Category Archives: Publishing Opportunities

Call for Papers for an edited volume on: Authority, Agency and Islam

Introduction
The relationship between Muslims and the world is in crisis-mode, and the effects are felt in many ways and in many different instances. One of the themes that often succumbs to ideological cooptation is the issue of authority in Islam and for Muslims. What role is there for Muslims within a minority context both as agents in charge of their own destiny, or as demanders of social justice, and recognition and representation in time, place, and public space? Is there space for and actions of solidarity transcending boundaries, either geographic or socio-cultural? To what extent can Muslims engage with non-Muslims and state authorities, whether as minorities in non-Muslim territories or in countries with a Muslim majority? Are there limits for Muslims in its ability to practice their faith in a secular state? What texts are to be considered authoritative when approaching these questions? And is there one locus or multiple loci for legitimate interpretive authority?

Although the focus of the public discourse remains on the headlines, this book aims to offer a much deeper insight into examining the relationship between authority and agency for Muslims and Islam today.

Objective of the Book
The overall mission is for this book to be one of the leading  publications within the area of contemporary Islamic and Muslim studies. We envision this book to be a key reference at a number of levels, across a wide variety of fields both within and outside of academia. The main objective is to bring together academic minds from a variety of fields all connected by an interest in understanding the role of authority and the dynamics of agency in contemporary Islam as lived by Muslims today.

Paper proposals to be included may engage the above theme from any perspective appropriate for this cross-disciplinary book. A list of suggested topics is the following:

  • Religious vs. State authority
  • Effects of cosmopolitanism and multiculturalism
  • Institution-building and citizenship
  • Geopolitics, power, and economic interests
  • Race and gender
  • Authority in a historical perspective (particular interest may go out to the effects that can be felt in the post-Ottoman, nationalist and post-colonial setting).
  • Health and behavioural change through social changes felt by Muslims
  • Islam and business (e.g. Islam and financial authority, commodification of Muslims, effects of marketing, branding, human resource training and motivation, sales, crowdsourcing and product
    development)
  • Environmental issues
  • Islam and Muslims in the news and as journalists, authority of public perception and reproducible images
  • Cross-cultural issues
  • Privacy, risk, ethics, and legal issues facing Islam and Muslims domestically or globally

The above list is meant to be illustrative, not exhaustive. Individual papers will be combined to form thematic but multi-layered approach to the relationship between Authority, Agency and Islam and/or Muslims.

Submission Procedure
The editors invite papers from diverse disciplines interested in expanding the body of knowledge in this intriguing area to submit chapters for publication consideration. Individuals interested in
submitting chapters should submit a 300-word abstract in a Microsoft Word or pdf document, with a short bio, to either  laurens.de-rooij@durham.ac.uk or law.ilm@durham.ac.uk by March 22nd, 2015.

Notification of Abstract acceptance will be March 30th, 2015. Following that a letter of interest, including your name, affiliation, and chapter proposal should be sent electronically by April 19th, 2015.

Proposals (2-3 pages) should provide a descriptive outline and clearly explain the purpose and contribution of the chapter. Definitive acceptance notifications will be sent by April 27th, 2015. We also
invite advanced graduate students and recent PhDs to submit proposals that address one or more of the themes above. Upon acceptance, authors will have until August 31st, 2015 to prepare a chapter of approximately 6,000 and 10,000 words, including notes and references. Each chapter will be subject to a peer review process and must not have been published, accepted for publication, or presently under consideration for publication elsewhere. Guidelines for preparing the final chapter will be sent upon acceptance notification.

Note: No late abstracts will be accepted. The final papers are due August 31st, 2015. We look forward to reading your abstracts.

Important Dates

  • Abstract Deadline: March 22nd, 2015
  • Abstract Notification: March 30th, 2015
  • Full Chapter Proposal Due: April 19th, 2015
  • Definitive Acceptance Notifications: April 27th, 2015
  • Full Chapters Due: August 31st, 2015

Call for Papers: Buddhist Tourism in Asia: Sacred Spaces within Global Networks

Workshop: “Buddhist Tourism in Asia: Sacred Spaces within Global Networks”

Conference Organizers: Courtney Bruntz (OSU); Brooke Schedneck (Chiangmai University)

Abstract Submission Deadline: May 1st, 2015
Date of Project: April 8-10, 2016
Project Location: Oregon State University

Project Description:
Across Asia, Buddhists, government organizations, business corporations, and individuals participate in re-imaginings of Buddhism by patronizing sacred mountains, temples, relics, and Buddhist teachers. Recent economic developments in India, China, and Thailand have spearheaded Buddhist tourism that re-conceptualizes the meanings and values of sites associated with Buddhism. Such realities require investigations into how Buddhism is entangled within various economic realms. This project brings together Buddhist scholars across Asia, to generate a comparative investigation of Buddhist spaces, identities, and practices as dynamic entities – entities that shift significance within various flows and networks of travelers. Scholars will pointedly analyze Buddhist-associated sacred sites that attract domestic, regional, and international visitors. We are interested in the ways that Buddhist sites are influenced by travel, and the individuals and organizations involved in managing Buddhist locations.

