Research Project: Contemporary Shi'ite Negotiations about Authority
Project leader
David Thurfjell, Södertörns högskola
Project Members
Torsten Hylén Thomas Brandt Fibiger, Aarhus universitet Mohammad Fazlhashemi, Teologiska institutionen Uppsala universitet Ingvild Flaskerud, Oslo universitet Johan Gärde, Ersta Sköndal högskola
Project Period
-
Project Status
Completed
Description
The last decade bears witness to massive changes within Shi´ite Islam. The American invasion of Iraq in 2003, the Cedar-revolution in Lebanon 2005, the domestic turmoil in Iran since 2009 and the so called Arab spring, are all developments that have empowered Shi´ite Muslims and triggered a process of self-evaluation among them. At the heart of this process lies the question of authority. Since the Islamic revolution of 1979, Shi´ite Islam has been dominated by Ayatollah Khomeini´s idea that Islamic jurists should wield direct political power. This idea, which is the fundamental constitutional principle of the Islamic Republic, is now put to question as Shi´ite Muslims - on the elite- as well as the grass-roots level - start to articulate and practice alternatives to Khomeinist theocracy.
This project aims to study the different and changing attitudes to religious authority that are practiced and articulated among Shi´ites in Iran, the Arab world and Europe today. In order to get a comprehensive understanding of this complex process, we will use a multidisciplinary approach. The project will therefore study (1) the elite discourse of theologians by means of text- and discourse analysis, (2) the general views of grass-roots Shi´ites by means of quantitative sociological analysis of available datasets, and (3) the lived religion of individual Shi´ites by means of ethnography and in-depth interviews in Shi´ite environments in Iran, the Arab world and Europe.
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