Rushdie's Old World: Islam on the Spectrum | Kim Motor Fund Announcement No.49

"Rushdie belongs to a Muslim society, which remains largely in pre-modern life. He writes his book in Europe, which is already modern, or rather at the end of this generation." --Milan Kundera

On August 12, local time, Indian-British and American writer Salman Rushdie (Salman Rushdie, also translated as Rushdie) was assassinated at an event in New York. After rescue, his life was not in danger, but his injuries were still serious. Rushdie was born in a Muslim family in Mumbai, British India, and immigrated to the UK at the age of 14, where he wrote Midnight's Children, Shame, and The Satanic Verses (also translated Satanic Verses) Wait for the novel. Hadi Matar, 24, is a second-generation Lebanese immigrant and a Shiite Muslim. He said Rushdie was an "attacker of Islam" .

This isn't the first time Rushdie has been threatened with death for criticizing Islam. In 1988, "Devil's Psalm" was published, which religious groups accused of blasphemy because of its Islamic content. In 1989, the then supreme leader of Iran, Khomeini, issued a global hunting order for Rushdie based on the contents of the book. In the same year, several scholars from the Muslim world (including Edward W. Said) wrote to the New York Review of Books , firmly opposed to the personal threats against the author and the ban of his works, arguing that "the protest and debate to the point of bigotry and violence is in fact contrary to the Islamic tradition of knowledge and tolerance", reiterating "the belief in the universal principles of rational discussion and freedom of expression".

In Testaments Betrayed, Milan Kundera writes, "Rushdie belongs to a Muslim society, which remains largely in pre-modern life. He wrote his book in Europe, which was already in modern times, or rather at the end of this generation" (translated by Yu Zhongxian). The succinct divisions fit many people's imaginations of the Islamic world, and the assassination seems to reinforce that view (though murders due to differences of opinion are not exclusively Islamic events). However, the gap between literature and writing is very small, and real politics and society are often either one or the other. When people put the West and Islam into the framework of simple and crude reason and religion, civilization and barbarism, modernity and pre-modernity, all understanding and communication may also be erased. On the other hand, institutionalized Islamophobia can have irreversible consequences—for example, the government uses the public’s ignorance and fear of the Islamic faith to rationalize its oppressive policies against ethnic minorities.

In this issue, I hope that through the following selected articles, I can learn about the rich Islamic world and Muslim life with you, supplement my understanding with a micro perspective and personal experience, and think about how Islam is imagined and shaped, and how diverse it is. Sex and complexity.

Muslims are people; Islam is complex - by @王立秋

At a 1992 American Islamic workshop, he and his colleagues chose a "ridiculously simple" goal: "Convince Americans that Muslims are human." both secretly support terrorism, or are unlikely to be loyal Americans—in addition, upholding the humanity of Muslims also means making students understand that Muslims are, for better or worse, just like everyone else, and sometimes the latter. Just as good and sometimes as bad as the latter**.** Some Muslims are very moral; others are not. Some Muslims follow the rules of religion out of piety in the way prescribed by the scriptures; others ignore them completely . More Muslims are in the blurry middle ground.

Muslim and non-Muslim students alike are exposed to the kind of tendencies that are widespread in the mass media, popular culture—even religious authorities and Muslim organizations: as if there is a single, "true" Islam Words and Actions - Influence. At the same time, Islamophobia and Muslim extremists, on the one hand, and apologists, on the other, accept this framework, but there are profound differences in the content of this single Islam.

Author Kecia Ali, a professor of religious studies at Boston University, describes her approach and experience in teaching Islam and Muslim-related courses. When students are accustomed to treating Muslims as a highly homogenized group, guiding students to complete their imagination of diverse individuals is the first step in teaching.

Salman Rushdie, Edward Said and Moral Courage - by @王立秋

For Said, Rushdie's most important contribution is related to this, namely that of a writer who inhabits liminal space - the space between multiple cultural worlds - in speaking truth to power. , will inevitably require a double critique: those who hold power and claim to represent a certain pure Islamic (or Hindu or Christian or secular) morality and forbid freedom of speech; A man who defends the idea of "liberation" by force.

The article, citing Said, criticized Rushdie's shift in political attitudes. The author points out that Rushdie's political point of view tends to see the Islamic world and Western civilization as an either-or opposition relationship, while his fictional works are full of a keen sense of ambiguity and complexity, full of contradictions between the two. When Western society has internalized and institutionalized discrimination against Muslim beliefs, it is the moral courage that intellectuals should have to recognize and point out the existence of "Iraphobia".

