An anthropology of Muslims in Europe - A modest attempt by Martijn
In navolging van Merkel en Cameron hebben nu ook Verhagen en Rutte gesteld dat de multiculturele samenleving mislukt is. Maar wat bedoelt men daar nu eigenlijk mee? In een serie van blogposts geef ik een schets van de maatschappelijke context waarin deze redenering opkomt en het blootleggen van de gevaarlijke cirkelredenering van het falen van de multikul. Dit is deel 2 over een perverse vorm van multiculturalisme.
Women’s conversion to Islam is a hot topic. Within a political context that perceives both Islam and women as important boundary markers between ‘us’ and ‘them’ the female convert is presented as the ultimate other. Often women’s involvement in religious movements is seen as a sign of mere female superstition, irrationalism, fanaticism, or the result of a false consciousness and their perceived submission to male supremacy is often poorly understood. In this seminar the participants explore new developments in the field of the study of conversion and focus on how women themselves are active agents in constructing a coherent self, a gendered Muslim identity and in creating sense of belonging while mainting a relationship with non-Muslims.
According to Asef Bayat, if revolutions are about intense struggle for a profound change, then any revolution should expect a counterrevolution of subtle or blatant forms. The question is not if the threat of counter-revolution is to be expected; the question rather is if the ‘revolutions’ are revolutionary enough to offset the perils of restoration. It seems that the Arab revolutions remain particularly vulnerable precisely because of their distinct peculiarity—their structural anomaly expressed in the paradoxical trajectory of political change.
In navolging van Merkel en Cameron hebben nu ook Verhagen en Rutte gesteld dat de multiculturele samenleving mislukt is. Maar wat bedoelt men daar nu eigenlijk mee? In een serie van blogposts geef ik een schets van de maatschappelijke context waarin deze redenering opkomt en het blootleggen van de gevaarlijke cirkelredenering van het falen van de multikul. Dit is deel 1.
José Casanova will deliver a lecture at Radboud University Nijmegen on 10 March 2011 on the topic of religion in a secular public sphere. Within Western societies, some of which are secular through-and-through, the activities or religious movements that claim a prominent role in society cause a climate of conflicts and tensions. But the success of these religious movements proves that modernity and religion are far from mutually exclusive phenomena and that modern secularized society must find a way of integrating them in its fabric.
Today the Netherlands has regional elections. The current campaign is dominated not by regional issues but by national themes. This, hopefully could lead to a high turn out rate but I doubt it since the 1995 elections not even half of the population voted in 1999, 2003 and 2007. This has inspired a Dutch journalism student to make video with the protesters on Tahrir Square in Cairo calling upon the Dutch to go and vote.
Gert Borg kijkt terug op de ontwikkelingen in Egypte en blikt vooruit. Daarnaast gaat hij in op de tribale structuren in Libië en Jemen en de vraag hoe deze zich verhouden tot het project van een levensvatbare economie.