We are concerned with not only mapping the networks and circuits of Buddhist travel but also in determining the relationship between Buddhism and tourism. We will investigate the ways Buddhist worlds are evoked for targeted audiences, both Buddhist and non-Buddhist. Advertising for Buddhist tourism, sometimes but not always labeled as pilgrimage, promotes markers of belonging, so that travelers are not going to a particular nation-state but to a Buddhist world. In this workshop we will use the idea of the nation-state but more important will be the ideas of networks and imaginaries.

Submission Details:
Following this workshop, all participants, will submit a chapter for publication in an edited volume on Buddhist tourism. Our workshop will primarily draw on theories and methods of the disciplines of
anthropology and religious studies but also tourism studies and cultural geography.

In this call for papers we are especially interested in participants with expertise in Myanmar, but scholars conducting research on Buddhism and tourism in all areas of Asia are welcome. Please submit an abstract (300 words) to Courtney Bruntz (courtney.bruntz@gmail.com) or Brooke Schedneck (brooke@iseaa.org) by May 1st. Selected participants will be notified within two weeks to discuss further logistics of paper submission and funding possibilities. The workshop will be capped at 15 participants.

Call for Papers for the journal Sociology of Religion

Call for Papers from Sociology of Religion for Advanced Graduate Students

The editors of Sociology of Religion: A Quarterly Review are now soliciting essays (25 page maximum or 7,000 words, all inclusive) from advanced graduate students built on dissertations in process. The essay should speak specifically to your scholarship, yet generally to sociologists interested in religion by presenting a central idea of relevance to our readership. In addition, the essay should also reflect on the process of developing as a sociologist whose scholarship includes a clear focus on religion, which may include observations on how “sociology of religion” as a sub-field is currently being shaped, where it is heading, why that matters, etc. While the essay may address one’s own experiences and in the first person, all aspects of the essay should remain of relevance and interest to rigorous scholarship, which therefore can include things like aspects of our training, professional development, conceptual breakthroughs, and empirical surprises. Be sure to cite sources and develop ideas and arguments adequate to the high standards of our journal. 

All manuscripts should follow standard author guidelines for the journal (e.g., 12 pt Times Roman, double space throughout), and be submitted through Manuscript Centralhttps://mc.manuscriptcentral.com/socrel. 

The deadline for submissions is May 31, 2015. Any questions should be addressed to the Editor in Chief, Gerardo Marti, sorjournal@davidson.edu.

Call for Papers ISLAMIC RELIGIOUS PRACTICE IN THE U.S.

Writer’s Seminar and Volume on: ISLAMIC RELIGIOUS PRACTICE IN THE U.S.

How do Muslims in the United States practice their religion? Where, when, how and why do they pray, fast during Ramadan, and make pilgrimage to Mecca? What rituals accompany the birth of a child, a wedding, and the death of a loved one? How do they celebrate holidays and mark days of commemoration such as the martyrdom of Husayn? How do U.S. Muslims recite the Qur’an, celebrate the birthday of the Prophet Muhammad, and praise God?

The growing scholarly corpus on Islam in America includes significant coverage of Muslim American organizations and associations, anti-Muslim prejudice and the politics of Islam, Sufism, the interpretation of Islamic law and ethics, gender and women’s issues, the sociology of mosque attendance, the assimilation of Muslim immigrants, Muslim American public opinion, and the ways that Muslim Americans construct their ethnic and racial identities. But there is a dearth of scholarship on Islamic ritual practice. Scholars, journalists, students, and members of the general public often resort to introductory textbooks to describe the ritual practices and performances of Muslim Americans rather than consulting a body of peer-reviewed scholarship.

This project, which includes a writer’s seminar and a resulting edited volume, will explore in concrete detail how Muslim Americans practice their religion through ritual performance. Drafts of volume chapters will be due on June 1, 2016. Contributors will then gather in early July, 2016, on the campus of IUPUI in downtown Indianapolis, Indiana, to comment on each other’s papers. Final drafts, approximately 30 pages long, will be due on November 1, 2016.

Scholars are welcome to use a variety of theoretical approaches, but all chapters should give readers a concrete sense of what it feels like, looks like, sounds like, and smells like (as relevant) to perform the ritual under consideration. So, each chapter should be descriptive as well as analytical. All writing should be accessible to a broad audience (so scholarly jargon, whenever used, must be defined and explained).

