Annelies Moors holds the ISIM Chair at the University of Amsterdam for the social science study of contemporary Muslim societies. On 13 March 2003, she delivered her inaugural lecture entitled '... Show moreAnnelies Moors holds the ISIM Chair at the University of Amsterdam for the social science study of contemporary Muslim societies. On 13 March 2003, she delivered her inaugural lecture entitled ''Muslim Cultural Politics': What's Islam Got To Do With It?' In this lecture she presented the research programme 'Muslim Cultural Politics', which she has initiated at the ISIM, and briefly summarized the results of some ongoing research projects. Show less
Muhammad Khalid Masud, ISIM Chair at Leiden University and Academic Director of the ISIM, delivered his inaugural lecture on 'Muslim Jurists' Quest for the Normative Basis of Sharia' on 20 October... Show moreMuhammad Khalid Masud, ISIM Chair at Leiden University and Academic Director of the ISIM, delivered his inaugural lecture on 'Muslim Jurists' Quest for the Normative Basis of Sharia' on 20 October 2000. In the lecture, he argued that the conception of the S h a r ia as divine law has problematized the binding nature of law in Islam because it conceals its material bases in the social norms. It also obscures Muslim jurists' continuous efforts to maintain general acceptance of Islamic law by bringing the legal norms closer to social norms. He argued that the current debates on the Sharia are also triggered by this conception as it ignores the inner contradictions between legal and social norms emerging in contemporary Muslim societies. The following contains a few excerpts from this lecture. Show less
On 21 November 2000, Martin van Bruinessen, ISIM Chair at Utrecht University, delivered his inaugural lecture entitled 'Muslims, Minorities and Modernity: The Restructuring of Heterodoxy in the... Show moreOn 21 November 2000, Martin van Bruinessen, ISIM Chair at Utrecht University, delivered his inaugural lecture entitled 'Muslims, Minorities and Modernity: The Restructuring of Heterodoxy in the Middle East and Southeast Asia'. The lecture compared Alevism in Turkey with kebatinan in Indonesia, where adherents of heterodox folk belief and practice - rather than gradually shifting towards scripturalist, sharica oriented Islam - were transformed into distinct religious minorities deliberately distancing themselves from orthodox Islam. The following is composed of excerpts from the lecture. Show less
