Rituals and Beliefs in Everyday Life in the Middle East
The Middle East, what is known to be as one of the most predominant region to originate several major religions, including Judaism, Christianity, Islam and many other different religions. It has been a crossroads of countless peoples and the origin of many religions. The Middle East is also called Near East as opposed to Far East, given to it by some of the first Modern Western geographers and historians, who tended to divide what they called the orient into three regions. It stretched from the lands around the southern and eastern shares of the Mediterranean Sea, extending from Morocco to the Arabian Peninsula and Iran. This essay will review some of the greatest Anthropology study of the politics in the Middle East including political Islam and how ethnic minorities have struggle over times to practice their own religion in the coexistence of religiously diverse populations. The Middle East religious practices are something considered paramount in the society and the world as a whole. Religion is
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From 1960’s, there has been approximately 80 violent changes of governments in the Africa continent. During this changes, there has been civil strife, wars and conflicts with human lives being lost as a result. By the turn of the millennium, many changes were forced into the African society, which had detrimental effects. While religious minorities were second-class subjects, they did enjoy significant accommodations. Jewish communi- ties, for instance, did not suffer the severe limitations and persecution experienced by Jews in Europe. Muslim-ruled Spain and Iraq became centers of flourishing Jewish cul- ture and scholarship, and after their expulsion from Spain in 1492, many Jews fled to the eastern Mediterranean and established their homes in territories governed by the Ottoman
Lewis, Bernard. The Middle East: A Brief History of the Last 2,000 Years. New York: Scribner,
Yahweh, B. L. (2013). Jewish and african affairs. In B. Yahweh (Ed.), Jews and the African
After a journey into the dark history of Europe and Africa with Sven Lindqvist, I found myself shocked. It’s earth shattering. Ideas and historical events are presented through a journal/proposal of his unique view on racism. Lindqvist raises questions as to where racism was spurred and why what happened in late 1800’s and early 1900’s lead to the holocaust. Including religion, personal human values, advanced warfare and even societies’ impact as a whole. His travels through the Sahara and Africa in the early chapters show a more current day view of society over seas. The description of the desolate continent and harsh conditions paints a picture of what previous civilization lived through. He explains that part of the reason he has traveled to the desert is to feel the space all around him, a definite emptiness if you will. As his travels progress he introduces his own family life that pertains to the human emotion, which is also a big focus point in this book. Childhood beatings over taking the lord’s name in vain, dropped calls from his daughter that leave him torn and sad. He does an excellent job on taking the reader on a personal journey with him through his current day traveling and even his early life. Linking these personal experiences and tying in histories misconceptions of “right and wrong” is what makes this book so valuable. Lindqvist gives a relevant and educated answer to the question of how racism became such a terrible tribulation in all parts of the world.
Hourani, Albert. A History of the Arab Peoples. Cambridge, MA: Belknap of Harvard UP, 1991. Print.
Burns, Thomas J. "Islam." Religion and Society. OU Campus' Dale Hall, Norman. 14 Apr. 2014. Lecture.
Ayoob, M. (2007) The Many Faces of Political Islam: Religion and Politics in the Muslim
The African continent features a beautiful mixture of culture, religion, and ideas. In particular, West Africa has a fascinating mixture of Islamic and traditional African culture. This mixture of religion is seen in West Africa due to the growing presence of Islam from 1200 to 1500. West Africa underwent a huge transformation as Islam became more widespread during the latter timeframe. Islam was transformative to West Africa’s economy, art, religious practices, and politics.
David Foster Wallace’s “Incarnations of Burned Children” shows that blame and remorse is inevitable in any frightening situation. For someone who went through decades of clinical depression himself, Wallace knew the theme of blame and remorse very well (Lipsky). "I don't think that he ever lost the feeling that there was something shameful about this," his father says. "His instinct was to hide it." (Lipsky). This could have added to his reasoning for publishing Incarnations of Burned Children. This story was full of emotion and overwhelmed by great sadness. It was obviously that someone who was struggling could write such a moving piece of work.
