Negotiating past and present for a new identity. Contemporary Canadian Muslim writers and their manifold approaches

Negotiating past and present for a new identity. Contemporary Canadian Muslim writers and their manifold approaches
Author: Matthias Dickert
Publisher: GRIN Verlag
Total Pages: 75
Release: 2020-11-11
Genre: Literary Collections
ISBN: 3346294943

Scientific Essay from the year 2020 in the subject Literature - Canada, Comenius University in Bratislava (Philosophische Fakultät), language: English, abstract: This paper compares various contemporary Muslim writers from Canada and their negotiation with their identity. The choice of works tries to focus on the last decade and wants to show the multiple and flexible way these writers treat the key topic identity. All novels offer a comprehensive and detailed investigation into the concept of identity in contemporary literature from writers with a migrational background whose basis lies in the Muslim world and who know Canada since they have lived there or still do so. The generic and thematic diversity which is reflected in these books show the importance of these writers and throws light on their pluralistic concepts of identity which has and still enriches Canlit. To better present the development of this part of Canlit the first and the last novel are discussed in more detail. The aim of this is to show the development this group of writers has made in such a short time. Contemporary English literature investigates a wide range of issues such as theoretical and conceptual debates over modernity and contemporary, the history and practice of reviewing and / or writing in relation to nationhood, gender, religion or postcoloniality. ‘Muslim Writing’, as one branch of contemporary English literature is part of 'Postcolonial Writing’ which includes sub-genres such as the 'Postcolonial', 'Black British Writing', ‘British Jewish’ or 'British Asian'. The novelists which form 'Muslim Writing' dispose of a Muslim background which is first of all geographical and cultural and not necessarily religious. It is necessary to point this out that it is not Islam nor the religious as such which shape this term since some important writers like Salman Rushdie or (for the Canadian background Rawi Hage) are not religious in the sense that they are Muslims although India and the Lebanon dispose of a large Muslim community (in the case of Rushdie) are part of a large Muslim world (or in the case of Hage). Many of these writers such as Hanif Kureishi, Nadeem Aslam, Khaled Hosseini, Hisham Matar, Monica Ali or Anna Perera attempt to bring in this geographical, cultural or religious element by discussing and reflecting topics such as postethnicity, multiculturalism, minority, race, class, gender, religion, diaspora, community, universalism, particularism, Britishness language hybridity, belonging and above identity making. Although 'Muslim Writing' in general and 'Canadian

The First Political Order

The First Political Order
Author: Valerie M. Hudson
Publisher: Columbia University Press
Total Pages: 657
Release: 2020-03-17
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 0231550936

Global history records an astonishing variety of forms of social organization. Yet almost universally, males subordinate females. How does the relationship between men and women shape the wider political order? The First Political Order is a groundbreaking demonstration that the persistent and systematic subordination of women underlies all other institutions, with wide-ranging implications for global security and development. Incorporating research findings spanning a variety of social science disciplines and comprehensive empirical data detailing the status of women around the globe, the book shows that female subordination functions almost as a curse upon nations. A society’s choice to subjugate women has significant negative consequences: worse governance, worse conflict, worse stability, worse economic performance, worse food security, worse health, worse demographic problems, worse environmental protection, and worse social progress. Yet despite the pervasive power of social and political structures that subordinate women, history—and the data—reveal possibilities for progress. The First Political Order shows that when steps are taken to reduce the hold of inequitable laws, customs, and practices, outcomes for all improve. It offers a new paradigm for understanding insecurity, instability, autocracy, and violence, explaining what the international community can do now to promote more equitable relations between men and women and, thereby, security and peace. With comprehensive empirical evidence of the wide-ranging harm of subjugating women, it is an important book for security scholars, social scientists, policy makers, historians, and advocates for women worldwide.

Culture and Imperialism

Culture and Imperialism
Author: Edward W. Said
Publisher: Vintage
Total Pages: 416
Release: 2012-10-24
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 0307829650

A landmark work from the author of Orientalism that explores the long-overlooked connections between the Western imperial endeavor and the culture that both reflected and reinforced it. In the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, as the Western powers built empires that stretched from Australia to the West Indies, Western artists created masterpieces ranging from Mansfield Park to Heart of Darkness and Aida. Yet most cultural critics continue to see these phenomena as separate. Edward Said looks at these works alongside those of such writers as W. B. Yeats, Chinua Achebe, and Salman Rushdie to show how subject peoples produced their own vigorous cultures of opposition and resistance. Vast in scope and stunning in its erudition, Culture and Imperialism reopens the dialogue between literature and the life of its time.

Islam and Muslims in the West

Islam and Muslims in the West
Author: Adis Duderija
Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan
Total Pages: 0
Release: 2018-08-13
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 9783319925097

This book analyzes the development of Islam and Muslim communities in the West, including influences from abroad, relations with the state and society, and internal community dynamics. The project examines the emergence of Islam in the West in relation to the place of Muslim communities as part of the social fabric of Western societies. It provides an overview of the major issues and debates that have arisen over the last three to four decades surrounding the presence of new Muslim communities residing in Western liberal democracies. As such, the volume is an ideal text for courses focusing on Islam and Muslim communities in the West.

