KITA Discourse Series 5/2022: Reform Through Writing: Muslim Intellectuals in Southeast Asia

REFORM THROUGH WRITING: MUSLIM INTELLECTUALS IN SOUTHEAST ASIA
by
DR. KHAIRUDIN ALJUNIED
(UNIVERSITY OF BRUNEI DARUSSALAM)

This talk captures the progressive and pluralistic nature of Muslim intellectualism in Southeast Asia beginning with the sixteenth century with a special focus on the mid-twentieth century onward, a period that can now be regarded as the age of networked Islam. I argue that several Muslim intellectuals have been especially influential in giving rise to what I term the “Islamic reformist mosaic” in Southeast Asia. Although different in terms of their specializations, social backgrounds, and styles of writing, Muslim intellectuals from the reformist current of thinking counter established cultures and paradigms of the day to free their societies from beban sejarah (the burden of history). They sought to overcome and mediate the effects of secularism, modernity, and other ideologies. These intellectuals reconstructed and provided alternatives to the various political, social, and economic systems put in place by the forces of colonialism and neo-colonialism. They underlined and accentuated the importance of ethics, virtues, and values in the shaping of Muslim societies in Southeast Asia.

TENTATIVE PROGRAMME

Date: June 28, 2022 (Tuesday)
Time: 10am – 12pm (GMT+8)
Venue: Online
Platform: Zoom & KITA Facebook page (links below)

10.00am: Introduction by Moderator
10.05am: Welcoming remarks by Distinguished Prof. Dr. Shamsul Amri Baharuddin, KITA Founding Director
10.10am: Seminar by Dr. Khairudin Aljuneied
11.10am: Q & A session

PRESENTER’S PROFILE

Dr. Khairudin Aljunied (PhD SOAS, London) is Professor of Southeast Asian Islamic and Intellectual History at University of Brunei Darussalam and Senior Fellow (previously Malaysia Chair of Islam in Southeast Asia) at the Alwaleed Centre for Muslim-Christian Understanding, Georgetown University. A recognized specialist in the study of Islam in Southeast Asia, he is the author and editor of thirteen books and more than thirty internationally refereed articles. Among his publications are Radicals: Resistance and Protest in Colonial Malaya (Northern Illinois University Press, 2016), Muslim Cosmopolitanism: Southeast Asian Islam in Comparative Perspective (Edinburgh University Press, 2017), Hamka and Islam: Cosmopolitan Reform in the Malay World (Cornell University Press, 2018), Islam in Malaysia: An Entwined History (Oxford University Press, 2019), and Shapers of Islam in Southeast Asia (New York: Oxford University Press, 2022).

Join via Zoom

Join via Facebook