Covid-19 and Muslim Religiosity: an AVACGIS Webinar Series | Summer 2020

June 16, 2020, 12:00 PM to August 24, 2020, 12:00 PM EDT
Online Location

 

The Ali Vural Ak Center for Global Islamic Studies (AVACGIS) at George Mason University is organizing a webinar series that will explore the impact of Covid-19 on various dimensions of Muslim religious life from a global perspective. Each webinar will feature a leading scholar whose work is starting to explore the intersection of Islam and the global pandemic with a view on exploring Covid-19’s impact on Muslim thought, theology, law, observance, and religious authority.

 

Topics the series will explore include:

1. Theological and legal discussions about e.g. communal prayers and modes of worship;
2. Conversations about inequalities and how structural problems affect Muslim community experiences of the pandemic;
3. Explorations of the challenges faced by global religious networks such as traveling da’wa movements and transnational tariqahs—and their responses to the health crisis;
4. The increased prevalence of online and virtual environments and their implications for religious life and religious observance;
5. Emerging politics and tensions between the state and religious actors in the context of Covid-19 plus the pandemic’s impact on sectarian dynamics

Each 1-hour session will feature a live presentation plus Q&A/discussion on Zoom. Video and audio recordings of each speaker’s remarks will also be made available later for asynchronous access. To register for the events in the webinar series and to receive Zoom connections details, please visit: https://islamicstudiescenter.gmu.edu/events/11063

Initial Speakers

June 16, 2020 - 12:00 PM EDT

Adnan Zulfiqar (Rutgers Law School), “Mapping Legal Responses to Covid-19: The Case of Islamic Law”

June 30, 2020 - 2:00 PM EDT

Donna Auston (Rutgers University), “The Pandemic of White Supremacy: Making Black Muslim Lives Matter in a Covid-19 World”

July 14, 2020 - 1:00 PM EDT

Dietrich Reetz (Free University, Berlin), “Covid-19 and the Missionary Work of the Tablighi Jamaat in South Asia and Beyond: Negotiating Grassroots Activism, Religious Authority and the State”

July 28, 2020 - 1:00 PM EDT

Andrea Stanton (University of Denver), “Lived Islam and Covid-19: Belief, Piety, Practice, and the Digital Turn”