Kategoria BISAC: Social Science >> Islamic Studies

Lost in the Sacred poses questions about the Muslim world that no other book by a Western writer has dared to ask. Focusing on the Arab Middle East, Dan Diner asks what caused the Muslim world to lag behind so dramatically. Is Western dominance to blame? Or is the problem even with Islam itself? These questions, however unsettling, need to be asked--and they are being posed all across the Muslim world today. This book provides cautious answers that are no less disturbing than the questions.

Diner argues that Islam's cultural stasis is not due to the Muslim faith...

What is jihad? Does it mean violence, as many non-Muslims assume? Or does it mean peace, as some Muslims insist? Because jihad is closely associated with the early spread of Islam, today's debate about the origin and meaning of jihad is nothing less than a struggle over Islam itself. In Jihad in Islamic History, Michael Bonner provides the first study in English that focuses on the early history of jihad, shedding much-needed light on the most recent controversies over jihad.

To some, jihad is the essence of radical Islamist ideology, a synonym for terrorism, and even...

In the High Atlas Mountains of Morocco, far from the hustle and noise of urban centers, lies a village made of mud and rock, barely discernible from the surrounding landscape. Yet a closer look reveals a carefully planned community of homes nestled above the trees, where rock slides are least frequent, and steep terraces of barley fields situated just above spring flood level. The Berber-speaking Muslims who live and farm on these precipitous mountainsides work together at the arduous task of irrigating the fields during the dry season, continuing a long tradition of managing land, labor,...

Iran has undergone considerable social upheaval since the revolution and this has been reflected in its cinema. Drawing on first-hand interviews and detailed ethnographic research, this book explores how cinema is engaged in the dynamics of social change in contemporary Iran. The author not only discusses the practices of regulation and reception of films from major award winning directors but also important mainstream filmmakers such as Hatamikia and Tabizi.

Contributing to ethnographic accounts of Iranian governance in the field of culture, the book reveals the complex...

Yossef Bodansky, the author whose #1 New York Times bestseller Bin Laden: The Man Who Declared War on America first introduced American readers to al Qaeda's evil mastermind prior to 9/11, returns to sound an important alert. In this authoritative look at the roots of modern terrorism, Bodansky pinpoints the troubled region of Chechnya as a dangerous and little-understood crucible of terror in the struggle between East and West. Drawing on mountains of previously unseen intelligence from Islamist movements and other military and intelligence sources from throughout the...

At the age of twenty, Zarah Ghahramani was swept off the streets of Tehran and taken to the notorious Evin prison, where criminals and political dissidents were held side by side in conditions of legendary brutality. In this richly textured memoir, she tells the terrifying, inspiring story of her time in prison. My Life as a Traitor celebrates a triumph of the individual over the state and is an affecting addition to the literature of struggle and dissent.

Political leaders of the 1930s may be accused of blindness to danger in their failed attempts to appease totalitarian aggression, but no one doubts they believed they were doing so to preserve their way of life. In contrast, Raphael Israeli suggests that twenty-first century appeasement of Islamists, wherever it occurs, is different. Appeasement in the advanced modern states of this century--in Europe, Australia, Canada, and even in parts of Asia--is characterized by what amounts to a self-inflicted humiliation, in misguided efforts to slow the advance of a rising Islamist tide. Such...

The Taliban remain one of the most elusive forces in modern history. A ragtag collection of clerics and madrasa students, this obscure movement emerged out of the rubble of the Cold War to shock the world with their draconian Islamic order. The Taliban refused to surrender their vision even when confronted by the United States after September 11, 2001. Reinventing themselves as part of a broad insurgency that destabilized Afghanistan, they pledged to drive out the Americans, NATO, and their allies and restore their "Islamic Emirate."

The Taliban and the Crisis of Afghanistan...