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Conference on:
Sufi Movements in Contemporary Islam
Date: |
14-16 August 2008.
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Location: |
Seminar Rooms I & II, Institute of Southeast Asian Studies (ISEAS) .
30 Heng Mui Keng Terrace, Pasir Panjang
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Within academic scholarship on contemporary Islamic expressions, the focus has largely been on Muslim 'modernists', and more recently 'fundamentalists', and their attempts to come to terms with Western modernity. This has largely ignored how traditional Sufis and traditionalist Muslim groups have responded to facets of contemporary Muslim expressions. The conference ultimately aims to educate the audience and readership about Sufism. There is often an unfounded assumption that Sufism is a sect in Islam and/or a marginal element of Islamic expression. In discussing Sufism in contemporary Islam, the presentations of this conference will focus on a relatively little studied, but demographically very substantial, segment of the global Muslim population. This conference will attempt to explicate that by theological and historical as well as anthropological standards, Sufism is not a marginal expression of certain adherents. As such, this conference itself a much-needed scholarly endeavor to re-centre the study of Sufism in scholarship on Islam. The diverse sub-themes/issues to be addressed include general themes in ancient/medieval/modern Sufi history; theological histories of diverse Sufi tariqahs; Sufi reform movements; traditionalist Muslim activism; "Neo-Sufism" and modernist Sufi intellectualism; connections between Middle Eastern, South Asian and Southeast Asian Sufi expressions; anti-Sufis and their attacks on Sufi traditionalism; and diverse forms of contemporary "cyber" and "artistic" Sufi expression and interaction. It is expected that in dealing with these issues, the papers will discuss them within the overall context of the Sufi reactions to extremism however the latter is to be defined.
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