The Two Year Initiative on Islam and Other Religions

Visiting Scholars

Kambiz GhaneaBassiri

• May 19, 2011
• 5:30 pm in Lane's Center for Meeting and Learning
• CML 104 (capacity of 200)
• Free and open to the entire community.

Islam in America:

American Muslims and the American Body Politic

Abstract:

The controversy that arose last year around a proposed Muslim community center in Lower Manhattan was a reminder of the still unsettled place of Muslims in the American body politic. While Muslim belonging remains politically in question today, historically American Muslims have been active participants in American society for many decades.

This lecture traced the history of American Muslim community and institution building in the past three decades to demonstrate the shortcoming of the contemporary political discourse on American Muslims, which has focused on the nature of Islam and its relation to American interests at the expense of Muslims' actual historical experiences in the United States.

Bio:

Kambiz GhaneaBassiri is an Associate Professor of Religion and Humanities at Reed College. He received his bachelor's degree in Religious Studies from Claremont McKenna College (1994) and completed his master's and doctoral degrees on Islamic Studies in the Committee on the Study of Religion at Harvard University (2003).

During 2006-2007, Dr. GhaneaBassiri served as the Interim Director of Academic Affairs at Dar Al Hadith Al Hassania, a prestigious, state-sponsored Islamic seminary in Rabat, Morocco. He was selected as a Carnegie Scholar in 2006 for his recent book on A History of Islam in America: From the New World to the New World Order (Cambridge University Press, 2010).

In addition to his work on the history of Islam in America, Dr. GhaneaBassiri specializes in classical and modern Islamic intellectual and social history in the Middle East.