Muslim World Book Award

Muslim World Book Award

The Muslim World Book Review was launched in 1980 and has been publishing quarterly issues since. To commemorate over 40 years of continuous publication, the Muslim World Book Review, alongside Kube Publishing and the Markfield Institute of Higher Education, have collaboratively launched the Muslim World Book Award.

The Muslim World Book Award celebrates excellence in academic scholarship and research through conferring an award to recognise an outstanding academic book published in the English language within the broad field of Islamic Studies/study of the Muslim World.

The award includes a cash prize of £1,000.

The book will be selected by our expert panel, who will make their selection according to the following criteria:

1) Contribution to a deeper understanding of the Islamic tradition/Muslim world;

2) Originality;

3) Erudition and scholarly acumen;

4) Published in the last three years;

If you would like to suggest a book, please provide a short overview detailing why the book should be considered and how it meets the aforementioned criteria (500 words max).

To suggest a book for the panel to consider, please email: awards@mihe.ac.uk

Please note the deadline for suggestions is the 5^th of January 2025. No books published after this date will be considered for the MWBA 2025.

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2024 Muslim World Book Award

Shortlist:

Hafsa Kanjwal, Colonizing Kashmir: State-building Under Indian Occupation (Stanford University Press, 2023)

Megan Robb, Print and the Urdu Public: Muslims, Newspapers, and Urban Life (Oxford University Press, 2021)

Mbaye Lo and Carl Ernst, I Cannot Write My Life: Islam, Arabic, and Slavery in Omar ibn Said's America (UNC Press, 2023)

Dzenita Karic, Bosnian Hajj Literature: Multiple Paths to the Holy (Edinburgh University Press, 2023)

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Winner:

Raihan Ismail, Rethinking Salafism: The Transnational Networks of Salafi ʿUlama in Egypt, Kuwait, and Saudi Arabia (Oxford University Press, 2021)

The Muslim World Book Award is sponsored by the Markfield Institute of Higher Education (MIHE), the Islamic Foundation, and Kube Publishing, and promoted through the long running journal ‘The Muslim World Book Review’. Professor Ismail won the award for important work entitled: Rethinking Salafism: The Transnational Networks of Salafi Ulama in Egypt, Kuwait and Saudi Arabia. The book was selected by the Muslim World Book Award panel for its erudition, originality and contribution to a deeper understanding of contemporary Muslim movements.

Professor Ismail also delivered a public lecture on the arguments found in the book. She detailed the different strands of Salafi thought, most commonly bifurcated between the ‘quietist, apolitical’ strands and the ‘activist’ delineation. Both of these ideological directions differ with the violent Jihadist Salafi trends due to their eschewing of violence in the pursuit of social and political change. Nevertheless, Professor Ismail highlighted that even amongst these influential groupings, Salafi thought is nuanced with many schisms that emit multifarious manifestations of Salafism.

These differences were influenced by a variety of factors, including the relationship with the state. The three key nations in which Salafism was analysed were Saudi Arabia, Egypt and Kuwait. In each of these contexts, key political events challenged and influenced the responses from Salafi scholarship, which further exacerbated the tensions between the quietist and activist groupings, such as the Gulf Wars, the Arab Spring etc. Loyalty, whether genuine or strategic is characteristic of many quietist strains that constrain and align understandings of Islam to those of the ruling dynasties in Saudi Arabia, and Kuwait, where social and religious change appears almost incremental in comparison to embryonic political reform that briefly characterised other North African and Middle Eastern states via the Arab Spring.

Professor Ismail also emphasised that Salafi typologies are not static, rather they appear fluid and able to embrace change to survive involatile regions. Detailing transnational networks that transcend traditional borders, Professor Ismail discussed informal and formal ideational ties and ideals held by a range of influential Ulama who are financially backed by affluent families across the Middle East. Major figures within the various Salafist contingents were highlighted alongside the contributions they offer to key dynamic debates.

Congratulations to Professor Raihan Ismail for winning the inaugural Muslim World Book Award, and the panel looks forward to the submissions for next year.

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