Generally speaking, chapters will cover topics such as the pillars of practice, life cycle rites, holidays, food rituals, dhikr, and Qur’an recitation but other thematic approaches to ritual practice and
performance are also welcome.

Contributors to the project so far include: Kambiz GhaneaBassiri on Hajj; Amir Hussain on funerals and burials; Michael Muhammad Knight on Ramadan; Marcia Hermansen on mawlid/milad; and Laury Silvers on congregational prayer.

If interested, please send a brief expression of interest to Edward Curtis, ecurtis4@iupui.edu . Participants will then be invited to submit a brief proposal by May 1, 2015.

New Open Access book series on New Religious Movements

De Gruyter Open, part of De Gruyter publishing group, invites book proposals for the inaugural volume of the new Open Access book series on New Religious Movements.

The series welcomes written or edited monographs and anthologies on New Religious Movements (NRMs) and alternative spiritualities – both empirical and theoretical with interdisciplinary approaches. Of particular interest are those that combine perspectives and methods drawn from all social sciences and humanities on the present, historical and newly emerging NRMs, as well as research methods, issues and problems, and new directions in study of NRMs. More information about the series can be found at https://degruyteropen.com/oatheologynrm/

Authors interested in submitting their proposals for the inaugural volume are asked to fill in the New Book Proposal Form (which can be found at https://degruyteropen.com/…/subj…/theology_religious_studies/) and send it to the series editor Dr. Rasa Pranskeviciute at Rasa.Pranskeviciute@degruyteropen.com, together with a sample from the book (introduction, chapter or subchapter). Authors of ready manuscripts are welcome to attach the whole text of the book.

The proposed book should be written in English, contain at least 100,000 words and must not have been published before in any language. The date of submission of the entire manuscript must be no later than November 2015. Earlier date of the submission will be an additional asset.

The author(s) of the inaugural volume(s) will benefit from:

- scrupulous peer-review
- free language edition done by native speakers in English
- no publication fees
- complimentary copies
- royalties from print sales
- unrestricted access to the book for all readers, helpful to reach audiences on a global scale

Our Open Access Books are available through De Gruyter’s publishing platform, libraries, full text repositories and distributors such as Amazon. Each title is also offered as a print version.

Submissions are due by February 15, 2015.

Please feel free to forward this invitation to any interested colleagues or associates.

Workshop: “Religion and the Political Participation and Mobilization of Immigrant Groups: A Transatlantic Perspective”.

The Centre for Ethnic and Migration Studies (CEDEM) of the University of Liège is pleased to announce the third scientific thematic workshop organized by the working group Citizenship and Political Participation on “Religion and the Political Participation and Mobilization of Immigrant Groups: A Transatlantic Perspective”.  

11 May 2015
CEDEM, University of Liège, Belgium

The scientific thematic workshop will examine the political participation of immigrants in an original perspective. Instead of analyzing it through an exclusive ethnic and racial origin lens, we will focus on the role of religion in the political participation and mobilization of immigrant groups in a transatlantic perspective (Europe-North America). The leading question, of the workshop is: what role does religion play in the political participation and mobilization of immigrant groups in European and North American cities? We don’t want to focus on Muslims but consider Catholics, Protestants, and religions as well as non-religious faith such as secularism.

The papers should cover in priority one of the following topics possibly in a comparative perspective.  However, other topics proposed by the applicants will also be considered.  The topics:

• Electoral behavior of Muslim, Christian, Buddhist, etc. citizens with an immigrant background
• Political mobilization through churches, mosques and religious associations
• Immigrants and organized secularism
• Music, religion and political mobilization of second and third generations
• Immigrants and anti-religious discrimination
• Trans-religious alliances among immigrants

This workshop is open to professors, researchers, MA students, PhD students. The attendance is free but registration is requested before April 15th 2015. Please send an email to Sonia.Gsir@ulg.ac.be

The intention is to prepare a special issue of a journal including a selection of the papers presented at the workshop. Those interested are asked to send a one-page presentation of their paper to Marco Martiniello by February 8th 2015 : mail to: M.Martiniello@ulg.ac.be

CFP: Oxford Symposium on Religious Studies, March 2015

Invitation to the Oxford Symposium on Religious Studies, 2015, at the Old Library in the Oxford University Church Of St Mary

We are pleased to invite you to participate in the Oxford Symposium on Religious Studies to be held and 18, 19 and 20 March, 2015.  The meeting will be held at The Old Library.  Constructed in 1320, The Old Library is the first university (as opposed to college) building in Oxford and therefore uniquely important; this is where the nascent University began.

The session will be hosted by Canon Brian Mountford, Vicar of St Mary’s. Dr. Mountford is a Fellow and Chaplain of St Hilda’s College in the University of Oxford.

You are invited to present a paper on an aspect of religious studies, or you may wish to attend as an observer.

For more information visit our website Oxford Symposium on Religious Studies