Islam
When Orthodoxy Is Good for You: Making Sense of the “Hajj Effect”
Headlines about Islam usually write themselves: A Muslim blowing up innocent people is dog-bites-man. A Muslim acting thoughtful or funny or anything besides angry is man-bites-dog. The obvious headline from a recent academic study, “Estimating the Impact of the Hajj: Religion and Tolerance in Islam’s Global Gathering,” fell into the latter category: Three economists [...]
10Jun2008 | Andrea Useem | 7 comments | ContinuedFor the terrorist ‘cheering section,’ it’s about ‘policy not principles:’ Q+A with Dalia Mogahed
If you have grown weary of punditry or sweeping op-ed comments about the state of the Muslim world, you may share my feeling that poll data feels like a breath of fresh air in the public conversation about Islam. What do Muslims around the world think about pressing issues like terrorism, U.S. foreign policy and [...]
4Mar2008 | Andrea Useem | 3 comments | ContinuedYour Grandmother’s Islam: Can Religion Be Separated from Culture?
Quick, identify this scene: At dusk, believers flock to a shrine, following the pounding of drums. They come to hear the rhythmic chanting of a living saint. A leafy stimulant is passed around, and the men and women chew it until they reach a transcendent state, rocking and dancing and chanting along with their leader [...]
4Sep2007 | Andrea Useem | 1 comment | ContinuedCNN’s “God’s Warriors:” Good Watching, But the Book Is Better
When ReligionWriter’s husband first saw a press copy of CNN’s new six-hour documentary, “God’s Warriors,” lying around the house, he said he looked forward to learning about famous heroes and soldiers in the Jewish, Muslim and Christian traditions.
He was disappointed, then, when the first segment, “God’s Jewish Warriors,” which will air next Tuesday, Aug. 21, [...]
Religion and the Presidential Candidates: Fun Facts
Question: What does the current field of presidential contenders have in common with the Supreme Court bench? Answer: It is disproportionately Catholic.
Using the handily compiled religious biographies of the presidential candidates (which number 16, if undeclared Fred Thompson is included) from the Pew Forum on Religion & Public Life, ReligionWriter discovered these interesting tidbits.
Six out [...]
Romeo and Juliet in Saudi Arabia, and Romeo’s a big disappointment
Get on a plane to Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. Rent a house, find a job, settle in. Learn Arabic, make friends, spend years in the country. Still, you will never get as full a glimpse into the lives of young urban Saudi women as you will from reading Rajaa AlSanae’s novel, Girls of Riyadh, published in [...]
13Aug2007 | Andrea Useem | 1 comment | ContinuedWhat Would Prophet Muhammed Eat?
Given that some American Protestants are finding dietary inspiration from Jesus, it seems only fitting that American Muslims might look to the Prophet Muhammed for inspiration to lose weight, eat healthy and fight the obesity epidemic. After all, evidence of Jesus’ diet in the Gospels is thin, and the Last Supper’s bread and wine is [...]
18Jul2007 | Andrea Useem | 5 comments | ContinuedHumanizing Iran, and Other Ways to Save the World with Summer Reading
If you liked Jhumpa Lahiri’s The Namesake, Monica Ali’s Brick Lane, Khaled Hosseini’s The Kite Runner, or any other novel strung poignantly between two continents, you’ll find much to like in Yamsin Crowther’s debut novel, The Saffron Kitchen, published several months ago by Penguin, which traces the bittersweet story of a young Iranian too headstrong [...]
25Jun2007 | Andrea Useem | 3 comments | ContinuedMuslim Identity Is Not Always About Religion, Two Novelists Show
By Andrea Useem, Religion BookLine — Publishers Weekly, 5/16/2007 (reprinted here with permission.)
With a title like The Reluctant Fundamentalist, Mohsin Hamid’s new novel (Harcourt, April) invites readers to expect a story of religion gone bad. But instead of radical preaching or religious fervor, the book details the transformation of Changez, an Ivy League-educated Pakistani, [...]
Economics of Religion: Suicide Bombing a Response to “Market Demand,” Says Scholar
What can the insights of economics tell us about the motivations of suicide bombers? A quick answer might be that the people (nearly all young men) who kill themselves while killing others are down-trodden, poor, and depressed by their limited circumstances in life.
Yet research does not bear out this out. Many suicide bombers, including the [...]