrace the richness of complexity and play with—rather than fear—the paradox of planetary pluralism.

What is in a name? A rejoinder to Ziauddin Sardar's ‘the namesake’

Names are not merely labels. They have meaning and significance, my own life has been shaped by my name. So what we call our schoalrly pursuits and practice is important. I do prospective, not futures studies. This essay explores the significance of the term ‘prospective’ and suggests that it has aspirations of becoming a discipline.

What's in a name: Reflections on Ziauddin Sardar's ‘the namesake’

This paper argues that the semantic difficulties surrounding the term ‘futures’ and its many variants have significantly impacted this field's legitimacy in public policy circles, as viewed from the experiences of this author. Lacking legitimacy, it has been difficult to build the number of academic programs in the United States needed to improve the field's legitimacy, branding, and quality. In addition to issue of semantics, the field needs to improve its central messages while maintaining its core strengths; diversity of thought and commitment to future generations.

The past and the possible futures of Futures Studies: Some thoughts on Ziauddin Sardar's ‘the namesake’

The need to explain the concepts and terms used in Futures Studies, as in other sciences, has existed for a long time. But the necessity to do so has increased since the Second World War and is clearly important in recent debates among different groups involved in the field. This article traces the historical timeline of some of these terms in relation to the social and cultural contexts in which they were coined and first used. It argues that concepts and terms used in Futures Studies are mainly of Western origin and suggests that research should be conducted in different social and cultural contexts for concepts and terms embedded, and possibly used, in cultures different from that of the West. The article also suggests that some sort of ‘liberation movement’ should be started in this direction.

Futures-thinking and identity: Why “Futures Studies” is not a field, discipline, or discourse: a response to Ziauddin Sardar's ‘the namesake’

The term we use to describe the study or research of the future or futures is indeed important, and “futures studies” is preferable, although there is considerable dispute as to who and what is involved. Even more important is the far deeper problem of defining the “we” and what “we” in fact do. Futures studies not only considers wickedly complex problems, but it is itself a wicked entity, with many puzzles and contradictions. To illustrate, a taxonomy of 12 types of futurists, first articulated in 1985, is revisited, with special emphasis on the relative handful of Synoptic Generalists, the larger category of Specialized Futurists, the still larger entity of Futurized Specialists, and the largest entity of Closet Futurists who think about futures–often in a leading-edge way–but do not identify at all with futures studies, or are seen as futurists. Most contributors to Futures and other futures journals, as well as listees in the 2000 Futurist Directory, appear to have a secondary “futurist” identity at best. The fuzzy entity of “futures studies” is thus quite unlike any field or discipline, because it is easily entered by specialists who identify with the entity weakly, while many of the most important futures-thinkers are outside the entity. Instead of denying this paradox, the reality should be acknowledged, and an alterative paradigm for “futures studies” should be seriously considered.

An Italian vision of a scientific Utopia

A century ago, artists and writers from Italy imagined a world governed by science and technology. But their vision of modernity also glorified violence and misogyny, finds Ziauddin Sardar.

Islam in the Age of Globalization

AbstractIf modernity is ambiguous, the relationship of Islam to modernity is still more ambiguous. This essay reviews the scope of change that has occurred in the Muslim world since the onset of the Age of Globalization. Marshall Hodgson coined the phrase ‘the Great Western Transmutation’, decentering the West and accenting the cluster of traits that make moderns modern wherever they are. Hodgson's analysis is amplified by current Muslim voices, such as Ziauddin Sardar, Chandra Muzaffar, Omid Safi, and Ebrahim Moosa. The premise, as also the outcome, of this essay is to project modern day Muslims as global citizens who can, and do, promote innovation, openness and pluralism as legitimate, natural dimensions of Islamic loyalty. Globalization, like modernity, becomes not the enemy of Islam but its ally.

The Contribution of Ziauddin Sardar's Work to the Religion–Science Conversation

The article claims that Ziauddin Sardar's contribution to the religion–science conversation is primarily a performance situated in a social location that gives him access to a highly significant perspective. Sardar places Western science within the context of the Western culture from which it emerged and which it continues to serve. The contemporary hegemonous science of today is one form of science. Its acceptance as a universal and objective form enables its users and promoters to exercise imperialistic control over much of the world. Sardar's critique receives its effective bite from his social location as an immigrant Muslim, raised and educated in Western culture. The article examines the relevance of his social location to the issues with which he is most concerned, such as promotion of the rights and responsibilities of cultures, in particular Islamic cultures, traditionally cast as “Other” by the West. They too have their sciences and these sciences function often within worldviews that are “religious.” Sardar's critique of science and his call for the recognition of the so-called Other cultures is significant for its performativity. His work is not merely a descriptive or explanatory account, but bears also the performative characteristics that seek to effect the change for which he calls.

