An inspired and inspiring polemic ("End of the Neo-Cons") has been loosed on the lunacy gripping Washington for so long and whose epic blunders just resulted in the Republicans losing control of the House of Representatives for the first time in over a decade in the Toronto Star by David Olive. If there’s any rhetorical mistep in this eloquent and exhaustive broadside at Neocon folly it is Olive’s somewhat toothless opining about the possibility that the "neo-cons will have earned... Read more
I wrote in February about how Shabana had against all odds defended her dissertation with flying colors. Well, she’s at it again. Her groundbreaking work has started to get recognition within the field. My better three quarters has been awarded the Council on Anthropology of Education’s 2006 Outstanding Dissertation Award for her recently completed dissertation entitled "Constructing Third Spaces: American Muslim Undergraduate Women’s Hybrid Identity Construction" . So, in addition to being a blogger extraordinaire, poet and general supermom,... Read more
Am I the only one who’s sick of mosques that don’t bother to announce the time and location of Eid prayers on their websites? This is basic, folks. Don’t just announce it verbally after tarawih prayers–POST IT in the places people are most likely to look. At the the start of Ramadan our local moque announced on its website "RAMADAN MUBARUK 1427 A.H.! Ramadan starts on Saturday, September 23rd, 2006." and has been mum ever since. This is especially irksome... Read more
Don’t know what came over me today. In the midst of a lively discussion of Plato and "the Good"–I and a a few other religion TAs share an office with some junior faculty from the philosophy department, who regularly rock my world with mind-bending discussions of Plato that prove the commonplace contention in such circles that the "ancients" were simply a lot smarter than we are today–I experienced the pop-cultural equivalent of Marcel Proust’s famous cookie-induced phantasmagoria of childhood nostalgia. ... Read more
[Reposted because I’d left out the link to the article in question.] There’s a another interesting article in the Washington Post series on Wahhabism in America. It looks at the ups and downs of Wahhabism among American Muslims through the spiritual journey of one person, fellow blogger Khaleel Moore. [HT: Koonj] In case you’re wondering, I’m not obsessed with the W-word. It just keeps coming up in my surfing these days. Just noticed that Br. Khaleel’s legal name is "Christopher". ... Read more
A "Muslim" cabbie in the UK has made headlines (and blogosphere Islamophobes' day) by refusing service to a blind passenger because of the presence of her seeing-eye dog, claiming it to be "unclean" and prohibited in his car by his religion. Sadly, this is not an isolated occurence. (Almost as sad, stupid Muslim antics here force me to cite Daniel Pipes approvingly: Pipes rightly dismisses this neurotic taboo as "Muslim lore". It's far more complicated than many Muslims realize.) Don't... Read more
Given all the work I have to do, I probably shouldn’t be blogging, but I’ve been really itching to comment on this bizarre Pope controversy for a while. I need to scratch this itch so I can get back to work. Under Progress has contributed some thoughtful and informative reflections on this mess, along with a useful round-up of what people are saying in the blogosphere. I’m of two minds on this sorry affair. Despite my vigorous objections to the... Read more
Do read Ralph Peters’ courageous declaration of war on the real cancer within the American body politic, empty-headed Islamophobia that passes off hatred and hysteria for patriotism and devotion to America’s ideals. As he notes, these tunes have a very famliar ring to those aware of the discourse of anti-Semites and white supremacists in American history. It’s in The New York Post. Will wonders never cease? [HT: Carnival of Brass, by way of Non Sceptical Essays] Read more
I’m going to try to briefly respond to a reader’s thoughtful criticisms of my observations on Wahhabism/Salafism. I disagree with it strongly on numerous counts, but I appreciate and respect the commentor’s perspective, and hope he’ll take my response in the constructive spirit it is intended. First, I want to emphasize that I am NOT interested in bashing Wahhabis and, as I said, I have been known to defend them when I thought they were getting a bum rap. My... Read more
There’s an interesting article in The Christian Science Monitor on the growth of Buddhism on American shores ("American Buddhism on the rise"), which according to this piece is our 4th largest religion today. Even a larger factor [in Buddhism’s spread in the USA –Svend], he suggests, is that Buddhism offers spiritual practices that Western religions haven’t emphasized. "People are looking for experiential practices, not just a new belief system or a new set of ethical rules which we already have,... Read more
Akram's Razor
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