Ordinary Matters in Islamic Studies: Notes from the Field

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ReOrient

Volume 5, Issue 1

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Ordinary Matters in Islamic Studies: Notes from the Field

research-article

Author(s): Setrag Manoukian

Publication date (Print): 1 October 2019

Journal: ReOrient

Publisher: Pluto Journals

Keywords: post-orientalism, Islamic Studies, critical philology, ethnography of knowledge, history, language, theory, archive, politic

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Abstract

This essay is a reflection on the everyday conceptual matters that inform the workings of the academic field of Islamic Studies and constitute its conditions of possibility. The research is based on observations I made while working at the Institute of Islamic Studies at McGill University. The everyday of the Institute is marked by arguments that reject orientalism but also foreshadow its return in different guises. In this context, historical and linguistic approaches, with their own tensions and limits, appear as safeguards, but they are inevitably caught up in a binary that juxtaposes theory to the archive as two opposing but equally necessary modalities of knowledge. While several ideas about what constitutes Islam seem to cohabit without much friction, a quite fixed and stable notion of politics overdetermines the possibility to think otherwise. The essay is primarily descriptive, but it contains a few personal and “extra-territorial” notes on how to inhabit these matters differently and follow desire.

Content

Author and article information

Journal

Journal ID (doi): 10.2307/j50009694

Journal ID (jcode): reorient

Title: ReOrient

Publisher: Pluto Journals

ISSN: 2055-5601

ISSN: 2055-561X

Publication date (Print): 1 October 2019

Volume: 5

Issue: 1 ( doiID: 10.13169/reorient.5.issue-1 )

Pages: 6-24

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McGill University, Montreal, Canada

Article

Publisher ID: reorient.5.1.0006

DOI: 10.13169/reorient.5.1.0006

SO-VID: 0c1b5b05-ca3c-45f2-bcbf-987944bd5668

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All content is freely available without charge to users or their institutions. Users are allowed to read, download, copy, distribute, print, search, or link to the full texts of the articles in this journal without asking prior permission of the publisher or the author. Articles published in the journal are distributed under a http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/.

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lang eng

ScienceOpen disciplines: Literary studies,Religious studies & Theology,Social & Behavioral Sciences,History,Philosophy

Keywords: archive,ethnography of knowledge,critical philology,politic,language,post-orientalism,theory,history,Islamic Studies

References

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Appadurai, A. et al. (2013) Mission Statement Responses. Comparative Studies of South Asia, Africa and the Middle East 33 (2), 137–39.
Bayat, A. (2013) Areas and Ideas. Comparative Studies of South Asia, Africa and the Middle East. 33 (3), 260–63.
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Cassin, B. (2014) Philosopher en Langues: les Intraduisibles en Traduction [Philosophying in Languages: the Untranslatables in Translation]. Paris: Presses de l'École normale supérieure.
Cecire, N. (2011) Introduction: Theory and the Virtues of Digital Humanities. Journal of Digital Humanities 1 (1), 44–53.
Chakrabarty, D. (2000) Provincializing Europe. Princeton: Princeton University Press.
Dabashi, H. (2015) Persophilia: Persian Culture on the Global Scene. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
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Comments

Comment on this article

[1] Abu-Lughod, L. (2013) Do Muslim Women Need Saving? Cambridge: Harvard University Press.

[2] Adams, C. J. (1985) Foreword. In Martin, R. C. (ed.). Approaches to Islam in Religious Studies. Tucson: University of Arizona Press, vii–x.

[3] Appadurai, A. et al. (2013) Mission Statement Responses. Comparative Studies of South Asia, Africa and the Middle East 33 (2), 137–39.

[4] Bayat, A. (2013) Areas and Ideas. Comparative Studies of South Asia, Africa and the Middle East. 33 (3), 260–63.

[5] Cantwell Smith, W. and Cracknell, K. (2001) Wilfred Cantwell Smith: A Reader. Oxford: Oneworld.

[6] Cassin, B. (2014) Philosopher en Langues: les Intraduisibles en Traduction [Philosophying in Languages: the Untranslatables in Translation]. Paris: Presses de l'École normale supérieure.

[7] Cecire, N. (2011) Introduction: Theory and the Virtues of Digital Humanities. Journal of Digital Humanities 1 (1), 44–53.

[8] Chakrabarty, D. (2000) Provincializing Europe. Princeton: Princeton University Press.

[9] Dabashi, H. (2015) Persophilia: Persian Culture on the Global Scene. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.

[10] Ernst, C. W. and Martin, R. C. (2010) Rethinking Islamic Studies from Orientalism to Cosmopolitanism. Columbia: University of South Carolina Press.

