<p> This dissertation examines twentieth-century Jewish-Muslim relations in Morocco&rsquo;s Atlas Mountains through oral traditions (anecdotes, jokes, songs, poetry duels) as remembered by Muslims and Jews in the twenty-first century. Jews had lived in these predominantly Berber-speaking regions for over one thousand years; yet these rural Jewish communities had almost completely disappeared by the early 1960s, due to mass emigration, largely to Israel. Despite the totality of the rupture, Jews and Muslims retain vivid memories of their former neighbors. Drawing on my fieldwork with Muslims still living in Moroccan villages and with Jews in Israel who had emigrated from those same villages over half a century earlier, I use the anecdotes and songs that animate these reminiscences as my primary sources. My analysis is further informed by extensive research on Moroccan history and culture. My study reveals that Berber oral traditions functioned in the past&mdash;and continue to function in present-day reminiscences&mdash;as forms of creative acknowledgment of both difference and affinity between Jews and Muslims. Analyzing examples from this corpus illuminates aspects and nuances of the intricacies of daily life rarely addressed in other sources, facilitating a deeper understanding of the paradoxes and possibilities of Jewish/Muslim co-existence in Morocco&rsquo;s Atlas Mountains, and perhaps beyond.</p><p> Central to my theoretical concerns, therefore, are interreligious cultural production and boundaries. Berber cultural traditions in particular offer a unique framework (for both participants and researchers) for addressing issues of boundaries and difference, while simultaneously elucidating the shared cultural worlds of Jews and Muslims in which oral traditions played a crucial role, and out of which came creativity, humor, and community. It was the engagement with difference, rather than its erasure, that fostered community and a rich intercultural life.</p><p> I begin with an investigation of the phenomenon of Arabic-speaking Jews among Berber-speaking Muslims, which also illuminates Jewish participation in Berber oral&mdash;and other cultural&mdash;traditions. Rather than a unidirectional acculturation of the minority into the majority culture, Berber cultural forms engaged by Muslims and Jews reflect a dynamic interchange. I posit the idea of Muslim-Jewish &ldquo;co-productions&rdquo; for many of the shared Berber oral traditions, particularly for the poetic duels. In my analysis of the recounted anecdotes and poems, I explore how Muslims and Jews not only speak <i> of</i> each other but also <i>through</i> each other&rsquo;s voices. Through adaptation of Bakhtin&rsquo;s theoretical concepts of dialogism and polyphony, I show how speaking in one another&rsquo;s voices allows Muslim and Jewish narrators to express multiple and often contradictory meanings simultaneously. Throughout my analysis, I investigate how boundaries did not always fall neatly or predictably into religious categories, nor did the complex socio-political stratification fit into a simplified majority-minority binary.</p><p> The nuanced views of Jewish-Muslim relationships that my project presents serve as a model for exploring such intercommunal relations beyond the temporal and geographic focus of my dissertation. My study serves as a corrective to simplified and polarized views of Jewish-Muslim relations prevalent in public spheres, media, and still, though to a lesser degree, in academia, and leads to an appreciation of the complexity and diversity of such relationships. </p><p>

There was a massive influx of Afghan refugees into Pakistan following the Soviet military intervention in Afghanistan in December 1979. An attempt has been made here to analyze the political, ethnic, economic and social ramifications of the Afghan refugees on Pakistan. Among the consequences of the presence of Afghan refugees are: 1. A heavy burden on Pakistan's resources on account of sustaining the 2.8 million Afghan refugees 2. Friction between Afghan refugees and the Pakistani population, due to land, employment, animal grazing-pasture and water-supply disputes, and 3. A direct threat to Pakistan's internal security and political stability, which is made evident by numerous violations of Pakistan's western borders by Soviet-Afghan air and ground forces in pursuit of the refugees and Afghan Mujahidin. The political talks on the Afghan crisis are deadlocked on the question of a Soviet troop withdrawal. The Soviets and Afghans insist on the stoppage of foreign support to the Afghan counterrevolutionaries. The refugees in Pakistan will not return to their homes unless they are insured a safe and honorable life by the Afghan government.

Abstract not available.

This thesis develops an Islamic legislative drafting methodology that is meant to serve a basis for bringing the family law of Islamic countries into line with current conceptions of gender equality found not only in the West but in Islamic law (the shari'a) as well. Contrary to Western assumption, the principle of gender equality is a fundamental principle of the Qur'an. As such, it pre-dates the emergence of concern for women's equality in Europe by several centuries. Despite the early acceptance of gender equality in the Qur'an, shari'a contains many rules that are inconsistent with equality. By way of example, I focus on the wife's obedience obligation found in verse 34 of sura An-Nisa' (women) of the Qur'an and still found in the current family law of Palestine. I show how the obedience obligation can be abolished while remaining true to the basic principles of shari'a. Historically, in the face of pressures to adopt Western models of legal reform, some Islamic states have sought to use eclecticism as a legislative technique to select the most appropriate rule for current social conditions "from within" the shari'a sources. As understood by traditionalists, "from within" refers to one or more schools of classical jurisprudence dating from the 9th and 10th centuries. I argue that in keeping with a liberal interpretative approach to Islamic law reform, it is essential to include all sources of shari'a within the scope of eclecticism including the original and pure texts of the Qur'an and the Sunna as well as modern interpretations of these primary sources. By relying directly on the pure sources of the shari'a considered in their historical context, one can distinguish the fundamental and permanent principles of shari'a from the temporary rules. It is also essential not to confine research to classical jurisprudence at the expense of modern interpretative efforts. There is no basis for privileging old interpretive efforts. The methodology I advocate involves identifying the fundamental principles of shari'a and recognizing that fundamental principles must be adapted to the socio-economic conditions in which they are to be applied. In Palestine, the conditions that gave rise to the wife's obedience obligation no longer exist and new ways of achieving equality must be found. The methodology I set out in this thesis provides a path to achieve this goal.

