Islamic Law in the News Roundup

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ISLAMIC LAW IN THE NEWS

  • “With Ramadan beginning on March 22, Muslim students have expressed concern over the accessibility and variety of Halal food, as well as a lack of communication,” which has promoted Princeton University dining services to take additional measures to address student concerns.
  • “Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyyed Ali Khamenei issued a decree in May 2015 that allows all foreign nationals, even those who have no identification and are living in Iran illegally, to attend schools in the country,” as a result of which approximately $352 million has been spent on Afghan students in Iran.
  • Under Taliban rule, women who divorced their husbands because they were abusive and remarried are not considered to have divorced their husbands in a way compatible with Islamic law, making them potential suspects in the eyes of the Taliban for the crime of adultery. Experts have estimated that there are thousands of women who may be charged after the Taliban invalidates their divorces.
  • “When the Taliban took power in August 2021, they vowed to respect women’s rights “within the bounds of Islamic law.”  Experts have argued that women in other countries may help to better the situation of Afghan women.
  • “Afghan universities reopened on Monday, March 6, after a winter break but only men returned to classes and women remained barred by Taliban authorities.” For more content and context on the recent developments in Afghanistan, consult our Editor-in-Chief, Professor Intisar Rabb’s “Resource Roundup: Afghanistan, the Taliban, and Islamic Law.”
  • Members of the Al-Tajdeed civil society organization in Bahrain, which calls for “discussion and questioning of Islamic law,” have been prosecuted for allegedly violating the country’s penal code prohibiting “mocking” religious texts. Some Bahraini scholars have called the members apostates and heretics.
  • “The conference, entitled ‘Contemporary Community Issues in the view of Shari’ah: Approaches and Solutions,’ [sponsored by Zawya Bank of the UAE,] discussed a number of key topics, including contemporary intellectual issues, security and development challenges, social, ethical, health, and environmental issues, as well as media, communication, economic issues and their developments.”
  • A couple in India, C. Shukkur and Sheena Shukkur, Head of the Department of Law at Kannur University, have decided to register their marriage under the Special Marriage Act of 1954, “to overcome the Muslim Law of Inheritance, which they say is discriminatory and humiliating for girls and women.” “The couple’s three daughters are not eligible to inherit their estate in its entirety in accordance with current Islamic law, should they pass away.”
  • Professor Aomar Boum (UCLA) wrote an encomium on his late brother, Mohammed Boum, where he described his brother’s building of a sustainable social network in a Moroccan village, based on economic practices compatible with Islamic law.

UPCOMING EVENTS AND OPPORTUNITIES

PIL & Harvard Calendar:

  • Disaster Relief: Harvard Law School’s Turkey-Syria Earthquake Relief Efforts.
  • Student work opportunity: Research assistant, Widener Library, Harvard University.
  • Islamic Law Speaker Series :: Haroun Rahimi (The American University of Afghanistan), “Taliban and Modernity,” Harvard Law School, March 21, 2023.
  • Islam in Africa Initiative: Abdulatif Finch, Swartz Hall, Garvin Room, Harvard University, March 24, 2023.
  • Position opening: Program in Islamic Law: Data Science Fellowships, 2023-2024, March 31, 2023.
  • Islam in Africa Initiative: Cheikh Anta Mbacke Babou, Swartz Hall, Garvin Room, Harvard University, March 31, 2023.
  • Islamic Law Speaker Series :: Elizabeth Lhost (University of Wisconsin–Madison), Everyday Islamic Law and the Making of Modern South Asia, Harvard Law School, April 4, 2023.
  • Seminar: “The Rule of Recognition and the Consolidation of the Maliki Madhhab in the 14th Century” by Mohammad Fadel, Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal Islamic Studies Program, Harvard University, April 6, 2023.
  • Islam in Africa Initiative: Caitlyn Bolton, Swartz Hall, Garvin Room, Harvard University, April 7, 2023.
  • Prize: The Class of 1955/Robert T. Coolidge Undergraduate Thesis Prize in Medieval Studies, April 7, 2023.
  • Prize: Alwaleed Bin Talal Undergraduate Thesis Prize, Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal Islamic Studies Program, Harvard University, April 14, 2023.
  • Islam in Africa Initiative: Ayodeji Ogunnaike, Swartz Hall, Garvin Room, Harvard University, April 14, 2023.
  • Islam in Africa Initiative: Zekeria Salem, Swartz Hall, Garvin Room, Harvard University, April 21, 2023.
  • Workshop: Arabic Manuscript Workshop, Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal Islamic Studies Program, Harvard University, April 24-28, 2023.
  • Islamic Law Speaker Series :: Dilyara Agisheva (Harvard Law School), “The Entangled Legal Formations and the Russian annexation of Crimea in the 18th century,” Harvard Law School, May 2, 2023.
  • Prize: Alwaleed Bin Talal Graduate Thesis Prize, Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal Islamic Studies Program, Harvard University, May 19, 2023.

