Venerating the pir: patron saints of Muslim ceramists in Uzbekistan

In some Central Asian oasis towns, the patron saints of craftsmen, known as pirs, have continued to be venerated, despite the repression of Islam and changes to the industrial structure during the Soviet Era. This paper analyses the social function and individual significance of pir veneration in the modern era, using ethnographic observations and interviews conducted in a ceramics town in Uzbekistan. Today, many old customs practised in pottery studios have become mere formalities, and the controlling role of the pirs over ceramist groups is declining. However, this is not necessarily indicative of an immediate decline in the pirs’ power. Some ceramists believe their highly skilled masters to be quasi-pirs and that the pir provides them with desirable goals, in addition to an ideal form to which to aspire.     

伊斯兰原教旨主义与马来西亚穆斯林妇女

伊斯兰原教旨主义推动了马来西亚社会和政治的伊斯兰化,并影响到马来穆斯林妇女的权利和地位.本文从分析伊斯兰原教旨主义妇女观入手,探讨马来西亚政府、政党、宗教部门和非政府组织如何从法律、法特瓦、政策、宣传来规范妇女的行为,并分析联邦政府与州政府、执政党与反对党、乌来玛与非政府组织围绕妇女权利展开的争论和斗争.     

Population Redistribution and Language Spread in the Medieval Muslim World

Between the seventh and eighth centuries, a remarkable linguistic phenomenon took place: the Arabic language, which had been mainly the tongue of a few isolated tribes in Western Arabia, became the spoken and written language of a vast region that spanned from the Oxus River in the east to the Atlantic Ocean in the west. Virtually overnight, speakers of other languages had to become conversant and literate in Arabic in order to maintain their positions throughout the Arabic-speaking Muslim Empire. This article explores one factor that enabled the spread of Arabic in such an unprecedented manner: the mass population movement of Arabic speakers and others that occurred as a result of the expansion of the Muslim Empire. The article traces and analyses three categories of movement: initial settlement by the conquest armies; later voluntary movement due to scholarship, alliance building and intermarriage; and ruler-instigated population movement.     

Abstention and politicisation in nineteenth-century Spain: the Catalan case

This paper analyses the phenomenon of abstention in nineteenth-century Spanish politics, where the government had great influence over the electoral results and liberty of opinion was not entirely guaranteed. It focuses in particular on the Catalan case. The paper aims to show that the electorate was not, in fact, apathetic or indifferent, but rather self-aware and politically mobilised. Questioning the dominance of patronage over elections, it contributes to the recent studies that have revised the interpretations of nineteenth-century politicisation by exploring the different ways of participating in the political sphere. By looking at abstention as an example of voters’ political expression, it argues that this phenomenon should be seen as evidence of political mobilisation and social and political engagement.