Den som säger sig tillhöra en viss religion kan i praktiken vara mer eller mindre troende, eller inte troende alls. Det kan handla om att man firar vissa högtider men utan att särskilt bry sig om deras religiösa innebörd, eller att man ibland deltar i gudstjänster och ber någon gång i månaden, eller ett liv iständig hågkomst av Guds närvaro. Spektrat av religiositet för en person kan vara allt från att religionen endast har kulturell betydelse till att man lever sitt liv helt enligt dess påbud, såväl som att man anser att religion är en privatsak till att man arbetar för att samhället skall formas enligt religionen. Vad gäller islam i Sverige har de muslimska samfundens organisation och aktiviteter beskrivits i ganska stor detalj. Däremot finns inte mycket kunskap om de värderingar de står för. Och vad gäller värderingar och övertygelser hos muslimer i allmänhet finns nästan ingenting skrivet. Denna uppsatstar fasta på den kunskapsbristen. Genom en enkätbaserad attitydundersökning av explorativ karaktär med muslimska SFI-elever somrespondenter har följande frågor undersökts: - Är fundamentalism ett utbrett fenomen inom denna grupp? - I hur stor utsträckning anser man att shari’a bör gälla för muslimer i Sverige och vad är attityden tilldemokrati? - Hur ser relationen mellan religion och moral ut och hur uppfattas det svenska samhället i dettasammanhang? Undersökningens resultat är överlag i samstämmighet med tidigare undersökningar med liknande teman. Respondenterna har en överväldigande positiv attityd till demokrati och en stor del anser också att yttrandefrihet är bra. Samtidigt tycks många mena att islam är undantaget yttrandefriheten ochatt islamiska regler är viktigare än svensk lag. Stödet för shari’a är också påtagligt. En stor majoritet menar att gudstro är nödvändig för att vara en moralisk person och anser samtidigt att Sverige är ett moraliskt land. På grund av urvalsmetoden och den stora andel som avstått från att delta i undersökningen kan resultatet inte generaliseras utanför gruppen av respondenter.

Denna uppsats är en undersökning om hur det politiska partiet Sverigedemokraterna använder ett religiöst språk för att föra fram en agenda som kan beskrivas som främlingsfientlig med inslag av orientalism och islamofobi. Sverigedemokraterna är sprungna ur en rasistisk och nationalistiskt mylla men beskriver sig numer som ett parti som tar avstånd från alla former av rasism och som anser att alla människor har samma värde.   Genom att läsa partiets principprogram och alla artiklar som rör kristendom, kristna, kyrkan, islam, muslimer och moskéer som finns i nätupplagan av partiorganet SD-Kurirens blottläggs dock en diskurs där islam och muslimer i stort sett uteslutande sätts samman med negativa företeelser och kristendom med positiva. Genom att i sina texter välja att ständigt förknippa islam och muslimer med negativa företeelser som våld, kvinnoförtryck, hot mot yttrandefriheten och så vidare, och låta kristendom och den svenska kyrkan alltid förekomma i positiva sammanhang som handlar om tradition, vackra byggnader och trygghet för SD fram en bild där islam och muslimer framstår som de Andra och kristendomen som en kraft för ett konservativt bevarande av det svenska och västerländska.   Att detta inte är någonting nytt i den västerländska traditionen utan en del av vad som brukar kallas orientalism förklaras också.   Undersökningen visar också att SD, av materialet att döma, i sin religiositet inte drivs främst av någon andlig eller teologisk längtan utan ser religion främst som en social- och/eller politisk konstruktion som har sitt berättigande som kulturbärare. Religionen ses också som något essentialistiskt som inte kan eller bör förändas över tid.

Popular interpretations and academic scholarship tends to emphasize the relationship between jihad, military action, and communal violence. These reinforce a sense that violence is inherent to Islam. Investigations into the contexts where jihad has been deployed highlight how its use is often a call for unity believed to be necessary for political goals. Therefore, in order to deconstruct this belief, this thesis tackles instead the relationship between textual interpretations and historical actions, and how these varied across specific moments in time. The case studies examined range from the initial evolution of a theory of jihad in the late antique world, to the Crusades in the 11th and 12th centuries, to early modern dynamics of the Ottomans and Safavids, and finally to modern state-making projects in the Arabian Peninsula These examples seek to create a comprehensive picture of the intricacies rooted in jihad and the narrative that can be associated with a religion that is most often misunderstood. The effort to shed some light on the multiple facets of jihad is hinged upon how these case studies differ from one another, thus forcing the reader to question how they previously understood the modern day phenomenon of jihad. While the conversation will reiterate various themes and concepts as discussed in previous scholarship, it should push the boundaries on how jihad has been framed as a modern day extremist ideology.

No description available.

A major threat in present political climate is identity group conflict as shown in such disparate cases as former Yugoslavia, Rwanda , Northern Ireland and the rise in racism and xenophobia in Europe. Conflict Resolution theory has addressed itself to intervention in existing conflict situations either by third parties or the conflicting parties themselves but conflict prevention has been a relatively neglected area. This thesis takes a case study of relations between the Muslim and white majority communities in Bradford where underlying tensions occasionally erupt into conflicts which have national ramifications and sometimes international dimensions. Within this situation there is scope for conflict resolution work but also conflict prevention work. Reference is made to Northern Ireland where identity group conflict has been longstanding and where community relations approaches have ben tried and tested over a period of fifteen to twenty yeas. The community relations work already being undertaken in Bradford is explored along with where and how this needs to be strengthened. An action research project was undertaken to bring together young members of the Muslims and white majority communities in an attempt to assess the usefulness of workshop based approaches in improving inter-group relations and transmitting skills of conflict handling to the participants.

