Project description
A theory of imagination: populist Islamist aspirations across the Balkan-to-Bengal complex
The EU-funded TAKHAYYUL project is a collaborative study that will ethnographically excavate the imaginative forces in the formation of populist Islamist aspirations across the Balkan-to-Bengal complex (the Balkans, the Middle East, and South Asia). Such political aspirations provide its followers with a wide range of historical references, religious cosmologies, nationalist feelings and other affective and imaginative registers, envisaging the resurrection of the Islamic Empire; this is best represented by the concept of takhayyul (a theory of imagination). The project will develop an extensive and comparative formulation of the concept to set the basis for an anthropology of imagination and expand anthropological knowledge on Islamism by exploring the historical, ethical and aesthetic aspects. The project will also advance an innovative comparative research design by combining historical and ethnographic explorations on the imaginative.
Objective
Imagination and dreams are often at the heart of political formations. The dream of reviving the Islamic empires has gained the Islamist political actors currency and a large following in the homes of the three greatest Islamic Empires (aka Islamdom: Ottoman, Safavid, Mughal/Timurid), even though the most recent of these ceased to exist almost a hundred years ago. Today, Islamist actors, across what is now called the Balkan-to-Bengal complex, tap into their followers’ various historical references, religious cosmologies, nationalist resentments, and other affective and imaginative registers to further their politics at the most ambitious scale, to resurrect the empire. In the former centres of Islamic Empires, the imaginative references emerge with elements of imperial nostalgia, post-imperial malaise, and political rage. The existing work has failed to capture the interconnected imaginative forces in the formation of Islamist politics for the following reasons: A) The region does not fit into foci of area studies. B) Eurocentric theories are limited to grasp and analyse the imaginative forces. This project builds on an Islamic concept takhayyul: terrestrial imagination that informs both doxastic and futuristic thinking towards developing an Islamic shared vision. C) An anthropological work with its fine-grained ethnographic method and comparative heritage, is poised to make a substantive contribution for the first time to excavate the imaginative forces in the formation of Islamist imperial dreams.
The project aims: 1) To lay the conceptual ground for an anthropology of imagination, by developing the in-depth and comparative formulation of the concept takhayyul. 2) To expand anthropological knowledge on Islamisms by pushing against the limits of modernist rationality; instead, exploring the historical, ethical, and aesthetic. 3) To experiment with an innovative comparative research design that combines historical and ethnographic excavations on the imaginative.
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Funding Scheme
ERC-STG - Starting GrantHost institution
WC1E 6BT London
United Kingdom