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Contemplating Sufism: Dialogue and Tradition across Southeast AsiaFriday, January 24th at 8 PM EST (24th Rajab)
Presented by: Professor Khairudin Aljunied (National University of Singapore / International Institute of Islamic Thought and Civilization / Georgetown University / Ihya Journal of Islamic Thought) Discussant: Dr. Safaruk Chowdhury (Centre for Islamic Knowledge / Ibn Rushd Centre for Excellence and Research / Journal of Islamic Philosophy / Islamic Literary Society) |
This CIK Talk based on Dr. Khairudin’s new book Contemplating Sufism: Dialogue and Tradition across Southeast Asia explores the factors and forces that have enabled Islam to assert and embed itself in Southeast Asia. Using a unique “contemplative histories” methodology, Khairudin Aljunied reveals the multiple undercurrents that continue to influence Sufi thought and practices. The book argues that the Sufis employed creative and spirited dialogues with themselves and those they encountered to sustain their importance in Southeast Asia for many centuries.
Engaging and highly readable, Contemplating Sufism is filled with vignettes and anecdotes of Southeast Asian Sufism, including the author's ethnographic observations and personal experiences living and learning about Sufism. Concise chapters illustrate the inventiveness of the Sufis in spreading their ideas while highlighting their influence on ideological, emotional, cultural, political, and social changes in Southeast Asia. Uncovering how and why Sufism became an energetic force in Southeast Asian history, this book:
Contemplating Sufism: Dialogue and Tradition across Southeast Asia is an excellent textbook for undergraduate and graduate courses on Sufism across disciplines, such as philosophy, political science, history religious studies, and anthropology. It is also a valuable resource for academics, analysts, social scientists, legal scholars, and historians with an interest in the subject.
Engaging and highly readable, Contemplating Sufism is filled with vignettes and anecdotes of Southeast Asian Sufism, including the author's ethnographic observations and personal experiences living and learning about Sufism. Concise chapters illustrate the inventiveness of the Sufis in spreading their ideas while highlighting their influence on ideological, emotional, cultural, political, and social changes in Southeast Asia. Uncovering how and why Sufism became an energetic force in Southeast Asian history, this book:
- Provides an accessible and coherent synthesis of the latest scholarship in the field
- Explores the various modes of Sufi engagement across Southeast Asia, with special attention paid to dialogue and the making of traditions
- Offers vivid descriptions and rich analyses of texts, ideas, people, practices, and institutions that aided in the development of Sufism
- Incorporates new data from repositories in Singapore, Malaysia, Indonesia, Brunei, South Thailand, Britain, Australia, the Netherlands, and the United States
Contemplating Sufism: Dialogue and Tradition across Southeast Asia is an excellent textbook for undergraduate and graduate courses on Sufism across disciplines, such as philosophy, political science, history religious studies, and anthropology. It is also a valuable resource for academics, analysts, social scientists, legal scholars, and historians with an interest in the subject.
Dr. Khairudin Aljunied is an Associate Professor at the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences, National University of Singapore (NUS). He received his BA and MA in History from the National University of Singapore in 2003 and completed his doctorate at the School of Oriental and African Studies, London, in 2008. Dr. Khairudin has studied and conducted research in countries such as the Philippines, Indonesia, Malaysia, Australia, the Netherlands, and the United Kingdom. Dr. Khairudin has held a number of visiting positions. He was an Honorary Research Associate at La Trobe University, Australia, in 2012. In 2013, he was a Fulbright Professor at Columbia University. More recently, Dr. Khairudin was a Visiting Professor at the University of Brunei (2015). He was appointed as Full Professor and the Malaysia Chair of Islam in Southeast Asia at Georgetown University (2017-2018) and maintains a position as Senior Fellow. A recognized specialist in the field of intellectual history, his research focuses on the connections between Southeast Asia and Global Islam. He is the author and editor of thirteen books and more than thirty internationally refereed articles. Recent publications include Resistance and Protest in Colonial Malaya (Northern Illinois University Press, 2016), Muslim Cosmopolitanism: Southeast Asian Islam in Comparative Perspective (Edinburgh University Press, 2017), Hamka and Islam: Cosmopolitan Reform in the Malay World (Cornell University Press, 2018), Islam in Malaysia: An Entwined History (Oxford University Press, 2019), and Shapers of Islam in Southeast Asia (New York: Oxford University Press, 2022).
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