The Construction of Belief

The Construction of Belief
Author: Aziz Esmail
Publisher: Saqi
Total Pages: 207
Release: 2013-02-01
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 0863567665

Mohammed Arkoun was one of the most prominent and influential Arab intellectuals of his day. During a career spanning more than thirty years, he was revered as an outstanding research scholar, a bold critic of the theoretical tensions embedded within Islamic Studies and an outspoken public figure, upholding political, social and cultural modernism. This Festschrift honours Arkoun's scholarship, bringing together the contributions of eleven distinguished scholars of history, religious studies and philosophy. It offers a comprehensive selection of critical engagements with Arkoun's work, reflecting on his considerable influence on contemporary thinking about Islam and its ideological, philosophical and theological dimensions. The authoritative reference study on the work of Mohammed Arkoun, The Construction of Belief is essential reading for students and scholars of Islam, Muslim societies and cultures, modernity, religious studies, philosophy and semanti.

Epistemologies of the South

Epistemologies of the South
Author: Boaventura de Sousa Santos
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 285
Release: 2015-11-17
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 1317260341

This book explores the concept of 'cognitive injustice': the failure to recognise the different ways of knowing by which people across the globe run their lives and provide meaning to their existence. Boaventura de Sousa Santos shows why global social justice is not possible without global cognitive justice. Santos argues that Western domination has profoundly marginalised knowledge and wisdom that had been in existence in the global South. She contends that today it is imperative to recover and valorize the epistemological diversity of the world. Epistemologies of the South outlines a new kind of bottom-up cosmopolitanism, in which conviviality, solidarity and life triumph against the logic of market-ridden greed and individualism.

Identity and Violence

Identity and Violence
Author: Amartya Sen
Publisher: Penguin Books India
Total Pages: 244
Release: 2007
Genre: Philosophy
ISBN: 9780141027807

Amartya Sen argues that most of the conflicts in the contemporary world arise from individuals' notions of who they are, and which groups they belong to - local, national, religious - which define themselves in opposition to others.

The Archaeology of Ethnicity

The Archaeology of Ethnicity
Author: Siân Jones
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 206
Release: 2002-11-01
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 1134767935

The question of ethnicity is highly controversial in contemporary archaeology. Indigenous and nationalist claims to territory, often rely on reconstructions of the past based on the traditional identification of 'cultures' from archaeological remains. Sian Jones responds to the need for a reassessment of the ways in which social groups are identified in the archaeological record, with a comprehensive and critical synthesis of recent theories of ethnicity in the human sciences. In doing so, she argues for a fundamentally different view of ethnicity, as a complex dynamic form of identification, requiring radical changes in archaeological analysis and interpretation.

The Evolution of International Security Studies

The Evolution of International Security Studies
Author: Barry Buzan
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Total Pages: 401
Release: 2009-08-27
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 1139480766

International Security Studies (ISS) has changed and diversified in many ways since 1945. This book provides the first intellectual history of the development of the subject in that period. It explains how ISS evolved from an initial concern with the strategic consequences of superpower rivalry and nuclear weapons, to its current diversity in which environmental, economic, human and other securities sit alongside military security, and in which approaches ranging from traditional Realist analysis to Feminism and Post-colonialism are in play. It sets out the driving forces that shaped debates in ISS, shows what makes ISS a single conversation across its diversity, and gives an authoritative account of debates on all the main topics within ISS. This is an unparalleled survey of the literature and institutions of ISS that will be an invaluable guide for all students and scholars of ISS, whether traditionalist, 'new agenda' or critical.

Muslims in Motion

Muslims in Motion
Author: Nazli Kibria
Publisher: Rutgers University Press
Total Pages: 189
Release: 2011
Genre: History
ISBN: 0813550556

In Muslims in Motion, Nazli Kibria provides a comparative look at Bangladeshi Muslims in different global contexts--including Britain, the U.S., the Middle East, and Malaysia. Kibria examines international migrant flows from Bangladesh, and considers how such migrations continue to shape Islamization in these areas. Having conducted more than 200 in-depth interviews, she explores how, in societies as different as these, migrant Muslims, in their everyday lives, strive to achieve economic gains, sustain community and family life, and realize a sense of dignity and honor. Muslims in Motion offers fresh insights into the prominence of Islam in these communities, especially an Islam defined by fundamentalist movements and ideologies. Kibria also focuses on the complex significance of nationality--with rich analyses of the diaspora, the role of gender and class, and the multiple identities of the migrants, she shows how nationality can be both a critical source of support and also of difficulty for many in their efforts to attain lives of dignity. By bringing to life a vast range of experiences, this book challenges prevailing stereotypes of Muslims.