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Politics : Foreign Affairs Discussion Group -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: carranza2 who wrote (44446)	9/16/2002 2:48:29 PM
From: Win Smith	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 281500

Lewis's own words: Like most university teachers, I have had a somewhat narrow field in which I conducted my own research, a rather wider one in which I was willing to assist others undertake research, and a still wider one in which I was willing to risk undergraduate teaching. My earliest interest was in medieval Islamic History, especially that of religious movements such as the Ismailis and Assassins. The war years awakened and nourished an interest in the contemporary Middle East, which I have retained ever since. My major research interest for some time past has been the history of the Ottoman Empire. At the present time I am trying to combine all three by studying the history of the relations between Europe and Islam from early through Ottoman to modern times. princeton.edu Somehow, the history of the Ottoman Empire seems sort of an odd primary research area from which to emerge as "one of the top five Western scholars on Islamic culture". Look at his own chosen publication list: The Emergence of Modern Turkey, London and New York 1961 The Assassins, London 1967 The Muslim Discovery of Europe, New York 1982 The Political Language of Islam, Chicago 1988 Race and Slavery in the Middle East: an Historical Enquiry, New York 1990 Islam and the West, New York, 1993 Islam in History, 2nd edition, Chicago, 1993 The Shaping of the Modern Middle East, New York, 1994 Cultures in Conflict, New York, 1994 The Middle East: A Brief History of the Last 2,000 Years, New York, 1995 The Future of the Middle East, London, 1997 The Multiple Identities of the Middle East, London, 1998 A Middle East Mosaic: Fragments of life, letters and history, New York, 2000 Looks like an old guy without much out there for most of his professional life. Then he carved out a political niche, and became suddenly popular. I'm sure he's in the top five among bloviating pundits of a certain stripe, but "scholar" doesn't quite seem right for that position.

To: carranza2 who wrote (44446)	9/16/2002 8:06:56 PM
From: JohnM	Respond to of 281500

Lewis needs a dose of Kepel's framework (political Islam) and to do his homework.... This is too funny. One of the top five Western scholars on Islamic culture has been told to "do his homework"! LMAO! Lewis' scholarship is not, so far as I've read, on the Islamist movement; Kepel's is. Lewis is making observations about the political content of the moment. Those observations are extremely general; they lack the bite of someone who is in the field, doing the work. Kepel is one of those; certainly not the only. I'm not saying I know things about any of this that Lewis does not. Of course not. But I'm making an observation about a deficiency in the writings of someone compared to to other work. Not unknown on this thread. I continue to assume something happened to you. This is the third confrontational post trying to get me to quit posting. I don't understand it. As for the Maine references, that's something several of us do on occasion. If you were around the thread more, you would see it. Bill and I exchange comments about a variety of things that are not exactly on topic; KLP and I now have done the same. I've done it with others. As have others. Those kinds of exchanges, frankly, make it easier for us to sustain friendships in contentious moments.