Mediation is a type of dispute resolution in which a third party intervenes to help disputing parties reach a mutually satisfactory agreement. In recent years, individuals and organizations have begun advertising Islamic mediation services. The development of this field has important implications for Muslims living in Western countries, as Muslim minority communities have long sought ways to resolve disputes according to their personal religious beliefs. Avenues for family dispute resolution—including the civil courts, informal Islamic courts, family counseling, and informal mediation by an imam—each have distinct drawbacks. Professional Islamic mediation could fill a significant gap in services. Although some work has been done on theoretical models of Islamic conflict resolution, little information exists on the current practice of professional Islamic mediation in Muslim minority communities. This study addresses this gap in knowledge through case studies of practicing Islamic mediators. Results indicate wide variation in the field in terms of how practitioners themselves define Islamic mediation. There were also distinct differences in the role the mediators played in relation to the disputing parties, what types of cases they mediated, and how they organized and funded their services. The lack of standardization in the field may be a positive thing, however, as different services may fill different needs in Muslim communities. / text

The partition of India that accompanied that nation's independence in 1947 created the additional state of Pakistan; by 1971, this Pakistan had fractured into the two independent states of Pakistan and Bangladesh. This dissertation seeks to expand our temporal and spatial understanding of the sub-continent's partitioning by examining the experiences of a group of South Asian Muslims across time and space. As this dissertation will show, South Asia's partitioning includes more than the official history of boundary creation and division of assets, and more than the people's history of unbridled violence. I have oriented my investigation around a single institution, the Aligarh Muslim University, and spoken to former students of the 1940s and 1950s, whose young lives were shaped by the independence and partition of India. The memories of these former students of Aligarh University offer a lens for examining the "multiple realities" of partition and the decolonized experiences of South Asian Muslims. The educational institution at Aligarh, founded in 1875, had long been concerned with cultivating a sporting, activist, masculine identity among its students; Muslim League leaders further empowered that identity as they recruited students for election work in support of Pakistan. The students embraced the values of the demand for Pakistan that appeared to be consistent with the values engendered at Aligarh. This dissertation uncovers the history of these students throughout the 1947 partition and beyond. It explores unexpected histories of trauma among communities who "chose to stay" but later experienced a powerful discontinuity in independent India. It exposes contradictions evident in remembered histories from Pakistanis who express triumph and grief at the prospect of Pakistani independence. Finally, this dissertation assesses the position of Muslims after partition and how the "disturbances" that began in the late 1940s continue to affect them today in both lived and remembered experience. As a site for examining the "disturbances" of partition, Aligarh University proves to be a hub of a community that was and remains deeply disturbed by the changes partition wrought. / text

The United States has maintained a heavy military presence in Afghanistan for a little more than a decade however; the US has been involved in Afghanistan on and off for over three decades. The 2001 ‘war on terror’ in Afghanistan became framed around the goal of saving Afghan women. In order to understand how this framing came about and what the impact of this framing was I study US congressional documents, speeches and other public rhetoric by government officials in the 1980s and early 2000s. Analyzing rhetorical language and reoccurring themes helps us understand what major framing devices and narrative techniques were in play during these time periods. Ultimately I conclude that women’s safety was a post-facto justification for intervention; the framing techniques used during the 2001 were utilized in order to create a clear, coherent narrative that selectively ignores the impact of US involvement in Afghanistan during the Cold War.

The increasingly politicized presence of Muslim communities in Britain today is raising issues not only for society in general but for other faith communities as well. Among these the Evangelical constituency, including the members of various Christian diasporas, is struggling to find a coherent response which is true to its Bible-based, activist roots. This thesis discusses the relationship of religion to the theoretical notion of the public sphere. Specifically it hypothesizes an Evangelical micro public sphere as the framework for an empirical exploration of the responses of British Evangelicals to Muslims since the events of 11th September 2001. It describes the formation, composition and discourse of this sphere drawing on data gathered from books, articles, lectures and interviews with key participants. The data reveal a marked tension, indeed a polarization, amongst Evangelicals, with an increasingly sharp disagreement between ‘confrontationalists’ and ‘conciliators’. A detailed analysis of the interaction of this sphere with Muslims, the national media and church leaders follows, leading to a concluding discussion of the future trajectory of the British Evangelical movement. Whilst it is still too early to say whether Evangelicalism will be strengthened or weakened, its encounter with Islam is likely to be an increasingly significant factor in British public life for the foreseeable future.

The aim of the study has been to analyse IS-sympathizers and their commitment to the Islamic State; however, this study will not be able to establish a representative result. The study has instead made an attempt to provide knowledge about four young Swedes who chose to leave Sweden in purpose to sympathize with, and to participate in the Islamic State. By announcing the aim of the study and the complexity of the subject area, the study has a hypothesis appropriated from earlier research which has been investigating young western Muslims. Hence, three question formulations derived; the first question intends to identify the previous research within two subject areas: religious identity and radicalization. The second question intends to analyse which common aim the four IS-sympathizers had for participating with the IS. In conclusion, the third question will analyse the possibility of a correlation between previous research and the collected empirical data. The study used a qualitative content analysis which also applied a deductive approach based on theories of deprivation and radicalization. The result of this study underlines that young Muslims acquire a stronger conflict between their individual and social concept of the world in relation to youths with the major ethnic background. The Western culture is being held up as a factor for a strengthened religious identity among the young Muslims when they are constantly forced to defend their religion. It appears that with a strengthened religious identity and a weakened national identity, the four Swedish IS-sympathizers chose to participate in the fighting in Syria after observing how the Western world had a passive standpoint regarding the prevailed situation in Syria. In this way, the four IS-sympathizers fought in favour of a religious identity in a country that they previously did not acquire a national belonging to.