Student Furnished Course Supplies/Prerequisites: There are no prerequisites for this course. All readings and materials will be provided in class.

Course Description: Where did ISIS come from? What is the difference between Salafism and Wahhabism? How do Muslims see themselves in relation to their non-Muslim neighbors? In this course, we will explore how Islamic thought evolved during the 1800s and the 1900s, as various parts of the Muslim world coped with European colonial rule, rapidly-changing technology, and economic development. Through the writings of Muslim jurists, theologians, journalists, and activists from the French Revolution to the Syrian civil war, we will consider how the fundamentalist turn, rising literacy, and communications technologies from the newspaper to the internet have transformed the ways in which Muslims practice and talk about their faith.

Course Instructor: Danielle Ross is an assistant professor of Asian history at Utah State University. She received her PhD in Central Asian history from University of Wisconsin-Madison. She worked as a social media analyst and then, taught for three years at Nazarbayev University in Astana, Kazakhstan, before coming to USU in 2014. She specializes in the history of Islam in Russia and the post-Soviet sphere. Her book, Tatar Empire, will be released by Indiana University Press in 2020. Her co-edited volume, Sharia in the Russian Empire, will be released by Edinburgh University Press in 2020.
danielle.ross@usu.edu