Markfield Centre for Contemporary Islam
About MCCI
The Centre supports research, academic programmes, and community outreach, contributing academic resources to aid the development of scholarship that promotes a comprehensive understanding of Islam in our contemporary context.
Organisations that we have worked alongside:
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The Center is committed to
Aims and Objectives
Research
Networking
Knowledge Dissemination
Advocacy
Our Director
Prior to this, Dr Bashir read an M.St in the Study of Religion (Dist.) at the University of Oxford and received his B.A in Arabic. & Islamic Studies (I) from the University of Leeds.
Internal Advisory Board
Dr. Hafza Iqbal
Dr Hafza Iqbal is Course Leader for Islam and Pastorial Care. She completed her PhD in the field of Sufi studies and Islamic Practical Theology at Coventry University’s Centre for Trust, Peace and Social Relations. Prior to the commencement of her doctoral research, based on Muslim communities in contemporary Britain, she completed a Masters in Theology at the University of Birmingham and studied Islamic Theology in the faculty of Usool in Madina Institute, South Africa. Her areas of research and writing continue to be based on contemporary religious communities and the history, development and modern expressions of Sufism. She has also theorised Islamic Practical Theology and is dedicated to highlighting and using the lived experiences of contemporary Muslims to produce new, contextualised and innovative theological understandings and adding nuance and depth to contemporary theology and Islamic studies.
Dr. F. Redhwan Karim
Dr F. Redhwan Karim is a Lecturer in Islamic Studies at the Markfield Institute of Higher Education, as well as the Course Leader for the B.A Islamic Studies program. He completed his PhD under Professor M.A.S Abdel Haleem at SOAS, University of London. His thesis examined the concept of gender relations in the Qur’an. Prior to this, he obtained an M.A in Islamic Studies and a B.A in Arabic and Islamic Studies. He has also studied at various capacities in Egypt, Jordan, and Oman. He is a Fellow of the Higher Education Academy.
Dr. Zahid Parvez
Dr Zahid Parvez is currently the Rector of the Markfield Institute of Higher Education and Head of Quality since 2013. He specialises in Information management, leadership development, and sustainable development from an Islamic perspective.
Dr Parvez has held leadership positions in several national charities and community organisations since 1985. He has engaged in delivering education and training on leadership development to a range of national and international organisations for over 30 years. This training has included sessions on strategic thinking, leadership skills, strategy and change management in the Information Age, Problem-solving and Decision-making, Project management, Risk management, Cross-cultural management, Performance management, and Personal development.
Before joining the Institute, Dr Parvez was a Senior Lecturer in Information Management at the University of Wolverhampton Business School for 20 years (1992 – 2012). He also served as an external examiner at the University of Wales Trinity Saint David, Hertfordshire University and Staffordshire University (for Oman delivery). He also served as the Chief Executive of the Muath Trust.
Dr Parvez has authored several academic papers published in peer-reviewed journals on e-democracy and problem-solving from an Islamic Perspective. He has also written a book entitled, “Building a New Society: An Islamic Approach to Social Change.
External Advisory Board
Dr Shahid Mathee
Mohamed Shahid Mathee is a senior lecturer in the Department of Religion Studies at the University of Johannesburg. He graduated from Al-Azhar University in Egypt with a BA/Honours in Islamic law and Modern Civil Law. He obtained a Masters from the Department of Religious Studies, University of Cape Town and a PhD in Historical Studies from the same university. His current research focuses on the social and intellectual history of Timbuktu and Muslim West Africa working on marriage, divorce and paternity-dispute fatwas from the colonial era and Timbuktu’s twentieth-century chronicles.
Profile: Mohamed Shahid Mathee - University of Johannesburg (uj.ac.za)
Professor S Sayyid
Professor S. Sayyid is a Professor of Rhetoric and Decolonial Thought at the University of Leeds, and Head of the School of Sociology and Social Policy. He is the author of numerous works on Islamism, Islamophobia, critical Muslim studies, decolonial thought, and the founding editor of ReOrient: The Journal of Critical Muslim Studies.
Profile: Professor S. Sayyid | School of Sociology and Social Policy | University of Leeds
Prof. Hansjoerg Schmid
Professor Hansjoerg Schmid is Professor of Interfaith Ethics and Christian-Muslim Relations at the University of Fribourg, Switzerland, and is also co-director of the Swiss Centre for Islam and Society (SZIG). His research focuses on socio-ethical questions of plural coexistence; Islam in post-secular societies; Conflict and Peace (religious resources, dynamics, transformations)and Muslim pastoral care and social work in the context of the welfare state.
Profile:
Dr Amina Eesat-Daas
Dr Amina Easat-Daas earned her PhD at Aston University, Birmingham, UK and studied Muslim women’s political participation in France and Belgium. Prior to this she completed her MA in Modern Languages and Humanities and also her BA in Psychology and Modern Languages at the University of Leicester.
Her research interests include the study of Muslim women, Muslim youth, Islamophobia and creatively countering-Islamophobia in Europe, gendered dimensions of Islamophobia, and ‘European-Islam’. In her capacity as an emerging Islamophobia studies specialist, she has been invited and has presented her research findings to the European Parliament, the Council of Europe, the Carter Center (USA), and the OSCE-ODIHR among others and has appeared on national and international media on numerous occasions to discuss Muslim current affairs.
Profile: Amina Easat-Daas (dmu.ac.uk)
Professor Abdulkader Tayob
Prof Abdulkader Tayob holds the chair in Islam, African Publics and Religious Values at the University of Cape Town, South Africa. He has published on Islam in South Africa, modern Islamic Thought and Islam and the History of Religions. He has led a number of research initiatives and projects, and convened numerous workshops and conferences. He completed a PhD (1989) at Temple University (Department of Religion, Philadelphia, USA) with a dissertation entitled: Islamic Historiography: The Case of al-Ṭabari's Ta'rīkh al-rusul wa 'l-mulūk on the Companions of the Prophet Muhammad.
Profile: Professor Abdulkader Tayob | Department for the Study of Religions (uct.ac.za)
Dr Omer Aijazi
Dr. Aijazi is a transdisciplinary scholar of South Asia, working on questions of violence and social repair in the mountain borderlands of the disputed territory of Kashmir and its continuity with Northern Pakistan. His work investigates how newness, commonly referred to as creativity or imagination, enters the world, particularly when such a possibility does not appear forthcoming. Dr. Aijazi has published in journals such as Himalaya, Women’s Studies Quarterly, Humanity & Society, and the International Journal of Mass Emergencies and Disasters. His book Atmospheric Violence: Disaster and Repair in the Borderlands is forthcoming with the University of Pennsylvania Press.
He is currently lecturer in Disaster Management at the University of Manchester. Dr. Aijazi has also worked as a research advisor for the United Nations system and various humanitarian organizations. He currently serves on the board of Canadians for Peace and Justice in Kashmir.