Throughout his life, the Prophet Muhammad proved to be exceptionally adept at uniting diverse groups, negotiating a series of alliances and loyalty arrangements that spanned religious, tribal, ethnic, and familial lines (Berggren 2009). Among other things, this ability enabled Muhammad to forge a shared identity and found a nascent Islamic state from a diverse and even heterogeneous community (Rahman 1982; Ernst 2003, pp. 87-93). This diversity proved to be both a source of strength and conflict for Islam, and following the death of Muhammad early Islamic communities engaged in extensive debates not only about the nature of his teachings or how to carry his legacy forward, but also about the terms that should be used to define his authority. Although this debate produced a colorful array of movements within the tapestry of early Islamic civilization, this essay offers a critical examination of two particularly distinct perspectives on the nature of prophetic authority: namely, those articulated
The Islamic tradition, as reflected in Naguib Mahfouz’s Zaabalawi, has over the course of history had an incredible impact on Arab culture. In Mahfouz’s time, Islamic practices combined with their political relevance proved a source of both great power and woe in Middle Eastern countries. As alluded to in Zaabalawi, Mahfouz asserts the fact that not all Muslims attain religious fulfillment through this common tradition, and other methods outside the scope of Islam may be necessary in true spiritual understanding.
Orientalism as termed by Edward Said is meant to create awareness of a constellation of assumptions that are flawed and underlying Western attitudes towards the Muslim societies. Evidence from his 1978 book “Orientalism”, states that the culture has been of influence and marred with controversy in post colonial studies and other fields of study. Moreover, the scholarship is surrounded by somehow persistent and otherwise subtle prejudice of Eurocentric nature, which is against Islam religion and culture (Windschuttle, 1999). In his book, Said illustrates through arguments, that the long tradition in existence containing romanticized images of Islamic stronghold regions i.e. Middle East, and the Western culture have for a long time served as implicit justifications for the European and American Imperial ambitions. In light of this, Said denounced the practice of influential Arabs who contributed to the internalization of Arabic culture ideas by US and British orientalists. Thus, his hypothesis that Western scholarship on Muslim was historically flawed and essentially continues to misrepresent the reality of Muslim people. In lieu to this, Said quotes that, “So far as the United States seems to be concerned, it is only a slight overstatement to say that Muslims and Arabs are essentially seen as either oil suppliers or potential terrorists. Therefore, very few details such as human density, the passion of Arab-Muslim life has entered the awareness of even the people whose profession revolve around reporting of the Arab world. Due to this, we have instead a series of crude, essentialized caricatures of the Islamic world presented in such a way as to make that world vulnerable to military aggression” (Said, 1980).
In the Islamic conquest, Muslims conquered large areas consisting of distinct religion members. Muslims believed that all religions should be treated respectably; hence Jews and Christians followed ...
The Fatimid’s had been rumored to be tolerant, compassionate and focused on unifying Islam; however, it has been proved that this was not always the case. Orientalists have acknowledged their contribution towards the advancement of Islam and claim that the Christian and Jewish communities excelled during this time; but it did not come without its deceptions and deviations from Islamic norms and rules. This historiography will explore whether the Fatimids were actually the tolerant Muslims whose actions, belief systems and practices evidenced the growth of Islam and tolerance of other religions, or if they were merely politi...
The Middle East has come along way since the rise of civilization thousands of years ago. Civilization emerged in the Middle East and northeast Africa along the river systems as agricultural societies grew in population and developed new forms of social organization. For the last two thousands years the west has been drawn to the middle east fascinated by the culture, religion, resources and politics. The Middle East has an immense impact on the world globally. My goal in this paper is to explain the ancient and modern significance of the Middle East and how it impacts the world in such a globalizing way.
Kenneth Jost. 2005. “Understanding Islam.” Annual Editions: Anthropology 11/12, 34th Edition. Elvio Angeloni. New York: McGraw-Hill Higher Education.