An Analytical Look at Anti-Americanism

Anti-Americanisms in World Politics. Edited by Peter J. Katzenstein, Robert O. Keohane Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2007. 368 pp., $55.00 (ISBN: 0-8014-4517-0), $24.95 paper (ISBN: 0-8014-7351-7). “Yankee Go Home—and Take Me with You!” This slogan, observed at an anti-US rally in the Philippines, exemplifies the ambivalent attitudes of some critics of the United States. (The complete story behind this quote can be found in Kiester and Kiester 1999) The message also captures a central puzzle in Peter Katzenstein and Robert Keohane's Anti-Americanisms in World Politics . Although increasing numbers of people criticize the United States and reject its international influence, many of these same people continue to embrace US culture and purchase US products. Anti-Americanism is a polarizing topic that tends to produce explanations based on catch phrases like “racist envy” and “cultural imperialism.” Increasing anti-Americanism has been documented by dozens of polls in recent years, and this information has fueled both speculation and research into its causes and implications. Anti-Americanism has been depicted as based on prejudice akin to anti-Semitism (O'Connor 2004) and as failing to consider the rich diversity of US culture (Markovits 2007). At the other extreme, Ziauddin Sardar and Merryl Wyn Davies (2002) argue that US cultural dominance has spawned a “hamburger virus” that eradicates indigenous cultures everywhere. Moses Naim (2003) posits two distinct strains of anti-Americanisms: “murderous anti-Americanism” in the radical Islamic world and “anti-Americanism lite” in Europe. Citing the importance of system structure in promoting the current negative climate, Farheed Zakaria (2004) argues that anti-Americanism fills the ideological vacuum left at the end of the Cold War. In this context, Katzenstein and Keohane have advanced the study of anti-Americanism by leaps and bounds with this tightly crafted volume. They establish a much needed framework for the analysis of anti-Americanism, and they begin the difficult task of assessing its impact in a systematic way. One of the most important innovations in Anti-Americanisms in World Politics is the adoption of the plural …

Beyond the troubled relationship

If scientific culture in the Muslim world has changed since the golden era of Islamic science, so has the practice of Islam. Reintroducing knowledge and creativity requires a revival of both, argues Ziauddin Sardar. In a Commentary, Ziauddin Sardar poses a question: can Muslim societies rediscover the spirit of scientific inquiry that prevailed during the classical period, when Islamic science enjoyed a golden era? The answer, he says, is yes. But it is not just the approach to science that has changed for the worse, so has the practice of Islam. Sardar argues that reintroducing learning, knowledge and creativity into Muslim culture requires a revival of both.

Book Review: Listening to Islam, with Thomas Merton, Sayyid Qutb, Kenneth Cragg and Ziauddin Sardar: Praise, Reason and Reflection

Book Review: <b>Listening to Islam, with Thomas Merton, Sayyid Qutb, Kenneth Cragg and Ziauddin Sardar:</b> Praise, Reason and Reflection

Disorienting Race: Humanizing the Musical Savage and the Rise of British Ethnomusicology

Although definitions of orientalism and racism seldom achieve consensus, the significance of their interplay is universally acknowledged amongst theorists of non-Western cultures. Tony Ballantyne, in his recentOrientalism and Race: Aryanism in the British Empire, describes their relationship in terms of mutuality, and Ziauddin Sardar, inOrientalism, describes them as ‘circles within circles’. Edward Said, of course, deals with their relationship exhaustively inOrientalism, and describes them as inextricably linked. Writing of the nineteenth century, he suggests that ‘Theses of Oriental backwardness, degeneracy, and inequality with the West most easily associated themselves early in the nineteenth century with ideas about the biological bases of racial inequality.’

‘How much does it cost for reason to tell the truth?’ Salman Rushdie and his Confessional Critics

The representation of Rushdie’s The Satanic Verses by confessional postcolonial critics is based on a reading that asserts one truth over the rest. I focus in particular on commentaries by two influential postcolonial confessional Muslim reviewers in Britain: Ahmed Akbar and Ziauddin Sardar. Their readings are critically assessed by simultaneously exploring the views of secular postcolonial critics and Muslim modernists who read Islam outside the conceptual framework of orthodoxy, especially Mohammad Arkoun and Abdefatah Kilito. I examine the way in which confessional postcolonial critics have appropriated religious rationalism along with postcolonial vocabulary. In my last section I discuss the ethical limitations of the confessional critics’ readings of The Satanic Verses. In the light of Bataille’s theory of the relation between sacrifice and divine justice as well as Derrida’s reflections on religion, I suggest that the dismissal of Rushdie’s fiction by such eminent commentators is localisable not only in the perception of metaphysics as origin, but also in a strategic reconstruction of an unthematisable sphere of al‐Fitra; that is, the scholar’s actual or imagined birth‐in‐Islam: his experience of circumcision and absolute dependence on faith.

Memories and methods: conversations with Ashis Nandy, Ziauddin Sardar and Richard Slaughter

The history and development of futures studies is explored in interviews with three leading futurists. Ashis Nandy, Ziauddin Sardar and Richard Slaughter provide a personal perspective on their involvement in the field and the World Futures Studies Federation and reflect on future possibilities.

Global Comparativism

Global Comparativism

Global Comparativism

Global Comparativism

Islam, Postmodernism and Other Futures

Followers of the Islamization of Knowledge project probably know thework of Ziauddin Sardar best for its trenchant critique of that project. Yetthe prolific British-Pakistani intellectual has written thoughtfully on topicsranging from the social consequences of science and technology and thefuture development of Muslim societies to cultural studies and the impactof postmodernism on religious belief. Since Sardar’s work is scatteredacross books, academic journals, and science and news magazines, the Reader is a most welcome compendium that showcases the breadth of hisengagements.The book contains 20 selections, which are divided almost equally intothree sections; the editors' introduction, which I discuss below; and a workingbibliography of Sardar's writings and index, both of which are very usefuladditions ...

Autopia: cars and culture

Contributors include Michael Bracewell, Ziauddin Sardar, Al Rees, Martin Pawley, Donald Richie and Peter Hamilton. Key texts by Marshall Berman, Jane Jacobs, Roland Barthes, Marc Auge and others.

Other Bother: The Alien in Science Fiction Cinema, on Aliens R Us: The Other in Science Fiction Cinema, edited by Ziauddin Sardar and Sean Cubitt

_Aliens R Us: The Other in Science Fiction Cinema_ Edited by Ziauddin Sardar and Sean Cubitt London: Pluto Press, 2002 ISBN 0-7453-1544-5 (hb) 0-7453-1539-9 (pbk) 208 pp.

Review of "Thomas Kuhn and the Science Wars," by Ziauddin Sardar,

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