The translator of the above two articles, Wang Liqiu, has translated and introduced many academic articles about the Islamic world. You can follow his translation to understand the details and meaning of fasting in Islam ("Fasting" in Islam), and the relationship between the view that "Islam is both a state and a religion" and modernization ( "Is Islam both a religion and a state?" ) Or, just read poetry written by Muslim women (“ Why I Can Dance the “Soul Train” in Public and Still be a Muslim ”) and stories from the Quran (Stories of the Quran ).

116 | Inequality between men and women, contrary to Islam - by @絵編志TyingKnots

In the same way, Vaduud challenges verse 4:34, which is said to allow a man to beat his wife. Vaduud analyzes the multiple meanings of the word "daraba" (ضرب), which is generally translated as "hit" (specifically or figuratively), which led him to translate it as "to leave" (Arabic). It does have this meaning in it - proofreading). Wadud's first book was a huge success in the Muslim women's community and in academia. Especially for those interested in women's rights issues, her efforts to reread religious texts from an egalitarian perspective have opened up opportunities.

When Muslim women are seen as eternal "the oppressed" and "the redeemed," Muslim feminists try to justify the equality of men and women written in Islam by reinterpreting the sacred texts of religion and liberating the power of translation from patriarchy. in the teachings. At the same time, the editor of the article also reminded us that Muslim women have been actively carrying out campaigns and practices related to gender equality, both at home and abroad.

195 | Yan Jiyu: I am the translator of the Chinese version of "The Devil's Psalm" - by @World Walks seh seh

Rushdie once said: "Its (The Devil's Psalm) is not really the subject of Islam, but immigration, metamorphosis, self-splitting, love, death, London and Mumbai (where Rushdie was born)." The Devil's Psalm has a huge structure, with complex characters, plots, time and space, and themes. However, many Muslims (I am afraid most of them have not actually read this book) are still obsessed with certain characters and plots in the book. Violence, on the one hand, tramples on the universal values of freedom of speech, freedom of expression, and freedom of the press, and on the other hand harms the international image of Islam again, which is truly regrettable.

Yan Jiyu, the translator of the Chinese version of "The Devil's Psalm", shared the process of translating and publishing the book in Taiwan. How should we understand the "blasphemy" of Islam in this book? When the translators and publishers of multiple editions were attacked or even killed mysteriously, why were Chinese translators able to put aside their concerns and face the difficulties? Defending freedom of speech and the press is no easy task.

ISIS brides, and the widow's house they can't leave - by @李易安

After reading this book, you may find that, for some European and North African women, "departing to ISIS" is sometimes a way for them to escape their original family, husband and in-law's family, allowing them to break their daily shackles; sometimes, It may be an act of "anti-body system" that can satisfy the rebellious aspirations of adolescent girls, or resist the oppression of secular elites and rulers. Therefore, compared with the pull of ISIS, what really made them decide to go on the road may be more the push from their native family and society.

Li Yi'an introduced his translation of the book "The Bride of the Islamic State". Why would European women from the free world volunteer to go to the Taliban or ISIS that "oppress women"? This book tells the life stories of several female Muslims from Germany, Britain, Tunisia, and Syria, and discusses gender issues in the Islamic world from a micro perspective.

"Saved" by State Terror: Gender Violence and Propaganda in Xinjiang - by @小白

Ethnic minority women are often regarded as private property by men with high nationalist sentiments in their own ethnic group, are subject to moral constraints from within the social network, and are stigmatized for intermarriage with other ethnic groups; on the other hand, they are Others see them as bound and brainwashed ignorant slaves, arrogantly demanding that they distance themselves from their own culture and embrace another outsider's culture to prove that they are "progressive" and autonomous. In Xinjiang, the former kind of bondage did exist, and now the latter kind of violence has developed to extremes. The history and culture of ethnic minorities in Xinjiang have been brutally reduced by the propaganda machine to a series of "closed" and "extremist" stereotypes, and ethnic minority women are portrayed as passively dependent on the Han and the Party to "save".

Translated from a scholar who grew up in Xinjiang, the theme of this article is the intersection of ethnicity/race, nationality and gender. The first sentence of the article is also reminiscent of L Abu-Lughod's classic article "Do Muslim Women Need Salvation?" ( Do Muslim Women Need Saving ). Xiaoyin 's writing has also translated many articles about the Uyghurs in Xinjiang. You can click on his homepage to learn more.