<p> In the last decade, theorists in anthropology and other disciplines have vigorously critiqued commonplace distinctions between secularism and religion. Highlighting how secularism is a form of Western epistemology, such theorists have argued this distinction is deeply problematic because it obscures secularism&rsquo;s historical, political, and cultural particularity. </p><p> My dissertation argues Iran is well situated to engage in this debate because its political terrain brings into relief how discussions of secularity and religiosity often fall back on an irresolvable dichotomy wherein secularism is defended without qualification or religious authoritarianism is ignored altogether. In an effort to move out of this impasse, my dissertation critiques the presumed neutrality of secularism without defending a thoroughly undemocratic Islamic Republic.</p><p> Through an examination of three sites within Iranian politics since 1979, I show how alternatives to both secularism and undemocratic forms of Islam are already present in Iran. The first site that I explore is the contemporary Iranian women&rsquo;s movement, specifically the One Million Signatures Campaign, which seeks full gender equality within the laws of the Islamic Republic. I argue that the internal logic of rights and a specific set of socio-political conditions that arose out of the revolution in 1979 made the newly fostered cooperation between Islamic and secular feminists within this campaign possible. Utilizing critiques of rights by poststructuralist and postcolonial feminists, I arrive at a critical endorsement of women&rsquo;s rights in Iran that calls for nurturing more radical political imaginaries by not treating rights jurisprudence as the apex of social justice struggles.</p><p> My second site focuses on the politics of time and its role in the 2009 post-election uprising as a further example of the porous boundary between secularism and religion in Iran. After surveying the history of Iran&rsquo;s three dominant calendars and the forty-day mourning cycle of Shi&rsquo;ite Islam in the last century, I argue the Islamic Republic is founded on temporal simultaneity, a non-secular organization of time wherein past, present, and future are enfolded into one dynamic moment. I conclude that during the 2009 uprising, protesters initiated a crisis of legitimacy for the regime by reconfiguring temporal markers that comprise this symbolic foundation of the contemporary Iranian state.</p><p> My final site is the visual culture in the Islamic Republic as well as Western understandings and depictions of it. I argue such analyses of artistic production in Iran by Western observers rely on a particular understanding of the state, religion, and art as discrete categories wholly separate from one another. This argument is twofold, the first part of which is a historical survey that shows how the relationship between art and the state in Iran over the last sixty years has been co-constitutive. On the basis of this history, I then explore contemporary Iranian street art, both sanctioned and illicit, to show how this convergence of art and the state has continued to unfold in the Islamic Republic. I show how the boundaries between culture and the state have not calcified under the current regime but remain dynamically in flux, albeit different ways than in the previous historical epoch.</p><p> Lastly, I trace how the politics of secularism and religion both consolidates and frays the public/private divide within these three sites. Given this fact, the question of what to do with secularism and religion in Iran is ultimately a question of what to do about the divide between the private and public spheres. Taking up the issue of the double-bind structuring the public/private divide, I conclude my dissertation by surveying the ethical-politico limitations and possibilities of these alternative political imaginaries in Iran.</p>

The dissertation critically analyzes the response of a major research public university to the attacks of 9/11 in order to gain a deeper understanding of public universities' stance on the relevance of Middle East studies, particularly in the context of the serious and far-reaching impact of 9/11. The absence of an articulated position of the U. S. universities in recognizing this need suggests the perpetuation of the dominant discourses of power and centrality of Western knowledge in the academy—the discourses that historically led to the marginalization of Middle East studies in the U. S. universities during the Cold War period. The study, underpinned largely by a critical theoretical perspective, employs a qualitative case study strategy to explore and analyze the presence of dominant Western ideological discourses that may have contributed to producing particular stance of the university's leadership on the relevance of Middle East studies in the aftermath of 9/11. More specifically, a critique is developed from the perceptions and insights of the senior administration and faculty based on their views of the pertinence of Middle East studies, and whether they think the university's response has been rather deficient. The evidence drawn from this enquiry highlights that the thinking and practice that had arisen and prevailed during the Cold War still persists, ostensibly in the dominant academic discourses.

No description available.

No description available.

The intent of this thesis is to explore the history of classification of Arab-Americans within the United States, showcase how Arab-Americans have encountered systematic racism, and give reasons why Arab-Americans should be able to self-identify. Currently, according to the Census definition, Middle Easterners fall under the "White" category. This is a misrepresentation of Middle Easterners as they should be considered a minority in light of societal treatment and policies set forth by policy makers. Even though much research has been conducted by the Census, they have elected to withhold the Middle Eastern or North African (MENA) category from the 2020 Census. Solutions for this issue are: Gaining universities' involvement in the movement for a MENA category, encouraging legislation to place MENA as a minority within affirmative action, and the MENA category being placed on the 2030 census.

No description available.