[11] Fotiadis, M. (2013) Naked Presence and Disciplinary Wording. In Humphreys, S. C. and Wagner, R. G. (eds.). Modernity's Classics. New York: Springer, 293–313.

[12] Hodgson, M. G. S. (1974) The Venture of Islam: Conscience and History in a World Civilization. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

[13] Hughes, A. W. (2014a) When Bad Scholarship is Just Bad Scholarship: A Response to Omid Safi. Religion Bulletin. February 3. Available at: www.equinoxpub.com/blog/2014/02/when-bad-scholarship-is-just-bad-scholarship-a-response-to-omid-safi.

[14] Hughes, A. W. (2014b) Theorizing Islam: Disciplinary Deconstruction and Reconstruction. New York: Routledge.

[15] Kleinberg, E., Scott, J. W. and Wilder, G. (2018) Theses on Theory and History. Available at: http://theoryrevolt.com.

[16] Kurzman, C. and Ernst, C. W. (2012) Islamic Studies in U.S. Universities. Review of Middle East Studies. 46 (1), 24–46.

[17] Lockman, Z. (2004) Contending Visions of the Middle East: the History and Politics of Orientalism. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

[18] Malabou, C. (2012) Ontology of the Accident: An Essay on Destructive Plasticity. Cambridge: Polity.

[19] Mas, R. (2014) Has Politics Let Us Off the Hook? Reflections on Islamic Studies. Religion Bulletin. March 10. Available at: www.equinoxpub.com/blog/2014/03/has-politics-let-us-off-the-hook-reflections-on-islamic-studies.

[20] Mas, R. (2018a) The Modesty of Theory. In Sheedy, M. (ed.). Identity, Politics and the Study of Islam: Current Dilemmas in the Study of Religions. Bristol, CT: Equinox Publishing, 19–42.

[21] Mas, R. (2018b) The Time of Critique. In Stone, L. and Mohaghegh, J. B. (eds.). Manifestos for World Thought. London: Rowman and Littlefield, 209–28.

[22] Menger, M.-P. (2009) Le Travail Créateur: S'accomplir dans L'incertain [The Creative Work: Accomplishing Oneself Through the Uncertain]. Paris: Gallimard-Seuil.

[23] Mirsepassi, A., Basu, A. and Weaver, F. S. (2004) Localizing Knowledge in a Globalizing World: Recasting the Area Studies Debate. Syracuse: Syracuse University Press.

[24] Mitchell, T. (2004) The Middle East in the Past and Future. In Szanton, D. L. (ed.). The Politics of Knowledge: Area Studies and the Disciplines. Berkeley: University of California Press, 71–119.

[25] Mitchell, T. and Rao, A. (2013) Comparative Studies of South Asia, Africa and the Middle East: Mission Statement. Comparative Studies of South Asia, Africa and the Middle East. 33 (2), 135–6.

[26] Most, G. W. (1997–2002) Aporemata: kritische Studien zur Philologiegeschichte [Aporemata: Critical Studies towards a History of Philology]. Gôttingen: Vandenhoeck & Ruprecht.

[27] Nietzsche, F. W. (1997) On the Uses and Disadvantages of History for Life. In F. W. Nietzsche, trans. R. J. Hollingdale, Untimely Meditations. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 57–124.

[28] Pollock, S. (2009) Future Philology? The Fate of a Soft Science in a Hard World. Critical Inquiry. 35 (4), 931–61.

[29] Pollock, S., Elman, B. A. and Chang, K.-M. K. (2015) World Philology. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.

[30] Rovelli, C. (2018) The Order of Time. New York: Riverhead Books.

[31] Safi, O. (2014) Reflections on the State of Islamic Studies. Jadaliyya. January 31. Available at: www.jadaliyya.com/pages/index/16269/reflections-on-the-state-of-islamic-studies

[32] Said, E. W. (1978) Orientalism. New York: Pantheon Books.

[33] Salvatore, A. (2016) The Sociology of Islam: Knowledge, Power and Civility. London: Blackwell.

[34] Sedra, P. (2015) Whatever Happened to Middle Eastern Studies. Mada. October 11. Available at: www.madamasr.com/opinion/politics/whatever-happened-middle-eastern-studies

[35] Spinoza, B. (2007) Theological-Political Treatise. Edited by Jonathan I Israel and Michael Silverthorne. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

[36] Stoler, A. La. (2009) Along the Archival Grain: Epistemic Anxieties and Colonial Common Sense. Princeton: Princeton University Press.

[37] Strathern, M. (2000) Audit Cultures: Anthropological Studies in Accountability, Ethics, and the Academy. New York: Routledge.

[38] Vico, G. (1968) The New Science of Giambattista Vico. Ithaca: Cornell University Press.

[39] Windelband, W. (1998) History and Natural Science. Theory and Psychology. 8 (1), 5–22.