Islamic Liberation Theology: Resisting the Empire

by Hamid Dabashi

This book is a radical piece of counter-intuitive rethinking of the clash of civilizations theory and global politics. In this richly detailed criticism of contemporary politics, Hamid Dabashi argues that after 9/11 we have not seen a new phase in a long running confrontation between Islam and the West, but that such categories have in fact collapsed and exhausted themselves. The West is no longer a unified actor and Islam is ideologically depleted in its confrontation with colonialism. Rather we are seeing the emergence of the US as a lone superpower, and a confrontation between a form of imperial globalized capital and the rising need for a new Islamic theodicy. The combination of political salience and theoretical force makes Islamic Liberation Theology a cornerstone of a whole new generation of thinking about political Islamism and a compelling read for anyone interested in contemporary Islam, current affairs and US foreign policy. Dabashi drives his well-supported and thoroughly documented points steadily forward in an earnest and highly readable style.

Genres: Islam, Religion, Politics, Theology, Nonfiction, Theory, Middle East

320 pages, Hardcover

First published May 13, 2008

About the author

Born on 15 June 1951 into a working class family in the south-western city of Ahvaz in the Khuzestan province of Iran, Hamid Dabashi received his early education in his hometown and his college education in Tehran, before he moved to the United States, where he received a dual Ph.D. in Sociology of Culture and Islamic Studies from the University of Pennsylvania in 1984, followed by a postdoctoral fellowship at Harvard University.

He wrote his doctoral dissertation on Max Weber’s theory of charismatic authority with Philip Rieff (1922-2006), the most distinguished Freudian cultural critic of his time.

Hamid Dabashi is the Hagop Kevorkian Professor of Iranian Studies and Comparative Literature at Columbia University in New York, the oldest and most prestigious Chair in his field. He has taught and delivered lectures in many North and Latin American, European, Arab, and Iranian universities. He is a founding member of the Institute for Comparative Literature and Society, as well as a founding member of the Center for Palestine Studies at Columbia University.

He has written 20 books, edited 4, and contributed chapters to many more. He is also the author of over 100 essays, articles and book reviews in major scholarly and peer reviewed journals on subjects ranging from Iranian Studies, medieval and modern Islam, comparative literature, world cinema, and the philosophy of art (trans-aesthetics). A selected sample of his writing is co-edited by Andrew Davison and Himadeep Muppidi, The World is my Home: A Hamid Dabashi Reader (Transaction 2010).
Hamid Dabashi is the Series Editor of Literatures and Cultures of the Islamic World for Palgrave Macmillan. This series is putting forward a critical body of first rate scholarship on the literary and cultural production of the Islamic world from the vantage point of contemporary theoretical and hermeneutic perspectives, effectively bringing the study of Islamic literatures and cultures to the wider attention of scholars and students of world literatures and cultures without the prejudices and drawbacks of outmoded perspectives.
An internationally renowned cultural critic and award-winning author, his books and articles have been translated into numerous languages, including Japanese, German, French, Spanish, Italian, Russian, Hebrew, Danish, Arabic, Korean, Persian, Portuguese, Polish, Turkish, Urdu and Catalan.

In the context of his commitment to advancing trans-national art and independent world cinema, Hamid Dabashi is the founder of Dreams of a Nation, a Palestinian Film Project, dedicated to preserving and safeguarding Palestinian Cinema. He is also chiefly responsible for opening up the study of Persian literature and Iranian culture at Columbia University to students of comparative literature and society, breaking away from the confinements of European Orientalism and American Area Studies.

A committed teacher in the past three decades, Hamid Dabashi is also a public speaker around the globe, a current affairs essayist, and a staunch anti-war activist. He has two grown-up children, Kaveh and Pardis, who are both Columbia University graduates, and he lives in New York with his wife and colleague, the Iranian-Swedish feminist, Golbarg Bashi, their daughter Chelgis and their son Golchin.

Reviews

[C. Quabela · Rating 3 out of 5]

I only gave this three stars not because I didn't agree with Dabashi, I actually thought the book to be full of really enlightening analyses of a problem that from my position I had not been exposed to. It's incredibly worth the read and gives a lot to consider. I love Levinas as well, so discovering Dabashi's thesis of Islam and ethics as first philosophy was exciting to come across. However, there are a few things that detract from the impact of the book. As other comments have stated, there is a whole lot of repetition and so can become burdensome to get to the main point of an argument. Also, and this was the biggest hit for me, was that this book is a really odd mix of high philosophical theory concerning axiology and postmodernism, while also having more everyday political lessons, mixed with even higher degrees of international politics. Not that either of these are wrong, but the way the modes merge together can also make it hard to get through. I would have preferred really this to be two different books - one dealing with more advanced philosophy and politics and another that gave a more practical conception of Islamic Liberation Theodicy with its relation to the lived experience of the faith. So I may have only given it 3 stars, but I would encourage anyone willing to make it through to do so.

[Nechayev_V · Rating 4 out of 5]

Good book, very knowledgeable in its subject matter and convincing in its case that Islam will see a new liberating theodicy. My one gripe with the book, hence the four-stars, is that Dabashi can be incredibly repetitive, to the point where the book can become a chore to read (he must have repeated his spiel on the end of the "East-West" dichotomy at least two dozen times throughout the book). Still, overall, good read.

[Neslihan · Rating 1 out of 5]

It's tragic that no one (no one competent?) cared enough to edit or even proofread this potentially valuable book. There's so much promise buried in the text, but the repetition is crushing (impossible not to start skimming) and the language errors seriously impede comprehension (far beyond the level of funny little typos). It's not realistically readable in this form. It's like a long-winded blog with no spell-check. It's like a dissertation from a bad university with an apathetic advisor and then published directly by Lambert with no efforts to clean it up. (It was not actually published by Lambert, but that's the level of quality.) It's like I'm deeply annoyed at having spent money on a rough draft. (I am, in fact, annoyed.)

[edenstephen]

Electronic (pdf).

[Dev Scott Flores · Rating 5 out of 5]

all the erudition of Edward Said but quadruple the cajones - a tremendous tour de force!

[Mahdi · Rating 3 out of 5]

Has its share of clever, insightful one-liners – but it's not a very good or groundbreaking book. The ideas of amorphous empire and embracing alterities was interesting. However, among several other issues, I thought his reading of Malcolm X was sometimes unsophisticated, sometimes bizarre and problematic (...like "reverse-racism" doesn't exist, Professor Dabashi).