Islam in South Asia [Book] : a short history / Jamal Malik.

Islamic and Islamicate South Asia has become a focal point in academia, esp. since 9/11. Where did South Asian Muslims come from? How did they fare in interacting with Hindu cultures? How did they negotiate identity as ruling and ruled minorities and majorities? Islam in South Asia aims to synthesize the long history of Islam as an intrinsic part of Indian society seeing the vantage point of such a complex history as a series of cultural encounters that were mutually energizing. Part I covers early Muslim expansion and the journey of the Arabs into South Asia and their formative phase in context of initial cultural encounter which produced a unique blend of Islamicated culture (app. 700-1300). Part II views the establishment of Muslim empire, cultures oscillating between Islamic and Islamicate, centralized and regionalized power, when Muslims became part of the Indian social fabric embodying cultural change through new urban centers and intellectual hubs as well as the expanding agricultural societies (app. 1300-1700). The third cluster is composed in the backdrop of regional centralization, territoriality and colonial rule, displaying processes of integration and differentiation, of marginalisation and privatisation of Muslim cultures in colonial setting, that helped the cause of masculinized Islam to create new forms of socialization which threatened to tear apart the tradition of tolerance in Muslim societies (app. 1700-1930). Tensions between Muslim pluralism and singularity evolving in public sphere as religious identity politics in the period of high nationalism followed by post-colonial predicaments make up the fourth cluster (app. 1930-2002). The book would interest all those interested in intellectual, cultural and social history of Muslim South Asia, and in history of religions, as well as social scientists, social and cultural anthropologists, theologians and Indologists.

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