The main focus of the seminar will be on the representations of Islam
and Muslims in the ethnographic/historical literature of the Middle
East and former Soviet Central Asia. Orientalism by Edward Said and a
selection of ethnographies by Western and native authors will be read
and critically discussed in light of some recent critiques of the
nature, purpose and direction of traditional practices in the social
sciences. The central aim of the seminar is to explore relationships
between ethnographers (producers) and their ethnographic
representations (products) of the Muslim peoples and cultures they
study. In particular the significance of place (of ethnographers
culture of orientation, of education and graduate training, of
employment, of research and fieldwork), gender, and voice (e.g.
speaking of or for people studied, institutions funding the research,
and governments and agencies supporting the research efforts) within
the broader sociopolitical and intellectual environment, and their
impact upon the ethnographic accounts will be examined and assessed.

Required Readings (some titles may vary):

E. Said Orientalism (1978)
D. Brower & E. Lazzerini  Russia’s Orient: Imperial Borderlands and
Peoples, 1700-1917 (1997)
L. Nencel & P. Pels    Constructing Knowledge: Authority and Critique
in Social Science (1991)
S. Altorki & C. El-Solh    Arab Women in the Filed: Studying Your Own
Society (1988)
F. E, Peters   A Reader on Classical Islam (1994)
R. Loeffler  Islam in Practice: Religious Belief in a Persian Village
(1988)
R. Antoun  Muslim Preacher in the Modern World: A Jordanian Case Study
in Comparative perspective (1989
D. Edwards   Heroes of the Age: Moral Fault Lines on the Afghan
Frontier (1996)
T. Bringa    Being Muslim the Bosnian Way: Identity and Community
in a Central Bosnian Village (1995)
D. DeWeese   Islamization and Native Religions in the Golden Horde:
Baba Tukles and Conversion to Islam in Historical Epic Tradition
(1994)
L. Polonskaya & A. Malashenko  Islam in Central Asia (1994)

Course Requirements:

A critical written report of the reading assignments for each week
(about 2-3 double spaced typewritten pages) highlighting the most
significant points (positive and negative) about the authors' approach
in the text(s). Students are also expected to actively participate in
class discussions, lead class discussions, make an oral presentation
of the term project, and submit a term paper on the term project. The
term project will consist of a review essay consisting of: 1) critical
reading, detailed assessment and synthesis of all required readings
for the seminar; and 2) serious and reasoned reflection on how the
theoretical, conceptual, methodological and substantive issues covered
in this seminar will (or will not) be useful to your own specific
topics or fields of research interests and why. The final essay should
be about 20 typed pages (double-spaced).