Topics

Browse topics
  • Historic image of a street featuring horse-drawn carriages
    Issue 26 Gastronomy

    Our Kitchen in 1940s Baghdad

    The house of my childhood in Baghdad had two courtyards, haush, Middle Eastern style. The larger one was the centre of the main living area, with…

    Sami Zubaida
  • A city skyline at night with building lit up by lights
    Issue 26 Gastronomy

    Twice Removed Migrant

    In January 2018, I went back to Kampala, the capital of Uganda, my birthplace. We Ugandan Asians were exiled from the country in 1972. I settled in…

    Yasmin Alibhai-Brown
  • The Wisdom of Owls Asleep
    Issue 24 Populism

    The Netherworld

    Until recently, populism hid a double-bind. For it carried with it two perfectly contradictory sets of associations. Both sets had direct connections…

    Ashis Nandy
  • Students in Dhaka
    Issue 23 Bangladesh

    Dhaka

    Every city moves to its own beat. Although I am a city dweller through and through, it took me some days into my visit to Dhaka before I could sense…

    Hassan Mahamdallie
  • A Tree in Paradise
    Issue 22 Utopias

    Gardens of Paradise

    Without doubt, the gardens of paradise are the ultimate utopias of Muslim consciousness. But what does the Qur’an say about gardens, landscapes and…

    Bruce Wannell
  • Ceiling and wall tilework at the Shah Mosque on Imam Square, Isfahan, Iran. The mosque is also known as Imam Mosque and Jaame' Abbasi Mosque. It is one of the masterpieces of Iranian/Persian Architecture and an excellent example of Islamic era architecture of Iran and also one of the top sights of the contry.
    Issue 21 Relations

    Best of All Patrons?

    A slave boy of Byzantine origin, who had grown up to become a scientific scion of Archimedes in the annals of world intellectual history, was offered…

    Syed Nomanul Haq
  • Sofia Khan is not obliged book cover
    Issue 21 Relations

    Hajabi Dating

    ‘Terrorists don’t wear vintage shoes.’ At least not according to Sofia Khan, the heroine of my novel, Sofia Khan is not Obliged. Because she knows…

    Ayisha Malik
  • Interior damage to an Armenian church in Mosul, Iraq, destroyed during the ISIS occupation of the city.
    Issue 20 PostWest

    The West is Dead

    It is clear. The West is dead. It is time to stop beating a dead West. It is time to start grooming and riding new horses beyond even postnormality.

    Jim Dator
  • Activists doing a demonstration outdoors
    Issue 20 PostWest

    PostWest Anxieties

    French sociologist Michel de Certeau argued that ‘narrations about what’s-going-on constitute our orthodoxy’. We can say the same about narrations…

    Gordon Blaine Steffey
  • Muslim men praying during Ramadan
    Issue 19 Nature

    Concepts and Symbols

    The central doctrine of Islam is al-tawhid, Unity. God is One; there is no god but God. And the Unity of God is reflected in the universe, in the…

    Charles Upton
  • low-angle photography of a brown archway in district 10 in Tehran, Iran under a calm blue sky
    Issue 18 Cities

    Utopia in Tehran

    From Plato’s Republic onwards, the idea of a politics built on an imagined city has allowed generations of thinkers to engage with the vision of a…

    Javaad Alipour