Sadik Al-Azm (1934-2016) was one of the foremost Arab public intellectuals, who offered innovative, often controversial challenges to conventional narratives on Islam and the West, Secularism, Orientalism, and the Israel-Palestine issue. This fourth and final volume of his works in English includes his essays on: Faith and Reason in Islam: Strategies in the Education of Muslim Communities Sharia from a Secular Perspective Crossing Borders: Orientalism, lslamism and Postmodernism The Concept of Civil Society in Relation to the 'Arab Spring' Statement by 99 Syrian Intellectuals ("Charta 99") Goethe Medal 2015 Acceptance Speech

Sadik J. Al-Azm was one of the foremost Arab public intellectuals, who offered innovative, often controversial challenges to conventional narratives on Islam and the West, Secularism, Orientalism, and the Israel-Palestine issue. This fourth collection of his essays includes:- Syria in Revolt (2014)- Experience or ""Regime of Truth""? About Translation, Arabic and the Postmodern (2014) - Orientalism of the Worst Kind (2015)- The Shari'a from a Secular Perspective (2015)- Crossing Borders: Orientalism, lslamism and Postmodernism (2016)- What's in a Name: Middle East or West Asia? (2016).

From 17 April, 1900, to 6 June of that year, Pierre Loti travelled in a private capacity from Bushire on the Persian Gulf, northwards through Shiraz, Persepolis, Isfahan and Tehran, before returning via the Caspian Sea to Europe. This is the personal day-by-day account of his journey, the hardships of the mountainous terrain and the empty desert. Loti excels in his descriptions of the world around him: the sky, the mountains, the fertile plains, the deserted desert. His descriptions of the people he meets, their dress and manners are remarkable. Loti had come from India and on his way to the Gulf, he stopped off at Muscat and his account of this brief visit was published as 'En passant a Mascate' (Passing through Muscat). This is the first English translation of both texts.

​The Palgrave Handbook of Religion and State Volume II: Global Perpectives addresses issues of Religion and State from a multitude of disciplines. The volume begins with the philosophical discussion of perennial issues that have to do with the origin and nature of rights. One question centers on the right to use one’s religious beliefs to enact laws. This discussion alone sets this handbook apart from other handbooks of its type. While addressing these perennial questions, this volume includes authors who interact with the work of John Rawls, Hobbes, Rousseau, and a host of contemporary philosophers. The subsequent sections address the American Constitutional Experiment, religion, state, and law in the Americas.

Sadik al-Azm's Critique of Religious Thought set off one of the the great Arab intellectual uproars of the twentieth century, leading to the author's imprisonment and trial for mocking religion and inciting sectarian conflict. As in his earlier Self-Criticism after the Defeat, Al-Azm takes on the taboos of the age and their sponsors: the religious elites. In this book, he attempts to awaken the Arab mind from its dogmatic slumber, leading it out of the Middle Ages and into a modern world characterized by science and rationality. Critique of Religious Thought is one of the most controversial and influential books about the role of religion in Arab politics. This is the authorised translation of Sadik Al-Azm's work, Naqd al-fikr ad-dini, originally published in Arabic in 1969. The 2014 edition includes an introduction by the author and translations by George Stergios and Mansour Ajami.

This anthology addresses the topic of "fundamentalism and gender" from inter- and trans-disciplinary perspectives. By referring to three major themes--"Literalism, Religion, and Science," "Nation, State, and Community," and "Body, Life, and Biopolitics"--the book focuses on the analytical diversification of the term "fundamentalism" and on intersections between religion, gender, sexuality, race, and nation. International scholars in cultural history and theory, religious studies, Christian theologies, Islamic studies, history, social sciences, anthropology, comparative literature, and women and gender studies examine the historical and current specifics of religious as well as of secular forms of fundamentalism. They also take a critical look at the Western discourse about religious fundamentalism and the ambivalent role feminism plays in this context, considering questions such as, Why do all religious fundamentalisms claim normalizing definitions of sexuality, gender roles, and intergender relations? In what way do gender and sexual politics play a role in secular criticism of religious fundamentalism? And how are forms of secular fundamentalism characterized by gender constructs and sexual politics?

In the controversy over political correctness, the canon, and the curriculum, the role of Western tradition in a post-modern world is often debated. To clarify what is at stake, Vassilis Lambropoulos traces the ideology of European culture from the Reformation, focusing on a key element of Western tradition: the act of interpretation as a distinct practice of understanding and a civil right. Championed by Protestants insisting on independent interpretation of scripture, this ideal of autonomy ushered in the era of modernity with its essentialist philosophy of universal man and his aesthetic understanding of the world. After explaining the dominance of European culture through the combined archetypes of Hebraism (reason and morality) and Hellenism (spirit and art), Lambropoulos shows how the rule of autonomy has been transformed into the aesthetic, disinterested contemplation of things in themselves. Arguing that it is time to restore the socio-political dimension to the movement of autonomy, he proposes that a genealogy of the Hebraic-Hellenic archetypes can help us evaluate more recent models--like the Afrocentric one--and redefine the controversy surrounding education, Eurocentrism, and cultural politics.