Today
Jane Vaynman, "Enemies in Agreement: Political Volatility and the Design of Arms Control" (Cambridge UP, 2026)
Why do adversaries sometimes cooperate to restrain their military competition? Why do they design arms control agreements with intrusive verification in some cases but rely on minimal transparency in others? Amidst ongoing international competition, arms control remains rare desp ... Show More
39m 22s
Today
Manuel Barcia, "Pirate Imperialism: Trade, Abolition, and Global Suppression of Maritime Raiding, 1825–1870" (Yale UP, 2026)
In the middle decades of the nineteenth century, imperial powers around the world came into direct confrontation with local resistance in the form of maritime raiding. From the Atlantic basin to the western Mediterranean Sea, the Persian Gulf and the east coast of Africa, and Sou ... Show More
38m 52s
Yesterday
Lewis Sage-Passant, "Beyond States and Spies: The Security Intelligence Services of the Private Sector" (Edinburgh UP, 2024)
Scholars have long viewed intelligence as the preserve of nation states. Where the term ‘private sector intelligence’ is used, the focus has been overwhelmingly on government contractors. As such, a crucial aspect of intelligence power has been overlooked: the use of intelligence ... Show More
1h 2m
Jul 2021
Supriya Gandhi, "The Emperor Who Never Was: Dara Shukoh in Mughal India" (Harvard UP, 2020)
In her magnificent and lyrical new book, The Emperor Who Never Was: Dara Shukoh in Mughal India (Harvard UP, 2020), Supriya Gandhi reorients and adds unprecedented depth to our understanding of the much memorialized but less understood Mughal prince and thinker Dara Shukoh (d. 16 ... Show More
1 h
Jan 2024
Rishad Choudhury, "Hajj Across Empires: Pilgrimage and Political Culture After the Mughals, 1739-1857" (Cambridge UP, 2023)
In Hajj Across Empires: Pilgrimage and Political Culture After the Mughals, 1739-1857 (Cambridge UP, 2023), Rishad Choudhury presents a new history of imperial connections across the Indian Ocean from 1739 to 1857, a period that witnessed the decline and collapse of Mughal rule a ... Show More
1h 23m
Oct 2020
Danielle Haque, “Interrogating Secularism: Race and Religion in Arab Transnational Art and Literature” (Syracuse UP, 2019)
In many popular accounts of contemporary “Western” society there is an inherent contradiction between the principles underlying liberal secularism and Islam. This type of binary discourse about “religion” and “secular” naturalizes these differences and promotes the seeming rigidi ... Show More
56m 8s
Jun 2021
Samy Ayoub, "Law, Empire, and the Sultan: Ottoman Imperial Authority and Late Hanafi Jurisprudence" (Oxford UP, 2020)
In his majestic and magisterial new book Law, Empire, and the Sultan: Ottoman Imperial Authority and Late Hanafi Jurisprudence (Oxford UP, 2020), Samy Ayoub examines and demonstrates the entanglement of Islamic law and imperial political authority in the early modern period. Focu ... Show More
1 h
May 2019
Scott S. Reese, “Imperial Muslims: Islam, Community and Authority in the Indian Ocean, 1839-1937” (Edinburgh UP, 2017)
Religion and empire are often intertwined. Regarding Muslims there are well known dynasties like the Umayyad, the Abbasid, the Fatimid, the Ottoman, and many others. But the empire governing the largest Muslim population was, of course, the British. In Imperial Muslims: Islam, Co ... Show More
1h 1m
Dec 2023
Nur Sobers-Khan et al., "Beyond Colonial Rupture: Print Culture and the Emergence of Muslim Modernity in Nineteenth-Century South Asia" (2023)
Scholarly discussions on Islam in print have focused predominantly on the role of Urdu in the development of North Indian Muslim publics (Dubrow, 2018; Robb, 2020), ʿulama and Islamic jurisprudence (Tareen, 2020) and relations between Islam and colonial modernity (Robinson, 2008; ... Show More
38m 21s
Feb 2024
Jonathan A. C. Brown, "Slavery and Islam" (Oneworld Academic, 2019)
In his majestic and encyclopedic new book Slavery and Islam (Oneworld Academic, 2019), Jonathan A. C. Brown presents a sweeping analysis of Muslim intellectual, political, and social entanglements with slavery, and some of the thorniest conceptual and ethical problems involved in ... Show More
1h 8m
Apr 2021
Junaid Quadri, "Transformations of Tradition: Islamic Law in Colonial Modernity" (Oxford UP, 2021)
In his much anticipated and equally brilliant book Transformations of Tradition: Islamic Law in Colonial Modernity (Oxford UP, 2021), Junaid Quadri explores the productive tensions, fissures, and creative interpretive projects enabled by the drive to defend Muslim traditionalism ... Show More
1h 16m
Feb 2018
Alexander Knysh, “Sufism: A New History” (Princeton UP, 2017)
Sufism, like many terms in the study of Islam, can be difficult to define and even more difficult to handle, but Alexander Knysh, in Sufism: A New History (Princeton University Press, 2017), has produced a primer that will both challenge and reinforce many of the assumptions we’v ... Show More
56m 2s
In her fascinating and remarkable new book Faithful Fighters: Identity and Power in the British Indian Army (Stanford University Press, 2019), Kate Imy explores the negotiation of religious identity, military service, and imperial power in the context of twentieth century British India. How were preconceived British imperial notions of religion and loyalty t ... Show More
