Reza Aslan will talk about Ten Years Later: Fighting Islamophobia and Understanding Muslims on Monday, November 7th, at 7 p.m. in the Young Auditorium. It’s the second fall 2011 Contemporary Issues Lecture.
Aslan’s international bestseller No god but God: The origins, evolution, and future of Islam has been named by Blackwell Publishers as one of the 100 most important books of the last decade, and it was shortlisted for the Guardian (UK) First Book Award in 2005. A synopsis at Blackwell’s web site says that it covers issues of belief including “the difference between the Quran and the Bible, the meaning of the Hajj, the Muslim relationship with Jesus, the Muslim attitude towards Jews, equality between the sexes and more.” A newly revised edition includes “recent uprisings in Tunisia, Egypt and Libya; the changing face of Islam in Europe and North Africa; and a number of topics of heated debate (the veil controversy; Islam Iraq War as a Jihadi recruiting agent etc).”
Aslan, born in Iran and raised in the San Francisco Bay area, also wrote How to win a cosmic war (also published as Beyond fundamentalism: Confronting religious extremism in the age of globalization). He is a contributing editor to The Daily Beast, and a member of many prominent foreign relations and policy councils. He edited Tablet and pen: Literary landscapes from the modern Middle East, a literary anthology that uses the arts to bridge the gap of understanding between East and West, and Muslims and Jews in America: Commonalities, contentions, and complexities. Aslan has degrees in religions from Santa Clara University, a Master of Theological Studies from Harvard Divinity School, and a PhD in the Sociology of Religions from the University of California, Santa Barbara, as well as a Master of Fine Arts from the University of Iowa’s Writers’ Workshop, where he was named the Truman Capote Fellow in Fiction.
Search HALCat (Harold Andersen Library’s catalog) to find Andersen Library’s copy of No god but God, as well as other titles on the history of Islam and other related topics. Other titles by Aslan may be borrowed by UWW students, faculty, and staff via the free Universal Borrowing service. Requested items arrive in 2-4 weekdays.
Please ask a librarian for assistance with finding materials.
