Select Page

Updated location: CGIS South S153

Muslim Societies in South Asia Seminar

Samira Sheikh, Associate Professor of History; Associate Professor of Asian Studies Program; Affiliated Faculty, Islamic Studies Program; Co-Director Vanderbilt History Seminar, Vanderbilt University.

Chair: Ali Asani, Professor of Indo-Muslim and Islamic Religion and Cultures, Faculty of Arts and Sciences; Director, Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal Islamic Studies Program, Harvard University

Shi`i and messianic groups in Gujarat evolved an often uncomfortable coexistence with Mughal political authority, one that was eased by occasionally imperial diktat but was regularly punctuated by bouts of violence and repression. This seminar will examine Mughal relations with three such groups from the late sixteenth century to the early eighteenth, paying attention to local politics and raising the question of whether Akbar’s supposed “tolerance” and Aurangzeb’s assumed “bigotry” are useful frames for discussion of empire, religion, and region.

Co-sponsored with the Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal Islamic Studies Program