Postcolonialism and Islam are two terms that frequently appear in tandem; however, the relationship between the two and the question of their compatibility has never been extensively investigated. The speed and intensity of changes characteristic of late modernity under the pressure of cultural and economic globalisation has traumatised Muslims and non- Muslims alike. Hybrid identity formations, very often provisional, are generated in the articulation of differences marked by imaginary relations to faith, nation, class, gender, sexuality and language. Postcolonialism might seem to provide a framework for approaching the experiences of not only formerly colonised subjects, but emigres, exiles and expatriates and their host societies. However, Muslim writers and intellectuals have both adopted and rejected postcolonial theory as an effective tool for analysing and accounting for the experience of Muslims in the modern world.
This conference seeks to explore these questions by problematising the terms themselves and their juxtaposition.
Conference Programme
Friday, 16 April
9:15 – 9:45 – Registration/Coffee & Tea in the Prospect Building
9:45-10:00 – Welcome address by Professor Gary Holmes, Dean of the Faculty of Education & Society, in the Sir Tom Cowie Lecture Theatre, Prospect Building
10:00 – 11:00 – Keynote – Prof. Patrick Williams (Nottingham Trent University): ‘Postcolonialism & Orientalism’ in the Sir Tom Cowie Lecture Theatre, Prospect Building
Chair: Dr. Geoff Nash
11:00 – 12:30 – Parallel Sessions: ‘Islam in Postcolonial Settings’ and ‘Islamic Studies & Politics’
‘Islam in Postcolonial Settings’ in Prospect Building 007
Chair: Prof. Patrick Williams
- Pei-Chien Wu (SOAS): ‘Freedom of Marginality: Negotiating Chinese Muslim Identity in Malaysia’
- William Berridge (University of Durham): ‘Sudanese Police and Prison Officers and Attitudes Towards Sharia, c.1960-1989’
- Dr. Ho Wai-Yip (City University of Hong Kong): ‘Postcolonial Mosque: Under the Sovereign State of China and Transnational Capital from the Gulf’
- Iqbal Akhtar (University of Edinburgh): ‘
‘Islamic Studies & Politics’ in Prospect Building 009
Chair: Kathleen Kerr-Koch
- Dr. Abdulsalam Hamad (University of Nizwa): ‘Western Arabo-Islamophobia: Where will it end?’
- Humayun Kabir (Hiroshima University): ‘Politics of “Islam”, the State and the Contesting Cultural Identity in Bangladesh: Contemporary Ulama and their Activism’
- Dr. Moeen Cheema (Australian National University): ‘Postcolonial (Il)legality: Islamization of Criminal Laws in Pakistan’
- Maszlee Malik (University of Durham): ‘Islamic Ontology for Governance’
12:30 – 13:30 – Lunch
13:30 – 14:30 – Keynote – Dr. Anastasia Valassopoulos (University of Manchester): ‘Postcolonialism and Islam: Arab Cinema of the 1960s/70s’ in the Sir Tom Cowie Lecture Theatre, Prospect Building
Chair: Kathleen Kerr-Koch
14:30 – 15:45 – Parallel Sessions: ‘Postcolonial & Multicultural Representations’ & ‘Islam in South Asian Fiction’
‘Postcolonial & Multicultural Representations’ in Prospect Building 007
Chair: Dr. Sarah Hackett
- Amira Richler (University of Rochester, New York): ‘Asserting the Right to Protest: Monica Ali’s Brick Lane and the Collision of Feminist and Postcolonial Politics’
- Dr. Monika Albrecht (University of Limerick): ‘Postcolonialism, Islam, and German Literature’
- Chloe Gill-Khan (SOAS): ‘Postcolonial Citizenship in “Multicultural” Britain: A Reading of Tariq Mehmood’s While there is Light’
‘Islam in South Asian Fiction’ in Prospect Building 009
Chair: Dr. Geoff Nash
- Catherine Fildes (University of Cambridge): ‘Hybrid, Unified and British: Islam in British South Asian Fiction’
- Prof. Abdul Kidwai (Aligarh Muslim University, India): ‘Recountextualization of Muslim Society and Modernity in Qaisra Shahraz’s The Holy Woman (2001)’
- Dr. Alex Pademsee (University of Kent): ‘Postnational Aesthetics and the Work of Mourning in Ahmed Ali’s Twilight in Delhi’
15:45 – 16:00 – Coffee/Tea
16:00-17:00 – Keynote – Dr. Claire Chambers (Leeds Metropolitan University) Interviews Fadia Faqir in the Sir Tom Cowie Lecture Theatre, Prospect Building
Chair: Dr. Geoff Nash
