The Making of Islamic Heritage: Muslim Pasts and Heritage Presents

135 Pages·2017·5.717 MB·English

by  Trinidad Rico (eds.)

Heritage Studies in the Muslim
World
Series Editor
Trinidad Rico
Rutgers University
New Brunswick
New Jersey, USA
“Heritage” is implicated in the creation and circulation of categories
through which Islam is studied and understood. The categories used in
themanagement,identification,andsafeguardingeffortsofallheritage—
authenticity, integrity, endangerment, values, and stewardship—are built
onrelationshipsbetweencommunitiesandtheirhistory,identity,politics,
andbeliefs,whichareoftenemployedascategoriesandrelationshipsthat
are rigorous and normative. In contrast, a critical heritage framework
recognizes the diversity of heritage constructs across territories and time
and, accordingly, aims to destabilize these categories by considering and
revealing the agendas and biases that have nurtured these categories and
their underlying relationships, methodological approaches, and research
agendas.
TheseriesHeritageStudiesintheMuslimWorldinvitesabreakawayfrom
disciplinarylegaciesthatareinvolvedinthestudyof“Islamicheritage.”It
featuresbroadrepresentationofdisciplinesandvoicesthatintersectatthis
subject of study, with scholarship that is often located at the margins of
disciplines and domains. In this aim, the series welcomes a broad repre-
sentation of voices that intersect to address heritage discourses and prac-
tices, considering the natural and built environment, material culture,
traditions, performances, technologies, discourses, and other political
and legal instruments that are associated with heritage. Contributors to
this series recognize the Muslim world as a diverse and fluid territory
where Muslim and non-Muslim communities engage with Muslim and
non-Muslimheritageconstructs.
More information aboutthisseries at
http://www.springer.com/series/15128
TrinidadRico
Editor
The Making
of Islamic Heritage
Muslim Pasts and Heritage Presents
Editor
TrinidadRico
RutgersUniversity
NewBrunswick,NewJersey,USA
HeritageStudiesintheMuslimWorld
ISBN978-981-10-4070-2 ISBN978-981-10-4071-9(eBook)
DOI10.1007/978-981-10-4071-9
LibraryofCongressControlNumber:2017937891
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A
CKNOWLEDGMENTS
This edited book is the result of two academic events that I hosted in
Doha between 2014 and 2016 in order to explore the way that different
disciplinary interventions create a field subject of “Islamic heritage”
throughtheirspecificmethodologies:thefirsteventwasaresearchwork-
shop titled “Islamic Pasts,” held in December 2014 at UCL Qatar; and
the second was a conference session titled “Islamic Presents,” which was
part of the Liberal Arts International Conference organized in January
2016 at Texas A&M University at Qatar. Following these focused initia-
tives,thecompletionofthiseditedbookrelied,aboveall,onthesupport,
patience, and feedback from the contributors themselves, and I would
thereforeliketothankthemagainforinvestingtheirtimeandscholarship
on this small collection. In addition, I would like to thank the blind peer
reviewers for their critical but encouraging comments on earlier versions
of this book, and Dr. Giulia El Dardiry and Dr. Imad Mansour for their
logistical support, their generous thoughts, and their endless supply of
mana’eeshandtabouleh during our sharedtimeasscholarsinDoha.
This book was made possible by a Conference and Workshop
Sponsorship Program grant from the Qatar National Research Fund (a
member of Qatar Foundation).
v
C
ONTENTS
1 TheMaking ofIslamic Heritages: AnOverview
ofDisciplinary Interventions 1
TrinidadRico
2 TheIntertwining of History andHeritagein Islamic
Contexts 13
Shahzad Bashir
3 MuslimCultures andPre-IslamicPasts:Changing
Perceptionsof “Heritage” 23
R. MichaelFeener
4 Reclaiming HeritageThrough the Imageof Traditional
Habitat 47
Ali MozaffariandNigel Westbrook
5 Framingthe Primordial:Islamic Heritageand SaudiArabia 67
Ömer Can Aksoy
6 Imagesof Piety orPower? Conservingthe Umayyad Royal
Narrativein QusayrʿAmra 91
Gaetano Palumbo
vii
viii CONTENTS
7 TheBuddha Remains:Heritage Transactions inTaxila,
Pakistan 109
Hassan AsifandTrinidadRico
Index 125
L F
IST OF IGURES
Fig.4.1 ApedestrianwalkwayinShushtarNoʾw,developmentstage1 56
Fig.4.2 GeneralviewofShushtarNoʾwrooftops,developmentstage1 58
Fig.6.1 Twoofthe“kings”beforeandafterconservation.The1975
interventiondidnotallowtheperceptionofthe“real”quality
ofthepaintings 95
Fig.6.2 OneofthenumerousrepresentationsofProphetJonahfound
inQusayrʿAmra 97
Fig.6.3 Standingfigureholdingabasketofgrapes,flankedbyafeline
(apanther?)—perhapsarepresentationofDionysus 99
Fig.6.4 Theso-calledSixKingspanel,eitherrepresentingthekings
defeatedbytheUmayyads,thesixregionsoftheEarth,orthe
recipientsofProphetMohammad’sembassies 100
Fig.7.1 BuddhistreliccasketsplacedinfrontofIslamiccalligraphy
with“Allah”inscribedonthestone(left);schiststonelyingby
thegateofRaheem’shouse(center);Buddhasculptureinthe
bodhisattvastage,unveiledfrombehindaplantpot(right) 111
ix
CHAPTER1
The Making of Islamic Heritages: An
Overview of Disciplinary Interventions
Trinidad Rico
Abstract Thischapterintroducesthechallengethatbroughttogetherthe
contributors to this collection of essays, describing the trajectory that
heritage studies has had in the face of established discourses about Islam
and heritage in order to suggest ways in which these perceptions can be
disrupted. In this introductory chapter, I define the value of involving
different disciplinary conversations and forms of expertise that entangle
specificlanguages,boundaries,categories,andconcernsintheshapingof
“Islamicheritage” asasubject ofstudy. Ipropose thataconsideration of
alternative modes of thinking and established biases may be an essential
tooltorupturethecurrentproblematictrajectoryincriticalheritagework
about Muslimcommunities andtheirconstruction of heritagevalue.
Keywords Expertise (cid:1) interdisciplinarity(cid:1) critical heritage
MAKING HERITAGES
In a space of definitional ambiguity and through an appeal to inclusivity,
both Islam and heritage have been said to be “all things to all people”
(Ahmed 1998, xi; Larkham 1995, 85). In consideration of this
T.Rico(*)
RutgersUniversity,NewBrunswick,NewJersey,USA
©TheAuthor(s)2017 1
T.Rico(ed.),TheMakingofIslamicHeritage,HeritageStudiesinthe
MuslimWorld,DOI10.1007/978-981-10-4071-9_1