Idea of the Muslim World

 "Superb... A tour de force." -Ebrahim Moosa "Provocative... Aydin ranges over the centuries to show the relative novelty of the idea of a Muslim world and the relentless efforts to exploit that idea for political ends." -Washington Post When President Obama visited Cairo to address Muslims worldwide, he followed in the footsteps of countless politicians who have taken the existence of a unified global Muslim community for granted. But as Cemil Aydin explains in this provocative history, it is a misconception to think that the world's 1.5 billion Muslims constitute a single entity. How did this belief arise, and why is it so widespread? The Idea of the Muslim World considers its origins and reveals the consequences of its enduring allure. "Much of today's media commentary traces current trouble in the Middle East back to the emergence of `artificial' nation states after the fall of the Ottoman Empire... According to this narrative...today's unrest is simply a belated product of that mistake. The Idea of the Muslim World is a bracing rebuke to such simplistic conclusions." -Times Literary Supplement "It is here that Aydin's book proves so valuable: by revealing how the racial, civilizational, and political biases that emerged in the nineteenth century shape contemporary visions of the Muslim world." -Foreign Affairs

Review: The Idea of the Muslim World is an original and important book. Aydin provides a global lens for viewing the ways in which modernity has shaped both Muslims' understandings of their global role, and the ways in which we understand the place of Muslims in the world.--Edmund Burke III, author of The Ethnographic State: France and the Invention of Moroccan Islam

Aydin captures the formation and evolution of our reference to 'the Muslim world' and how this phrase came to prominence in everyday discourse. In eight superb chapters, he frames the Muslim world, and by implication Islam, as a cultural and civilizational tradition within a defined historical and political framework. A tour de force.--Ebrahim Moosa, author of What Is a Madrasa?

Bold and provocative...Aydin's book, a veritable tour de force, is packed with insights and observations which are both original and profound...Aydin also challenges the notion that there was a homogenous 'Muslim world' before the advent of Western imperialism which divided them...The book is a must-read for both Muslims and general students of history.--Ammar Ali Qureshi"Friday Times" (04/20/2018)

Much of today's media commentary traces current trouble in the Middle East back to the emergence of 'artificial' nation states after the fall of the Ottoman Empire a hundred years ago. According to this narrative, the region prospered as an organic whole before the imposition of modern nationalist ideologies. Today's unrest is simply a belated product of that mistake. The Idea of the Muslim World by Cemil Aydin is a bracing rebuke to such simplistic conclusions...A tightly argued and impressive book.--