17:00 – 18:15 – Parallel Sessions: ‘Arab Literary Voices’ & ‘Islam & Multiculturalism in Britain’
‘Arab Literary Voices’ in Prospect Building 007
Chair: Dr. Anastasia Valassopoulos
- Dr. Christina Phillips (SOAS): ‘The Domestic Other: Islam in the Arabic Novel’
- Yousef Awad (University of Manchester): ‘‘Islam and Trans-cultural Dialogue/Monologue – Leila Aboulela’s The Translator’
- Linda Maloul (University of Manchester): ‘Refracting and Subverting the Oriental Tale: The Representation of Islam in the Fiction of Ahdaf Soueif and Leila Aboulela’
‘Islam & Multiculturalism in Britain’ in Prospect Building 009
Chair: Dr. Tahir Abbas
- Samaya Farooq (University of Warwick): ‘Shooting Hoops for Britain: De-Colonising the British Muslim Women’s Basketball Team’
- Brooke Storer (University of Bristol): ‘From the Drawing Board to Everyday Reality: Navigating British Muslims’ Identities through Notions of “Private”, “Public” and “Political”’
- Alexej Ulbricht (SOAS): ‘Liberal Multiculturalism/Liberal Monoculturalism’
7pm Onwards – Conference Dinner in the Lowry Room in the Marriott Hotel
Saturday, 17 April
9:30 – 10:30 – Keynote – Prof. Javed Majeed (Queen Mary, University of London): ‘Islam, Aesthetics & Postcolonialism: Mohammed Iqbal’ in the Sir Tom Cowie Lecture Theatre, Prospect Building
Chair: Kathleen Kerr-Koch
10:30 – 11:00 – Coffee/Tea
11:00 – 12:30 – Parallel Sessions: ‘Situating Muslim Women’ & ‘Islam on Film & Music’
‘Situating Muslim Women’ in Prospect Building 007
Chair: Dr. Claire Chambers
- Petra Feldmann (University of Bielefeld): ‘Between Orient or Modernity? Representations of German-Muslim Women in German Mass Media: A Critical Glance’
- Dr. Fotini Tsibiridou (Macedonia University): ‘In the Name of Islam! Critical Approach to the Politics of Islamic Feminism’
- Silvia Bruzzi (Bologna University): ‘The Contribution of Western Colonial Discourse in Bounding Muslim Women Leadership. An Historical Case Study’
- Ruth Barzilai-Lumbroso (Interdisciplinary Center Herzliya, Israel): ‘Reverse Orientalism: Turkish Historians Writing the History of Ottoman Women’
‘Islam on Film & Music’ in Prospect Building 009
Chair: Dr. Sarah Hackett
- Syed Haider (SOAS): ‘Shooting Muslims: Looking at Islam in Bollywood through a Postcolonial Lens’
- Sariel Birnbaum (Hebrew University): Youssef Chahine and the Colonial and Postcolonial West’
- Dr. Claire Chambers (Leeds Metropolitan University): ‘Choosing Between the Sacred and the Secular in Recent Filmic Representations of British Muslims’
- Dr. Amir Saeed (University of Sunderland): ‘Between Hip-Hop and Muhammad: European Muslim Hip-Hop and Identity’
12:30 – 13:30 – Lunch
13:30 – 14:30 – Keynote – Dr. Rabah Aissaoui (University of Leicester): ‘The Political Uses of Religion by North African Immigrants in Colonial and Post-colonial France’ in the Sir Tom Cowie Lecture Theatre, Prospect Building
Chair: Dr. Sarah Hackett
14:30 – 15:45 – Parallel Sessions: ‘Islam in the West’ & ‘Theorising Muslims & Islam’
‘Islam in the West’ in Prospect Building 007
Chair: Kathleen Kerr-Koch
- Candace Hoffman-Hussain (Lancaster University): ‘An Exploration of Hybrid Identities of Five Interfaith Muslim-Christian Couples in Postcolonial Britain’
- Leon Moosavi (Lancaster University): ‘Muslim Converts in a Post-colonial World’
- Siraj Khan: ‘Islam at the Crossroads: No Left Turn’
‘Theorising Muslims & Islam in Prospect Building 009
Chair: Dr. Geoff Nash
- Dr. Rosa Vasilaki (University of Bristol): ‘The Muslim Political Subject: From Postcolonialism to Radical Historicism’
- Narzanin Massoumi (University of Bristol): ‘The Political Consciousness of Muslim Women Activists in the Movement against the “War on Terror”’
- Prof. Mustapha Marrouchi (University of Nevada, Las Vegas): ‘(Im)possible Narratives: Islams De/Reconstructed’
15:45 – 16:15 – Coffee/Tea
16:15 – 17:15 – Keynote – Dr. Tahir Abbas (Head of Research, Policy and International Relations, DEEN Foundation): ‘Post-Islamism in the Context of Globalisation and Multicultural Politics: British Muslims at the Crossroads’ in the Sir Tom Cowie Lecture Theatre, Prospect Building
Chair: Dr. Sarah Hackett
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