Readings in Critical Muslim Studies

Graduate / Professional

This course surveys key texts from a broad range of fields, including transnational American studies, religious studies, history, and anthropology, to explore methodological and theoretical questions that include: What is the “critical” in critical Muslim studies? What and who is “the Muslim” in these scholarly formations: a religious subject, a racial category, a location of subjection and surveillance, or all of these? What theoretical frameworks have emerged in the past twenty years to analyze the Muslim experience, and what is the impact of these intellectual projects on the academy and Muslim populations themselves? What different methodologies are used and what kinds of knowledge do they yield? How does critical Muslim studies as an emergent field complicate notions of an “American Islam” and “American Islamophobia,” terms that are and have been practiced, debated, encoded, and altered both by transnational populations within the United States and by U.S. imperial policies, investments, and interests in Islam. The aim is to combine the resources and insights of various disciplines while identifying theoretical and methodological pitfalls and possibilities for future research. We focus on the relationship of our readings to other interdisciplinary formations that transcend disciplines, such as critical security studies and the anthropology of the secular, and the debates and trends therein. Permission of the instructor required. Th 10:30am-12:20pm