HFKA00371U Voices of Islam in Southeast Asia

This course is “about Islam and being Muslim” in Southeast Asia. The question is, what exactly does it mean? Is there a unitary Islamic landscape? For the vast number of “believing” Muslim men and women, “Islam” stands not only for religious piety, but also for critical engagements in processes of continuation and change. In this course, we journey through various Muslim societies spanning Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore, Brunei, Thailand and the Philippines – or the Malay World – to examine how Islam has been interpreted and adopted in diverse manners to influence domains of both the private and public realms. The mosaic of different national cultures, historical experiences and political trajectories in Southeast Asia has produced different cultures, perceptions and practices of Islam in the region. We will draw parallels as well as comparative studies across both time and space. Topical matters in this course include the relationship between Islam and the realms of politics and state, cultural pluralism, negotiation of ethnic identity, and gender dynamics. This course will also incorporate a general introduction to anthropological theories about ethnicity, nationalities, identity, religion and culture politics.