Related Posts

A Good Essay

Unfortunately, the monography Islamic History as Global History by Richard Eaton seems to be out of print. However, if you can get a used copy, I highly recommend it a good, short (46 pages) introduction to Islamic civilizations as part of global historical processes. While not a true introduction to Islam, it is not meant for a specialized reading audience either. Two passages that leapt out at me are below. Thanks to miamvi for the introduction.

Reading the Qur’an – part 3 – Translations and Secondary Sources [updated][2x]

[I’ve jumped a head to part 3 since several commentors have asked about translations and secondary material.] I’ve done one post already on the vagaries of Qur’anic Arabic. Learning Arabic does not really help in learning to read the Qur’an in the sense of its interpretive history, but it does help you appreciate the large semantic range of each word in the Qur’an. (A really good secondary source for this discussion, although somewhat technical, is The Qur’an’s Self-Image.) As a result, when I look up passages, I don’t rely on just one translation, but rather several. I also use languages…

Dissertation Online

For those who care, my dissertation is finally online at UMI (if you are at a subscribing institution, I’m sure you know the link to use). Search under “Rashid” for name and “dust” for the title. You should hopefully get my dissertation. It is available via Open Access, so free PDF downloads for all. UMI butchered the illustrations and tables in the scans, so if those things are important to you, drop me a line and I’ll send you a clean copy. Rashid, Hussein. “A Handful of Dust: Reading South Asian (Im)migrant Identity in Islamicate Literatures.” PhD, Harvard University, 2010.