Contested Minorities of the Middle East and Asia

Editor(s): Attila Kovács, Katarína Šomodiová

Book Description

Relations among minorities and majorities, whether religious, ethnic, cultural or other, have been a triggering factor of social dynamics all over the world for millennia. Indeed, their relevance has further grown in recent decades due to turbulent politics and rapidly changing social relations. The Middle East and Asia have traditionally been home to a vast array of religious and ethnic groups, yet a series of both armed and ideological conflicts have begun to re-shape their classic complex social composition.

This volume offers valuable insights into the issue of minorities in various geographical and political settings, from the Uyghurs of China and the modern Christian movements of India to the Romas and Dervishes of early 20th century Iran, the Mandaeans of Mesopotamia, and the Muslims of Western Europe.

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Hardback

ISBN-13: 978-1-5275-0772-2

ISBN-10: 1-5275-0772-6

Date of Publication: 01/05/2018

Pages / Size: 161 / A5

Price: £58.99

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Biography

Attila Kovács is an Islamologist and Associate Professor at the Department of Comparative Religion, Comenius University, Slovakia, having completed his doctoral studies at the Department of Comparative Religion at the same institution in 2004. He is the author of numerous studies and articles on Islam in various journals and published a monograph titled Allah’s Warriors: the Visual Culture of Islamic Radicalism (2009). His research focuses on contemporary Islam and Islamism in the Arab Middle East, Islam and its visual representations, and the anthropology of Islam. He is the director of the Academic Centre for Shi'a Studies in Bratislava.

Katarína Šomodiová is a Doctoral Student in the Department of Comparative Religion, Comenius University, Slovakia, and holds an MA in Political Science. She specialises in the relationship between ethnic and religious identity among Muslims in Europe, as well as among members of Middle Eastern minority groups both in their homelands and the diaspora. She is one of the founding members of the Academic Centre for Shi'a Studies in Bratislava.