Today I have have found several messages in my email referring to a youtube video that is going viral among Muslims. The video shows a Muslim student praying publicly during his graduation ceremony at WSU (Washington State University). The public appeared oblivious to what may be perceived as a 'strange' performance by anyone unfamiliar with the Islamic style of... Continue Reading →
Dear all, I have not written for a while in my blog nor podcasted on my Ipadio's channel. The reason is that I have moved (yes again!) from NUS in Singapore to finally Australia (as was planned since the time I left Aberdeen)This time I have landed at Macquarie University, in Sydney, and I... Continue Reading →
During my career I've had the opportunity to observe several student association fairs in various countries, where dozens (and sometimes hundreds) of clubs and organizations campaign to attract new members. I am always interested in the Muslim associations and also the growing and increasingly visible Jewish-Israeli student associations. Recently I have accepted a new position at... Continue Reading →
Recently, those who have been following the news may have noticed an increase of terrorist attacks and the general persecution of Shi’a Muslims, particularly within Iraq, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Bahrain, Saudi Arabia, and recently Palestine together with less reported, but still significant, events in Indonesia and Malaysia, among other Sunni majority countries. In the case of... Continue Reading →
The Worldwide Association for the Study of Religion is an association for scholars studying religion or with an interest in religion that aims to develop a platform accessible to any scholar or student wherever he or she might live. The goal of the association is to study religion in all of its forms and not... Continue Reading →
After nearly ten years of membership and $2000 US dollars, I have finally decided to leave the American Academy of Religion, the most important association representing scholars from different fields of the study of religion. I pondered my decision for a while, hoping that my doubts, questions and suspicions might have been answered and clarified.... Continue Reading →
On the 13th of December, in my birthplace Florence, an Italian gunman killed two street vendors from Senegal, wounded another three, and committed suicide when the police reached him. The killing was racially-motivated and Gianluca Casseri, 50, was a writer for and member of CasaPound, a neo-fascist group. The Senegalese street vendors he killed (Samb Modou,... Continue Reading →
I am pleased to inform you that my publisher Berg has decided to join the Social Science Open Access Repository and to make my first book, Jihad Beyond Islam(2006) available legally for download with no costs but strictly under the Creative Common License. In this first work I discussed through an anthropological approach how we... Continue Reading →
During my 3 years of research in Singapore, as part of a wider research on Malay youth in Singapore, I studied the social identity formation of Malay teen Muslim girls from socially and economically disadvantaged families. Methodologically, not only have I conducted in-depth interviews but also, thanks to organizations such as Clubilya, 4PM and Petrapis,... Continue Reading →
