Media

The Being Human festival highlighted the ways in which the humanities can inspire and enrich our everyday lives, help us to understand ourselves, our relationships with others, and the challenges we face in a changing world. On November 19th 2016 at the Bait ul Aman Mosque in Bradford, 80 guests from across Yorkshire and beyond came together to participate in a unique event inspired by teaching and research taking place in Islamic Studies at the University of Leeds. “From Canon to Critique: The Future of Islamic Education” was delivered by Dr Tajul Islam and Dr Mustapha Sheikh.

Black Lives Matter: Bilal and the Formation of the Early Islamicate took place on Monday 20th March 2017. This was a collaboration between the Iqbal Centre, CERS, Re-Orient: Journal for Critical Muslim Studies, Leeds ABSoc and Leeds ISoc, and exceeded all expectations: a full house of more than 100 attendees, an unprecedented joint Sunni-Shi’a prayer led by Shaykh Ahmad Haneef, and talks by Dr Tajul Islam, Professor S. Sayyid and Shaykh Ahmad Haneef probing issues around racism/discrimination within the Islamosphere and the importance of Muslim participation in social justice movements. The event also announced the launch of Bilal Studies, named after Bilal al-Habashi, the forgotten symbol of egalitarian Islam.

Dr Tajul Islam talk: 11:50-39:00
Shaykh Ahmad Haneef talk: 39:00-59:50
Professor Salman Sayyid talk: 1:00:00-1:14:47

Professor Salman Sayyid discusses his book ‘Recalling the Caliphate’.

A Theology of Tolerance: Amimul Ihsan’s Ecumenism event was organised by the Iqbal Centre in association with ReOrient: Journal for Critical Muslim Studies and the Department of Arabic, Islamic and Middle Eastern Studies, Leeds University, on 18th November 2017.

Dr Tajul Islam, “Theological Tolerance: A Synthetic Approach”.

Professor Salman Sayyid, “In Search of the Homeland: A Critical Muslim Studies Approach”.

Dr Mustapha Sheikh, “Teaching Islam in Higher Education: Sacred Knowledge and Safe Spaces”.

Iran Bostan, “Reclaiming our Tradition: A Feminist Reading of the Dars-i-Nizami”.

Muhammad Rokib, “Secularity and Sacred Law: Mufti Ehsan’s Legal Maxims”.

Talk by Professor Salman Sayyid. This video was recorded during Al Sharq Forum's Conference on "Envisioning a Post Crisis Regional Order in the Sharq Region," which took place in Istanbul at Swissotel The Bosphorus, 8 Oct 2016

Dr Tajul Islam delivered this talk at the Islamic Renaissance Front's 2020 Summer School, which took place in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. The IRF is a partner of the Iqbal Centre.

Dr Tajul Islam delivered this talk at the Islamic Renaissance Front's 2020 Summer School, which took place in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.

Dr Hizer Mir discusses secularism, Richard Spencer, political spectrums, Islamic Tradition and Jordan Peterson.

Dr Tajul Islam's talk explores the question of racism within Islamicate societies and deals with issues of negrophobia and negritude, drawing upon the histories of the Zanj revolution and the Fula sultanates, raising the possibilities of an Afro-futurism which challenges the perceived notion of perpetual Black pessimism.

Islam is often depicted as being in a state of crisis. It is blamed for being the cause of  “backwardness”  and violence.  At the same time many Muslims are targets of great violence and systematic denigration. Critical Muslim Studies is way of making sense of these contrasting visions of Islam, and understanding its place in today’s world.

"The genocide that's ongoing is not an interruption of the argument that I made about Islamophobia being the grammar of world [order], but in fact, it's a demonstration of that," Prof Salman Sayyid tells Maktoob. Islamophobia is not simply a matter of semantics, but rather a powerful concept that shapes how people understand and interact with the world.

Since their return to power, the Taliban have waged a relentless campaign against the women of Afghanistan. Upon seizing control, the Taliban dismantled the Ministry of Women’s Affairs and replaced it with the Ministry of Vice and Virtue, an entity tasked with enforcing their oppressive laws. Over 100 edicts have been issued, restricting nearly every aspect of women’s rights, from access to education and healthcare to recreational spaces. Recently, the Taliban have even banned women’s voices in public. This collaborative event between Femena, Rawadari and Musawah aims to bring together religious scholars and advocates from Afghanistan and the broader region to examine and challenge the Taliban’s edicts from an Islamic and human rights perspective and call for regional solidarity in support of Afghan women’s rights. Moderator: Shafiqa Khpalwak - poet, writer and women's rights advocate Speakers: Nazifa Jalali - religious scholar and writer; Dr. Ziba Mir-Hosseini - scholar of Islamic Law, founding member Musawah; Dr. Mustapha Sheikh - Associate Professor of Islamic Thought, University of Leeds

The Iqbal Centre Distinguished Lecture 2021, delivered by Dr Hatoon Al-Fassi, Saudi Associate Professor in History and Honorary Fellow of Arabic and Middle Eastern Studies, University of Manchester.

In this podcast Mustapha Sheikh delves into the critical questions surrounding the Taliban’s actions and their claims of implementing Islamic law. Are the bans on girls’ education and the erasure of women from public life truly rooted in Islam, or do they represent a misinterpretation of the deen? He explores the contradiction between their professed adherence to the Hanafi school—renowned for its rational legal reasoning—and their oppressive policies, questioning whether tribal customs overshadow Islamic principles. Finally, we confront the silence of scholars and the lack of condemnation from the global Muslim community. How do these factors contribute to disillusionment among Afghan Muslims, and what can be done to inspire accountability and justice?

A speech by Dr. Salman Sayyid, Professor of Rhetoric and Decolonial Thought at the University of Leeds, on “The Colonialism of Minds and Its Role in Shaping Public Opinion Regarding the Palestinian Issue” during the strategic session “Breaking the Barriers of Hegemony: Palestine, Al Sharq Region, and the Emerging World Order,” which was held during Al Sharq Youth 7th International Conference, “Breaking Barriers,” was held in Istanbul on October 21 and 22, 2023, in the presence of more than 1,500 participants and 50 speakers from 40 countries around the world.

In this first part of a special two-part series for IKIM FM (Malaysia), Professor Salman Sayyid (University of Leeds) and Professor Mustapha Sheikh discuss Islamophobia, not merely as individual prejudice, but as structured and systemic discrimination that targets expressions of Muslimness. Our conversation challenges conventional understandings of Islamophobia by exploring its intellectual, political, and historical dimensions. How has Islamophobia been constructed in dominant narratives? What role does it play in shaping public policy, media discourse and global power relations?

Part two of the radio show