by ANDREW HAMMOND for OPEN DEMOCRACY on APRIL 25, 2013: Tension with its Gulf neighbours began to rise from 2006 when Qatar and Al Jazeera stood with Lebanese Shi’ite group Hizbullah during its war with Israel, while western allied states clearly hoped to see the Iranian-backed militia wiped out. Secular activists and politicians in Egypt [...]
by FRANCES S. HASSO for ISLAMiCommentary on APRIL 23, 2013: Last month I attended the World Social Forum (WSF) – my first – in Tunis, the capital of Tunisia. I study social movements and teach about the WSF and the very different and more established annual scrum of the powerful in Davos — [...]
by DON BELT (Q&A with DAVID SCHANZER) for NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC NEWS on APRIL 20, 2013: With the Friday arrest of suspect Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, the Boston Marathon bombing investigation has entered a new phase. Yet to be uncovered are the motives of the bombers—the other suspect, Dzhokhar’s older brother Tamerlan Tsarnaev, was killed during a gun battle [...]
by MONA AL MUNAJJED (SOCIOLOGIST) for ARABIAN BUSINESS on MARCH 4, 2013: (excerpt) Today, powerful Arab women represent a force in their countries, preparing the ground for future generations. Each one of those women has worked hard to become a champion in her own field and a winner in her country. With ambition and determination they [...]
by CAITLIN CLEAVER for ISLAMiCommentary on MARCH 18, 2013: The Harlem Shake. It may seem to many of us like a crazy dance that’s been sweeping the nation’s community of YouTube fanatics. But is there more to it? In fact, its significance has been much more powerful in the Arab world, where protests and [...]
‘No to Dictatorship’: Duke Students Cover Sudanese Rap Song
by LAWRENCE NEMEH for ISLAMiCommentary on MAY 7, 2013: At Arabic Night this past April, Duke students and faculty came together to celebrate Arab culture through music, food and poetry. Four students in the AMES department – Mayyadda Major, Ryan Gaylord, Desmond Lee and I – debuted our interpretation of the Arabic rap song “La Lildictatoria” or “No [...]
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