Book ID: CBB001553253

The Medieval Islamic Republic of Letters: Arabic Knowledge Construction (2015)

unapi

Musawi, Muhsin Jasim (Author)


University of Notre Dame Press


Publication Date: 2015
Physical Details: xiv + 449 pp.
Language: English

"In The Medieval Islamic Republic of Letters: Arabic Knowledge Construction, Muhsin J. al-Musawi offers a groundbreaking study of literary heritage in the medieval and premodern Islamic period. Al-Musawi challenges the paradigm that considers the period from the fall of Baghdad in 1258 to the collapse of the Ottoman Empire in 1919 as an "Age of Decay" followed by an "Awakening" (al-nahdah). His sweeping synthesis debunks this view by carefully documenting a "republic of letters" in the Islamic Near East and South Asia that was vibrant and dynamic, one varying considerably from the generally accepted image of a centuries-long period of intellectual and literary stagnation. Al-Musawi argues that the massive cultural production of the period was not a random enterprise: instead, it arose due to an emerging and growing body of readers across Islamic lands who needed compendiums, lexicons, and commentaries to engage with scholars and writers. Scholars, too, developed their own networks to respond to each other and to their readers. Rather than addressing only the elite, this culture industry supported a common readership that enlarged the creative space and audience for prose and poetry in standard and colloquial Arabic. Works by craftsmen, artisans, and women appeared side by side with those by distinguished scholars and poets. Through careful exploration of these networks, The Medieval Islamic Republic of Letters makes use of relevant theoretical frameworks to situate this culture in the ongoing discussion of non-Islamic and European efforts. Thorough, theoretically rigorous, and nuanced, al-Musawi's book is an original contribution to a range of fields in Arabic and Islamic cultural history of the twelfth to eighteenth centuries. "Muhsin al-Musawi's work systematizes a huge body of primary literary texts and current scholarship under a compelling and original thesis. The Medieval Islamic Republic of Letters will be the starting point for a new generation of scholarship on this six-hundred-year 'republic of letters' that stretched from India to North Africa." --Suzanne P. Stetkevych, Sultan Qaboos bin Said Professor of Arabic and Islamic Studies, Georgetown University

...More
Reviewed By

Review Dana Sajdi (2016) Review of "The Medieval Islamic Republic of Letters: Arabic Knowledge Construction". Journal of Early Modern History (pp. 589-592). unapi

Citation URI
https://data.isiscb.org/isis/citation/CBB001553253/

Similar Citations

Thesis Küçük, B. Harun; (2012)
Early Enlightenment in Istanbul (/isis/citation/CBB001560802/)

Thesis Yalcinkaya, Mehmet Alper; (2010)
“Their Science, Our Values”: Science, State and Society in the 19th Century Ottoman Empire (/isis/citation/CBB001567221/)

Article Mikhail, Alan; (2013)
Unleashing the Beast: Animals, Energy, and the Economy of Labor in Ottoman Egypt (/isis/citation/CBB001212530/)

Book McIntosh, Gregory C.; (2000)
The Piri Reis map of 1513 (/isis/citation/CBB000111399/)

Book Brooke, John; İhsanoǧlu, Ekmeleddin; (2005)
Religious Values and the Rise of Science in Europe (/isis/citation/CBB000503116/)

Thesis Bulmus, Birsen; (2008)
The Plague in the Ottoman Empire, 1300--1838 (/isis/citation/CBB001561189/)

Article Robert Morrison; (2016)
Mūsā Cālīnūs’ Treatise on the Natures of Medicines and Their Use (/isis/citation/CBB277280462/)

Article İhsanoǧlu, Ekmeleddin; Nicolaïdis, Efthymios; (2005)
Communications du Symposium “La diffusion de la science et de la technologie dans l'Empire Ottoman et les États nationaux” (/isis/citation/CBB000770866/)

Article Fazlioğlu, Ihsan; (2008)
The Samarqand Mathematical-Astronomical School: A Basis for Ottoman Philosophy and Science (/isis/citation/CBB001024098/)

Article Inönü, Erdal; (2005)
Salih Zeki and Asâr-i Bâkiye (/isis/citation/CBB000931401/)

Article John Hedley Brooke; Ronald L. Numbers; (2016)
Science, Eastern Orthodoxy, and World Religions (/isis/citation/CBB144851888/)

Book Shefer-Mossensohn, Miri; (2009)
Ottoman Medicine: Healing and Medical Institutions, 1500--1700 (/isis/citation/CBB001200973/)

Article Robert Morrison; (2016)
Religion and Science in the Eastern Mediterranean (/isis/citation/CBB487335056/)

Chapter Joachim Gierlichs; (2013)
Tabrizi Woodcarvings in Timurid Iran (/isis/citation/CBB213047868/)

Book Zayde Antrim; (2018)
Mapping the Middle East (/isis/citation/CBB695290584/)

Article Pinto, Karen; (2011)
The Maps Are the Message: Mehmet II's Patronage of an “Ottoman Cluster” (/isis/citation/CBB001221481/)

Book Kātib Çelebi; Gottfried Hagen; Robert Dankoff; (2021)
An Ottoman Cosmography: Translation of Cihānnümā (/isis/citation/CBB656697132/)

Authors & Contributors
Morrison, Robert G.
Ihsanoglu, Ekmeleddin
Joachim Gierlichs
Elif Baga
Dankoff, Robert
Antrim, Zayde
Concepts
Arab/Islamic world, civilization and culture
Medicine
Science and religion
Mathematics
Maps; atlases
Cartography
Time Periods
18th century
Early modern
16th century
19th century
17th century
15th century
Places
Ottoman Empire
Europe
Tabrīz (Iran)
Middle and Near East
Istanbul (Turkey)
Eastern Europe
Comments

Be the first to comment!

{{ comment.created_by.username }} on {{ comment.created_on | date:'medium' }}

Log in or register to comment