This volume contains the full Qadi Records of Brava (1893 - 1900). The importance of these records for those studying Southern Somalia and the Swahili coast cannot be overestimated. The register is like a daily journal of events in a typical Swahili town. The information in the records covers a wide range of issues: Slavery, the role of women and their usage of the court system in the 19th century, the role of the Ulama, trade, inheritance, et cetera. The register is signed and stamped by the Italian Commander/governor in Asmara, Eritrea where it was taken and authenticated and bears the Official Stamp of the Royal Italian Government. This volume contains both the Arabic original and a translation into English. The print edition is available as a set of two volumes (9789004131224).

This skillfully written text presents the full sweep of Ottoman history from its beginnings on the Byzantine frontier in about 1300, through its development as an empire, to its late eighteenth-century confrontation with a rapidly modernizing Europe. Itzkowitz delineates the fundamental institutions of the Ottoman state, the major divisions within the society, and the basic ideas on government and social structure. Throughout, Itzkowitz emphasizes the Ottomans' own conception of their historical experience, and in so doing penetrates the surface view provided by the insights of Western observers of the Ottoman world to the core of Ottoman existence.

In the face of Islam's own internal struggles, it is not easy to see who we should support and how. This report provides detailed descriptions of subgroups, their stands on various issues, and what those stands may mean for the West. Since the outcomes can matter greatly to international community, that community might wish to influence them by providing support to appropriate actors. The author recommends a mixed approach of providing specific types of support to those who can influence the outcomes in desirable ways.

Analyzes Muslim countries' contemporary problems, particularly violence, authoritarianism, and underdevelopment, comparing their historical levels of development with Western Europe.

The book describes the worlds where Swahili is spoken as multi-centred contexts that cannot be thought of as located in a specific coastal area of Kenya or Tanzania. The articles presented discuss a range of geographical areas where Swahili is spoken, from Somalia to Mozambique along the Indian Ocean, in Europe and the US. In an attempt to de-essentialize the concepts of translocality and cosmopolitanism, the emphasis of the book is on translocality as experienced by different social strata and by gender and cosmopolitanism as an acquired attitude. Contributors are: Katrin Bromber, Gerard van de Bruinhorst, Francesca Declich, Rebecca Gearhart Mafazy, Linda Giles, Ida Hadjivayanis, Mohamed Kassim, Kjersti Larsen, Mohamed Saleh, Maria Suriano, Sandra Vianello.

Drawing on ethnographic research, Living Sharia examines the role of sharia in the sociopolitical processes of contemporary Malaysia. The book traces the contested implementation of Islamic family and criminal laws and sharia economics to provide cultural frameworks for understanding sharia among Muslims and non-Muslims. Timothy Daniels explores how the way people think about sharia is often entangled with notions about race, gender equality, nationhood, liberal pluralism, citizenship, and universal human rights. He reveals that Malaysians’ ideas about sharia are not isolated from—nor always opposed to—liberal pluralism and secularism. Living Sharia will be of interest to scholars as well as to policy makers, consultants, and professionals working with global NGOs.

A study on the Islamic ADR institutions in England through the lens of Comparative Law and Geopolitics.

After the abolition of slavery in 1897, Islamic courts in Zanzibar (East Africa) became central institutions where former slaves negotiated socioeconomic participation. By using difficult-to-read Islamic court records in Arabic, Elke E. Stockreiter reassesses the workings of these courts as well as gender and social relations in Zanzibar Town during British colonial rule (1890–1963). She shows how Muslim judges maintained their autonomy within the sphere of family law and describes how they helped advance the rights of women, ex-slaves, and other marginalised groups. As was common in other parts of the Muslim world, women usually had to buy their divorce. Thus, Muslim judges played important roles as litigants negotiated moving up the social hierarchy, with ethnicisation increasingly influencing all actors. Drawing on these previously unexplored sources, this study investigates how Muslim judges both mediated and generated discourses of inclusion and exclusion based on social status rather than gender.

The term ‘Swahili’ describes the Muslim peoples of the East African coast, speakers of Kiswahili or closely related languages, who have historically filled roles as middlemen and merchants, the cosmopolitan products of a trading economy between Africa and the Indian Ocean world. This collection brings together anthropologists working on the greater Swahili world and the issues it confronts, dealing with societies from southern Somalia, northern Mozambique and the Comoro Islands, to Zanzibar and Mafia. The authors discuss a range of contemporary issues such as the shifting roles of Islam on the mainland coast; consumerism, conservation, memory and belonging in Zanzibar; how a Muslim society deals with HIV/AIDS; social change, development and political strategies in the Comoros; and Swahili women in London. The diversity of these themes reflects the diversity of the Swahili world itself: despite a cohesive cultural identity built upon shared practices, religious beliefs and language, the challenges facing Swahili people are multiple and complex. This book comprises articles originally published in the Journal of Eastern African Studies along with some new chapters.

This book discusses the common principles of morality and ethics derived from divinely endowed intuitive reason through the creation of al-fitr' a (nature) and human intellect (al-‘aql). Biomedical topics are presented and ethical issues related to topics such as genetic testing, assisted reproduction and organ transplantation are discussed. Whereas these natural sources are God’s special gifts to human beings, God’s revelation as given to the prophets is the supernatural source of divine guidance through which human communities have been guided at all times through history. The second part of the book concentrates on the objectives of Islamic religious practice – the maqa' sid – which include: Preservation of Faith, Preservation of Life, Preservation of Mind (intellect and reason), Preservation of Progeny (al-nasl) and Preservation of Property. Lastly, the third part of the book discusses selected topical issues, including abortion, assisted reproduction devices, genetics, organ transplantation, brain death and end-of-life aspects. For each topic, the current medical evidence is followed by a detailed discussion of the ethical issues involved.