front cover of Comparing Muslim Societies
Comparing Muslim Societies
Knowledge and the State in a World Civilization
Juan R. I. Cole, Editor
University of Michigan Press, 1992
This book departs from stereotypes that often dominate Western discourse about Muslim societies. The Muslim world encompasses a wide range of countries—among them Turkey, Iraq, Egypt, Senegal, Saudi Arabia, and Morocco—each with a varying degree of religious stricture. Generalizations, therefore, can be erroneous and misleading. The contributors to this book—prominent scholars in anthropology, history, sociology, and political science—examine such issues as the ideology and political practices of Iran's ruling Shi'ite clerics, the impact of state policies on the status of women, the controversy over parliamentary government in the Arab world, the role of modern intellectuals, and charisma and leadership in tribal societies. The arguments the authors put forward often overturn conventional opinion about the Muslim world. This original and important book reminds us that Muslim society is not a monolith, but that it encompasses a rich variety of cultures.
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Religion and Nationalism in Iraq
A Comparative Perspective
David Little
Harvard University Press, 2006
Because the situation in Iraq exhibits some of the standard symptoms of religious nationalism, it seems appropriate to compare it to other cases where the impulses of religion and nationalism have also come together in a highly lethal way. This volume provides a comparative consideration of attempts to manage and resolve nationalist conflicts in Bosnia, Sri Lanka, and Sudan, and examines how lessons from those situations might inform similar efforts in Iraq. In their introduction, Professors Little and Swearer review current scholarly thinking on the connection of religious and ethnic factors to nationalist conflicts, and they demonstrate the salience of religious and ethnic identity to these conflicts. For each country, two prominent thinkers examine the intersection of religion and ethnicity and the struggles to form a nation-state. The volume also contains a summary of the discussion on each country among 20 scholars, appendices providing background on the three countries with which Iraq is compared, and maps of the countries. The central role of ethnic and religious impulses in forming the identity of a people or "nation" directly ties these matters to nationalism and nationalist conflict.
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