Studying Islam and Its Adherents in Australian Universities

Authors

  • Jan A. Ali Western Sydney University

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.15575/jpi.v7i2.15773

Keywords:

Australian University, Islamic Studies, Modernism, Multicultural

Abstract

Islamic Studies is a relatively new, yet growing phenomenon in Australian universities. With an increased focus on Islam and Muslim in the age of War on Terror and with Australian Muslim population fast increasing, Islamic Studies is an important intellectual tool to better understand, Islam and Muslims and many challenges facing them. This paper is an investigation of the recent trends and developments in Islamic Studies as an academic discipline in Australian universities. This is an important intellectual task because Islamic Studies continues to play a significant role in Australian academia. The data were collected from literature review and are analysed descriptively. The findings of the study show that the intellectual tools developed in Islamic Studies can be deployed to build relationship between fragmented Muslim communities and between Muslims and non-Muslims particularly in multicultural Australia. Islamic Studies draws on a variety of fields making it a crossdiscipline. As such, it offer a rich and analytic investigation of world’s second largest religion and its multiple expressions. Australian universities offer Islamic studies ranging from undergraduate to postgraduate program. The topic studied include Islamic philosophy, jurisprudence, education, history, and Arabic.

References

Akbarzadeh, S. (2004). Australian-based Studies on Islam and Muslim Societies, report sponsored by Australian Research Council Seed-funding. Melbourne: Monash University.

Ali, J. (2018). “Australian Muslims as Radicalized “Other†and their Experiences of Social Exclusionâ€, in Abe Ata & Jan Ali (eds.), 108-128, Islam in the West: Perceptions and Reactions. New Delhi: Oxford University Press.

Ansari, M. (2018). The Muslim Student Associations (MSAS) and the Formation of the Australian Ummah. Australian Journal of Islamic Studies 3: 103–20. Retrieved from https://ajis.com.au/index.php/ajis/article/view/143/87 (accessed on 22 January 2021). AQF. n.d. Available online: https://www.aqf.edu.au/ (accessed on 1 November 2020).

Auda, J. Bernasek, L. Bunt, G., & Canning, J. (2008). International Approaches to Islamic Studies in Higher Education: A Report to HEFCE Bristol: The Higher Education Academy.

Bisati, A. (2016). Islamic Studies as a University Discipline: Origin and Development. Faculty of Islamic Studies and Arabic Language, South Eastern University of Sri Lanka, Oluvil. Retrieved from http://ir.lib.seu.ac.lk/handle/123456789/2585-2021-November 29th.

Buskens, L. (2016). “Introduction: Dichotomies, transformations, and continuities in the study of Islamâ€, in Léon Buskens and Annemarie van Sandwijk (eds.), 11–27, Islamic Studies in the Twenty-first Century: Transformations and Continuities. Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press.

Hourani, A. (1991). Islam in European Thought. Cambridge: CUP.

Jung, D. (2011). Orientalists, Islamists and the Global Public Sphere: A Genealogy of the Modem Essentialist Image of Islam. London: Equinox.

Keskin, Z. & Ozalp, M. (2021). Islamic Studies in Australia’s Universities, Religions, 12(99), 1-16. https://doi.org/10.3390/rel12020099.

Mahdi, M. (1997). “The Study of Islam, Orientalism and Americaâ€, in Mapping Islamic Studies: Genealogy, Continuity and Change, Azim Nanji (ed). Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.

Mansouri, F., & Kamp, A. (2007). Structural Deficiency or Cultural Racism: The Educational and Social Experiences of Arab-Australian Youth. Australian Journal of Social Issues. 42 (1), 87–102. https://doi.org/10.1002/j.1839-4655.2007.tb00041.x

Martin, R. Empey, H. Arkoun, M., & Rippin, A. (2021). Islamic Studies, The Oxford Encyclopedia of the Islamic World, Oxford Islamic Studies Online. Retrieve from http://www.oxfordislamicstudies.com/article/opr/t236/e0395, accessed 2021- November 29th.

Musharraf, M. Bhutto, J., & Bux, H. (2019). ‘Islamic Studies’ in Australian Universities: An Analysis from the Perspective of Local Training Imams. The Scholar Islamic Academic Research Journal. 4(1), 49-92. Retrieved from http://siarj.com/index.php/Siarj/article/view/153.

Nanji, A. (ed) (1997). Mapping Islamic Studies: Genealogy, Continuity and Change. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.

Neyazi, T. A. (2014). Darul Uloom Deoband’s Approach to Social Issues: Image, Reality, and Perception. In Being Muslim in South Asia: Diversity and Daily Life. Edited by Robin Jeffrey and Sen Ronojoy. New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 181–200.

Ozalp, M., & Daqiq, T. (2016). Muslim Student Expectations from Islamic Studies Courses in Australia. ICR Journal 7, 509–26. Retrieved from https://icrjournal.org/ index.php/icr/article/view/585.

Ozalp, M., & Keskin, Z. (2015). Muslim Identity Threshold: Emergence of a Distinctive Australian Muslim Identity. In Muslim Identity Formation in Religiously Diverse Societies. Edited by Derya Iner and Salih Yucel. Cambridge: Cambridge Scholars Publishing.

Ramadan, T. (2007). Plotting the Future of Islamic Studies: Teaching and Research in the Current Political Climate. Academic Matters.

Rane, H. Duderija, A., & Mamone, J. (2021). Islamic Studies in Australia’s Higher Education Sector. Australian Journal of Islamic Studies. 6(1), 1-31. Retrieved from https://ajis.com.au/index.php/ajis/article/view/337.

Saeed, A. (2014). Islamic Studies in Australia: Establishing the National Centre of Excellence for Islamic Studies. In The Teaching and Study of Islam in Western Universities, Kindle ed. Edited by Paul Morris, William Shepard, Toni Tidswell and Paul Trebilco. New York: Routledge. 85–96.

Said, E. (1979). Orientalism. London: Random House.

Saras, E., & Perez-Felkner, L. (2018). “Sociological perspectives on socializationâ€, Oxford Bibliographies Online. Retrieved from https://www.oxfordbibliographies.com/view/document/obo-9780199756384/obo-9780199756384-0155.xml

Siddiqui, A. (2007). Islam at Universities in England: Meeting the Needs and Investing in the Future, Report Submitted to the Minister of State for Lifelong Learning. London: Further and Higher Education, DFES.

Voll, J. (2009). Changing Western Approaches to Islamic Studies, in Mumtaz Ahmad, Zahid Bukhari and Sulayman Nyang (eds.), The State of Islamic Studies in American Universities. London: The International Institute of Islamic Thought (IIIT). 29-31

Waardenburg, J. (1997). The Study of Islam in German Scholarship, in Azim Nanji (ed), Mapping Islamic Studies: Genealogy, Continuity and Change. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. 1-32.

Downloads

Published

2021-12-31

Issue

Vol. 7 No. 2 (2021): Jurnal Pendidikan Islam

Section

Articles

License

Authors who publish with this journal agree to the following terms:

  1. Authors retain copyright and grant the journal right of first publication with the work simultaneously licensed under a Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International (CC BY-SA 4.0) License that allows others to share the work with an acknowledgment of the work's authorship and initial publication in this journal.
  2. Authors are able to enter into separate, additional contractual arrangements for the non-exclusive distribution of the journal's published version of the work (e.g., post it to an institutional repository or publish it in a book), with an acknowledgment of its initial publication in this journal.
  3. Authors are permitted and encouraged to post their work online (e.g., in institutional repositories or on their website) prior to and during the submission process, as it can lead to productive exchanges, as well as earlier and greater citation of published work (See The Effect of Open Access).