Global Calendar:

  • Call to Sponsor a Member: for applicants affected by the earthquakes, MESA 2023.
  • Internship opportunity: The Executive Office of the President, White House, various deadlines.
  • Call for Panels: Association for the Study of the Worldwide African Diaspora (ASWAD) 11th Biennial Conference, University of Ghana-Legon, March 15, 2023.
  • Ottoman Summer School, Istanbul, Bilgi University, March 15, 2023.
  • Call for Papers: Interdisciplinary Conference on Islamic Law in the Crucible of the Modern State: Problems and Perspectives, University of Muenster, Germany, March 20, 2023.
  • Position opening: Policy Specialist, UN Women (NY), March 20, 2023.
  • Webinar: “Public Freedoms in the Islamic State,” with Rached Ghannouchi, Noah Feldman and Rushain Abbasi, Yale Law School, March 21, 2023.
  • Conference: “Succession in Islamic Law,” Max Planck Institute for Comparative and International Private Law, March 30-31, 2023.
  • The Laura Bassi Scholarship, March 31, 2023.
  • Postdoctoral Fellowship: Columbia University’s Sakıp Sabancı Center for Turkish Studies, 2023-2024, April 3, 2023.
  • Prize Nomination: Biennial prize for best book on the medieval Middle East (ca. 500-1500 CE). The Board of Directors of Middle East Medievalists, April 15, 2023.
  • Conference: Policing Issues in the 21st Century, AALS, April 28, 2023.
  • Global Academy Award, 2023-2024: The MESA Global Academy, May 1, 2023.
  • Conference: Seventh Conference for Junior Researchers, The Law and Society Association at Stanford Law School (LSAS), May 5, 2023.
  • Roundtable Discussion: The future of teaching in the Islamicate Digital Humanities, AKU-ISMC, London, May 15-16, 2023.
  • 2023 Law and Humanities Interdisciplinary Workshop: 22nd meeting of the Law and Humanities Interdisciplinary Workshop, Georgetown Law Center, Washington, DC, May 24-25, 2023.
  • Call for Papers: Munich Summer Institute 2023 & Ph.D. Workshop, May 24-26, 2023.
  • The Graduate Student & Early Career Workshop: Law and Society Association, May 31, 2023.
  • Annual meeting: Law & Society Association’s Annual Meeting, San Juan, Puerto Rico, June 1-4, 2023.
  • Summer Course: Thinking with Islamicate Manuscripts: Critical Approaches to Historical Methodology, History of Collections, and Digital Tools In Islamic Studies, July 3-7, 2023, Central European University (application deadline: February 14, 2023).
  • Conference: Interdisciplinary Conference on Islamic Law in the Crucible of the Modern State: Problems and Perspectives, University of Muenster, Germany, July 10-12, 2023.
  • Position opening: Assistant Professor of Modern Middle Eastern History, University of Tennessee, Fall 2022. Deadline: until an appointment is made.
  • Position opening: Columbia University, The Department of Art History and Archaeology Barbara Stoler Miller Assistant Professor, Indian and South Asian Art History. Deadline: until an appointment is made.
  • Position opening: Associate Director, Center for Religious and Spiritual Life and Muslim Chaplain, Macalester College (priority given to applications by August 1, 2022).
  • Workshop: TraSIS (Trajectories of Slavery in Islamicate Societies) and the BCDSS (Bonn Center for Dependency and Slavery Studies) Murtensee, August 30, 2023 – September 1, 2023.
  • Call for Papers: Special Issue of Religions: “A Critique of the Modern Discourse of Maqāṣid,” September 15, 2023.
  • Fall 2023 Works-in-Progress Workshop: Comparative Constitutional Law in the Global South, Columbia Law School, October 20-21, 2023.
  • Position opening: Adjunct Lecturer in Modern Middle East, Babson College.
  • Call for Applications: Interdisciplinary Scholars of Places, Movement and Cultural Practices Professor, New York University Abu Dhabi. Deadline: until the position is filled.
  • Research Project: Historian/Researcher – Tudor Period/Elizabethan Era, and the Ottoman Empire during the Suleiman the Magnificent Period. Deadline: until the position is filled.
  • Call for Submissions: The UCLA School of Law’s Journal of Islamic and Near Eastern Law (JINEL).
  • Call for Manuscripts: Advances in the Study of Islam, Edinburgh University Press.
  • Request for Open Submissions: AALS 2023 Annual Meeting, January 4-7, 2023. Submission deadlines vary.
  • MEM Fellowship for Graduate Students of Color.
  • Scholarship: Islamic Scholarship Fund CAMBA Law Scholarship 2023.

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