szabist civilization 1

A Cultural History of the Islamic World

Instructor: Fatima Quraishi

Email: quraishi.fatima@gmail.com

What is history?

What is art?

What is Islamic?

“If it exists at all, Islamic art would be one that overpowered and transformed ethnic or geographic

traditions, or else one that created some peculiar kind of symbiosis between local and pan-Islamic modes of

artistic behaviour and expression. In either instance the term “Islamic” would be comparable to those like

“Gothic” or “Baroque” and would suggest a more or less successful cultural moment in the long

history of native traditions. It would be like a special overlay, a deforming or refracting prism which

transformed at times temporarily and imperfectly, at other times permanently, some local energies and

traditions.” -- Oleg Grabar (1973)

The Byzantine Empire

The Sassanian Empire

The Early Islamic World

Some dates

• 622 C.E. Hijrah (beginning of Muslim era)• 632 C.E. Death of Prophet Muhammad (PBUH)• 633-640 C.E. Conquest of Syria, Palestine & Iraq• 642 C.E. Lower Egypt conquered• 651 C.E. Conquest of Western Iran• 711 C.E. Beginning of Spanish conquest• 731 C.E. Taskent captured, hence completing conquest of

Northeastern Iran

“A theory is a consistent, coherent, complete, critical body of ideas believed to provide clearer, more

comprehensive, or more adequate understanding of some object or objects than less systematic, pre-

theoretical perspectives.”--H. Fisher

“Any given theory emerges in a particular place and time, in response to particular events. It subsequently circulates, and is used and developed by scholars with

particular motivations, working in particular places and times, with particular audiences.”

--A. D’Alleva

Methodology: “a set of procedures or ways of working that characterise an academic discipline.”

“…theory as the process of formulating research questions and methodology as the process of trying to

answer those questions.”

Discourse: “meaningful communication that expresses and shapes cultural ideas and practices.”

--A. D’Alleva