Uyghur Voices: Three Uyghur Podcasts I Recommend ——by@Kita

Mukaddas mentioned that in the early days of her life in Europe, she always felt a sense of urgency and felt that it was her responsibility to let the Europeans she came into contact with know what the so-called "Uyghur" was (especially through the dance art form she specialized in), And because of such expectations, self-examination and correction will be made from time to time. It's an expectation that hopefully will be recognized by the international community, but can be a breathless burden.

Uyghurs are not equal to Muslims, and Islam cannot explain everything about Muslim life. If you are like the author of this article, and it is not entirely because of the "cotton incident" and its controversy in Xinjiang that you pay attention to Uyghurs, the three Uyghur podcasts recommended by the author should be suitable for you to listen to - in "Singing and Dancing" and "Religious Faith" "Besides, there are many things in Uyghur life that are worth exploring, understanding and listening to.

Walk around interview | She is Afghanistan's first female deputy speaker, exiled amid Taliban death threats - by @World Walks seh seh

If we Afghans lived in darkness during the years of war, the years to come will literally throw us into the deepest, darkest places of hell. It is a purgatory on earth created by believers who claim to be Allah and followers of Islam. But these people do not represent at all the Islam that I and millions of Afghans live by. Our Islam is a faith of peace, tolerance and love, in line with the values of the rights and equality of all human beings. I want you to understand that as women, true Islam empowers you politically and socially. It gives you dignity and the freedom to be educated, to pursue your dreams, and to live your own life... -Fazia's letter to her two daughters

Fawzia Koofi, a former deputy speaker of the Afghan parliament, left Afghanistan due to the Taliban occupation and went into exile. The World Walk interview recorded her whole life of fighting under the cannon fire and patriarchal dictatorship. At the age of 3, his father was shot by jihadists; at the age of 20, he was forced to give up his dream of being a doctor due to the Taliban occupation; at the age of 30, he was elected as the country's first female deputy speaker. Today, she's still fighting - "I hope that one day Afghanistan will be a safe and stable country for all women, men, races, religions."

In Echoes of Divine Revelation: Read Daromir Rudnyckyj's "Beyond Debt" - by @aboutanthropology

What is Islamic Finance? Could it be an alternative to neoliberalism? This is a long overdue Eid al-Fitr essay. Daromir Rudnyckyj’s 2019 publication Beyond Debt: Islamic Experiments in Global Finance may be the first ethnography to delve into the world of Islamic finance in Malaysia. The field of expert communities is difficult, but Rudnyckyj sincerely demonstrates another facet of economic anthropology.

The article introduces Beyond Debt, a book about how the Malaysian government develops "Islamic finance" and attempts to build "New York in the Islamic world". How does Islam as a religion affect contract making, material interests and financial transactions in the secular world? How do the triple forces of religion, capital and state interact? Economic anthropologists have attempted to answer these questions by conducting survey interviews with financial practitioners in different fields of the Islamic world.

Islam and Southeast Asian Chinese - by @Danny Chew 周晓红

In addition, the Chinese community has also shaped a set of "Islamic discourses" from the perspective of the Chinese through Chinese-language media and communities. From the perspective of Islamic political parties and Islamic criminal law, the media interprets the cultural representation of Islam, the "other", from the cultural perspective of the "me", which in turn affects the Chinese community's perception of Islam. Scholar Tambiah believes that as a diaspora, most overseas Chinese have been facing "dual territorialization" rather than "deterritorialization" in terms of cultural identity, which means living in the local country ( Malaysia, Indonesia) and at the same time ambiguous and simulacrum about their ancestral country (China). This situation has led to a clear boundary between the "me" and the "other" between the Chinese community and other ethnic groups.

Malaysia and Indonesia are at the forefront of the collision between Islamic and Chinese cultures. As the author puts it, "pagan intermarriage" and "reformation" are still sensitive topics in Southeast Asian Chinese society. Living in Malaysia and Indonesia, where "the rulers have long regarded themselves as defenders of Islam", how did the Chinese society as a visible minority construct their imagination of Islam? How far is it from a pluralistic society that truly respects each other?

Opposition to violence that suppresses freedom of speech, as well as an essential understanding of ethnicity and religious belief, both require some "moral courage." These articles hope to open up a different perspective of a big issue for everyone to understand the Islamic world that is not flat; also welcome the citizens of Matt City to Tag the writers of related issues that you think are high-quality in the comment area, or associate with this article Jinma The article connects the world in front of us with us.