Islamicate Civilisation
-
The Mughals!
After a Clubhouse debate on the Mughals, the author rejects both the ‘great Indians’ and ‘genocidal colonisers’ extremes, arguing they were partly an alien Turco-Mongol presence yet drove changes that…
-
Review: Magic in Islam by Michael Mohammed Knight
In an old capsule review, the author calls Michael Knight’s Magic in Islam a hot mess worth reading: full of fascinating material on magic in Islamicate tradition, but wrapped in…
-
Book Review: Islamic Empires- Fifteen Cities that Define a Civilization
Reviewing Justin Marozzi’s Islamic Empires, the reviewer argues that Indic and Islamic civilisations contrast in how they value the urban: Dharmic thought favours solitude and the forest, while Islam has…
-
Will the Sikhs Save India?
Omar Ali explains his tweet that Sikhs might restore balance to India: he argues Sikhism is an Indic religion, with Islamicate vocabulary but not Islamic in any strong sense, and…
-
What is indigenous about Indian civilization?
Razib Khan asks readers what is indigenous to Indian civilisation, noting that potatoes, tomatoes and chillies are New World crops now central to its cuisine, and whether North Indian Hindu…
-
Browncast Episode 118: Professor Ahmet Kuru, Islam, Authoritarianism and Underdevelopment
A BrownCast episode with Professor Ahmet Kuru of San Diego State, author of Islam, Authoritarianism and Underdevelopment, discussing his book and the causes of the relative decline of the Islamicate…
-
India, Pakistan, TNT
Two tweets set side by side: one urging Pakistanis to see themselves as Muslims within India’s ancient civilisation, the other insisting that the only identity is ‘Muslim’, with an Ertuğrul…
-
Why Indian Muslims are in India not of India
Razib Khan asks why Indian Muslims have stayed less assimilated than earlier arrivals such as the Ahom. He argues that the gap between Islam and Dharmic traditions matters, and that…
-
How Islam’s greatness redounds to Indian religion
The author argues that the more transformative Islam appears in the genetic and cultural record, the more remarkable it is that India was still about 75 per cent non-Muslim on…
-
As India Saffronises, 9 Questions on her Za’faran sister (IranZamin) with Professor Foltz-
Starting from the etymology of saffron, the author laments the loss of India’s Islamicate and Persianate heritage as the country saffronises, with Urdu left to the Hindu majority’s mercy. He…
