‘Moderate Islam’

Islam Almasri_TOCSJ

Recently, a number of methods have been proposed to improve image retrieval accuracy by capturing context information. These methods try to compensate for the fact that a visually less similar image might be more relevant because it depicts the same object. We propose a new quick method for refining any pairwise distance metric, it works by iteratively discovering the object in the image from t...

Moderate Islam and Secularist Opposition in Turkey: implications for the world, Muslims and secular democracy

Developing an argument based in theories of democratic consolidation and religious competition, and discussing the reasons for the secularist opposition to the government, this article analyses how government by a party rooted in moderate Islamism may affect Turkey’s peculiar secular democracy, development and external relations and how Muslims in the world relate to modernization and democracy...

Islam in local contexts: Localised Islam in Northern Pakistan

As Clifford Geertz remarked in his Islam Observed (1968), the idea of a ‘changing’ religion is a contradiction in terms, as religion is fundamentally concerned with what is permanent and eternal. Still, one way to come to terms with religious change is to consider the many ways that religion is interpreted, by laymen and scholars alike. Social anthropologists like myself have naturally found a ...

Islam in the West: From Immigration to Global Islam

Islam in Europe

Xenophobia is on the rise in Europe; and the ten million Muslims living there are often its targets. This paper contends that the fear and anxiety Westerners exhibit toward Muslims stem ultimately from a fear and anxiety regarding ourselves and our beliefs. I argue that the perceived standoff with Muslims causes us to doubt the sincerity and superiority of our own convictions. The latter are pr...