They Sing Ishhumar, Their Exile
With the 54th Grammy Awards for the best world music album going to Tinariwen, a band born in Libya and brought up in the Sahara desert of Mali, a West African landlocked region, the accolade has added to the fame and stature of the African musical team. The band consists of artists Mustapha Ag Ahmed, […]
English Vinglish: A Mom’s Cinematic Self-Discovery
It was a Cool Sunday morning. Ours is an extended family, so the clatter at our home on a Sunday is much noisier than in today’s nuclear-families. But like any other family, ours too was enjoying this “Holy Day”. The best thing on that day is one can put aside the Grandfather clock – that […]
‘I want to learn experience of living Islam in India’
Amina Wadud speaks at an informal gathering held by Other Books, Calicut, which published her ‘Quran and Women’ into Malayalam Thank you very much. First I want you to know that I am loving India and I am loving Kerala specially. I have only been here for one week. It is my intention to stay […]
The Circumstance 2011: What is beyond the ancestral dichotomy?
Anything that is Iranian, either being itself or being included in the broader identity of ‘the oriental’ or ‘eastern’, in the scenario of cultural criticism, will always bring that same old dialogue on the dichotomy of west and east, or liberty and religion. In addition, we are in such a political situation that considering something […]
The Story of Abraham: A Journey of Hope for All
In the name of Allah Most Merciful Most Compassionate Delivered at the College of St. Elizabeth in on July 19 th, 2003 First of all, let me offer my Gratitude to the Almighty One for His divine grace having brought us all here today. Let me also ask for His blessings upon all of His […]
Islamic Gallery at Louvre: Good, Bad and Ugly Islams
“There is a distance between what was the Muslim civilisation, the Islamic civilisation, and its contribution to world history and what is happening now,” says Sophie Makariou, the director of the Islamic Art Department, in the context of France’s famous Louvre gallery opening a new wing dedicated to the art of Islam. The Islamic wing […]
Mappilas of Malabar – A Kitchen Community
There is no more sincere love than the love of food – thus observed George Bernard Shaw and one finds it very difficult to disprove the Shavian observation, if one has tasted any of the delicacies that Mappila cuisine of North Malabar offers. Muslims of North Kerala are generally called as Mappillas or Moplahs. Many […]
Wife-beating and Feminist Hermeneutics
Recently, a friend of mine who does not believe in Islam has said about the violent, patriarchal nature of Islam with special focus on a verse which, she says, ask men to beat women. Her allegation is motivated by innocence-to clarify her doubt. But the verse in question has been used as a material for […]
The Kite Runner: Plotting an Afghan Narrative
For Aristotle ‘catharsis’ was the aim of entertainers. We make thrillers in the way Shakespeare did comedies, tragedies and tragi-comedies to create so much catharsis as to make us shed our emotional tensions through tears, as to make us laugh our problems out and as to fix our buttocks on the edge of our seats […]
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