Eirik Hovden - Uses of the past

January 2, 2019March 17, 2019 by Eirik Hovden

Uses of the Past in Pre-modern Codification and Canonization of Islamic Law – 30th November 2018

Canonization of pre-modern Islamic law can refer to the formation of new criteria of interpretation as well as formation textual canons of normative source texts or collections of rules. Somewhat less explored is canonization processes during transition to modernity and the notion of pre-modern codification. Codification of Islamic law is often seen as a term and concept reserved for cases where the modern state take a direct role in formulating the law.

In this workshop we wanted to explore how various actors, elites and Muslim legal scholar in late pre-modern times also appealed to the notion of a code-like law, in line with certain exceptions of quality and free of ambiguity and contradiction. We also wanted to explore the “open space” between the analytical terms “codification” and “canonization”.

Most of the presentations dealt with contextualized cases of how Islamic law had been canonized or codified in specific instances, regions and periods. During the workshop we had much time for discussion of concepts. There were still disagreements to what extent the term “codification” fits to processes of defining pre-modern Islamic law, however, there was a strong concensus that the phenomena related to this problem field need to be addressed, explored and elaborated further. All the participants agreed to continue with this process and to be part of a theme issue addressing this. We will update as this develops!

December 4, 2017April 12, 2018 by Eirik Hovden

Governance and Violence in Islamic Law Workshop: University of Exeter 24th November 2017

The USPPIP workshop “Governance and Violence in Islamic law” was held on Friday 24th November 2017 at the University of Exeter. This workshop combined the two research foci “governance” and “violence” in Islamic law and was organised by the Exeter and Bergen team respectively, namely Professor Robert Gleave and Dr. Omar Anchassi in Exeter and Professor Knut Vikør and Dr. Eirik Hovden from Bergen. After an open call for papers, the programme was filled with both senior and junior scholars with a diversity of geographic background.

The invited speakers were Nesrine Badawi from the American University of Cairo; Usaama al‐Azami from Markfield Institute of Higher Education; Gunnar J. Weimann from Leiden University; Adnan Zulfiqar from Rutgers University; Tukur Mukhtar from Usmanu Danfodiyo University; Naveen Kanalu Ramamurthy from UCLA and Zubair Abbasi from Lahore University of Management Sciences. Present were also several local UK and Exeter scholars of Islamic law.

While the invited speakers presented cases of individual research, common themes of discussion were how governance and violence are related in Islamic legal thought and how Islamic law has been used to justify a wide range of practices by typical state actors as well as non-state actors and vigilante groups.

March 6, 2017May 23, 2018 by Eirik Hovden

First USPPIP Project Workshop – Rabat, Feb. 2017

I was asked to share in writing some personal remarks of how I as a team member experienced the project workshop held recently in Rabat. The following are some short reflections.

First: Why Rabat? Each of the four project teams is scheduled to organize and host one project workshop during the two-year project period. The first team out was the Dutch one, led by prof. Leon Buskens (Leiden University). We had originally expected to be invited to Leiden, but prof. Buskens also happens to lead the Dutch research institute in Rabat called NIMAR, and the workshop was early on decided to be held there rather than in Leiden. Personally for me, that was great, not having been to Rabat before.

The workshop’s main focus was “custom” and how custom is referred to in order to legitimate both continuities and changes in Islamic law. Several of the presentations were held by Moroccan specialists (and practitioners, like judges) in Moroccan family law and issues related to women’s ownership of common land, two fields where much has changed the last couple of decades in Moroccan law and legal discourse. We therefore got a deep empirical backdrop for the more methodological and theoretical discussions on how “the past” and hereunder custom, is used in contemporary Islamic legal discourses and the many ways custom can be incorporated into both Islamic law and national state law, and a mix thereof.

The workshop not only focused on custom, it was also a project workshop for the internal project members where each of us held a presentation. Since we are still in the beginning, this was also a good time to discuss the details of the outline of our research plans, including the main issues related to theory and methods. While everyone in the project subscribes to belonging to the broad category of “Islamic studies” and “Islamic legal studies” more specifically, many of us do have different disciplinary backgrounds. To simply have time to talk about the different backgrounds, perspectives and interests and how it can constructively fit together was highly valuable.

Actually, for me as a project post-doc, who does not have as good an overview over the field as the professors, to simply have plenty of time in breaks, meals, walks to and from the venues was very important, also in order to hear more about the background of the ideas behind the project. In the project we do have monthly meetings via internet, but the informal and spontaneous meetings we had in Rabat, in smaller groups, or even one-to-one, was useful for me.

After the two day workshop most of us had a full day to see the city of Rabat and its once neighbour-city, Sale. Browsing through several of the city’s bookshops was of course high up on the to-do-list. Having several Morocco-experts in the group made the “self-guided tour” fascinating to take part in.