~ VITAE ~
AMYN B. SAJOO Simon Fraser University, Vancouver (Canada)
515 WEST HASTINGS STREET, RM 2300 VANCOUVER, BC, CANADA V6B 5K3
Tel: (604) 412-6848 Email:
[email protected]
PROFILE Extensive record of teaching, research, and policy analysis in public service, academia, and global media – notably with regard to human rights, civic culture, ethics, and public religion in comparative global contexts Doctorate (McGill, Columbia, 1987) Bachelor of Laws (Hons) (London, 1979) O Scholar-in-Residence, SFU Canada Dept of Foreign Affairs Visiting Academic in the Middle East, 2010 O Research Scholar/Grad Program Lecturer, Institute of Ismaili Studies (UK), 2007-09 O Visiting Fellow, University of Cambridge, UK, 2005 O Advisor, Canada Foreign Affairs/Justice Departments, 1989-93, 1999 O Canada-ASEAN Fellow, Institute of SE Asian Studies (Singapore), 1993-4 O
2 CURRENT STATUS
SFU Faculty of Arts & Social Sciences
Research program in Religion & Civic Culture, Minority Citizenship, Bioethics Lecturing in International Politics and History Editor, Muslim Heritage Series (I.B. Tauris, London & New York) Advisory Board, University of Victoria Centre for Study of Religion & Society Guest lecturing in Europe, United States, United Kingdom, Middle East, and Canada Visiting Academic in Middle East, Canada Foreign Affairs Dept, 2010
COURSES TAUGHT Religion in International Relations Islamic Intellectual & Social History Civil Society in the Middle East Human Rights in Global Affairs World Literature & Human Rights The Arab Spring: Historical and Minority Perspectives Ethical Traditions in Islam
EDUCATION 1987
McGILL UNIVERSITY, MONTREAL Doctorate, International & Comparative Law Courses: Islamic Jurisprudence; Human Rights; International Relations; Humanitarian Law Publication on human rights & ethics in global conflict, McGill Law Journal (1983) Theoretical segment of thesis published, 1989
{1983-84}
COLUMBIA UNIVERSITY, NEW YORK Visiting Doctoral Research Residency
1976-79
UNIVERSITY OF LONDON, KING'S COLLEGE, U.K Bachelor of Laws (Honours) … /Experience
3 EXPERIENCE 2007-2009
RESEARCH SCHOLAR, GRADUATE PROGRAM LECTURER Institute of Ismaili Studies (IIS), London Civil Society & Human Rights in Comparative Muslim Contexts; Muslim Ethics Planned & Hosted Visiting Lecture Series Field-visits to Middle East & Central Asia Founding Editor, Muslim Heritage Series 2000-1 IIS Visiting Research Fellow
2003-2007
LECTURER University of British Columbia, Simon Fraser University, Vancouver Middle East/Islamic World Politics International Human Rights
MAY-JUL 2005 VISITING FELLOW {INTERNATIONAL AWARD} Cambridge University (UK) — Centre for Research in Arts, Social Sciences & Humanities Comparative Modernities in the Muslim World APR-AUG 2003 VISITING SCHOLAR McGill University, Montreal Civil Society & Ethics in Muslim Contexts Winter 2000
ADVISOR, INTERNATIONAL HUMAN RIGHTS Canada Department of Foreign Affairs Briefing Report on compliance with the International Covenant on Civil-Political Rights
1993-1994
CANADA-ASEAN FELLOW Institute of SE Asian Studies, Singapore Human rights and civic culture in SE Asia – fieldwork in Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand
1989-1992
POLICY ADVISOR Canadian Human Rights Commission, Ottawa (Justice Department) Policy & legal advice on human rights, notably with regard to minorities, associative freedoms Project management; liaison with state and nongovernmental institutions, UN agencies … / Invited Lectures/Awards
4 INVITED PUBLIC LECTURES AND AWARDS
“Political Theology and Human Rights: Framing Radicalization,” University of Texas-Dallas, May 2015
“Pandora’s Sectarian Box: Myth & Reality,” IIS London, Nov 2014
“Uncivil Identities, Civil Conflict” (Colloquium), Arizona State University, Apr 2014
“’Sacred Law’ and Its Discontents,” University of Vienna, Apr 2014
Minority Citizenship in a Post-Secular World, University of Calgary, 2013
Augustana Lectures on Public Religion, University of Alberta, 2011
Distinguished Lecture, “Civic Islam,” University of Victoria, 2011
2010 Foreign Affairs Canada Academic Visitor to the Middle East (Egypt, Jordan, and Syria).
University of Cambridge, ‘Conversations Fellow’, Apr-May 2005
Visiting Fellowship, Institute of Ismaili Studies, London, 2000-01
Canada-ASEAN Fellowship on Pluralism in Southeast Asia, Singapore, 1993-94 {fieldwork in Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand)
… / Publications
5 SELECT PUBLICATIONS Books Sajoo, Amyn B. Muslim Ethics: Emerging Vistas. London: I.B. Tauris, 2004, 2009. Sajoo, Amyn B. Pluralism in Old Societies and New States: Emerging ASEAN Contexts. Institute of Southeast Asian Studies (Singapore), 1994. Sajoo, Amyn B. ed., A Companion to Muslim Cultures. London: I.B. Tauris/ New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2012. Sajoo, Amyn B. ed. (with Farhad Daftary & Shainool Jiwa), The Shi’i World: Pathways in Tradition and Modernity. London: I.B. Tauris, 2015. Sajoo, Amyn B. ed., Muslim Modernities: Expressions of the Civil Imagination. London: I.B. Tauris, 2008. Sajoo, Amyn B. ed., Civil Society in the Muslim World. London: I.B. Tauris, 2002, 2004. Sajoo, Amyn B. ed., A Companion to Muslim Ethics. I.B. Tauris, 2010. Sajoo, Amyn B. ed. A Companion to the Muslim World. I.B. Tauris, 2009. Chapters, Journal Articles “The Fog of Extremism,” Social Inclusion, Special Issue — Religious Diversity and Social Inclusion, 2016 {forthcoming} “Negotiating Virtue: Principlism and Maslaha in Muslim Bioethics,” Studies in Religion, Vol. 43:1 (March 2014), 53-69. “Fitting Islamophobia into an Historical Pattern,” 34:2 Journal of Muslim Minority Affairs (2014), 191-96. “Public Ethics,” chapter, The Islamic World, ed. A. Rippin, Routledge, 2008. “Reimagining the Civil,” chapter (pp. 207-26), Muslim Modernities, ed. Amyn B. Sajoo, I.B. Tauris, 2008. "Citizenship and Its Discontents: Public Religion, Civic Identities", chapter (pp. 27-47), Religious Diversity and Civil Society, ed. B. Turner, Oxford, 2008. …/6
6 “The Ethics of the Public Square,” 2 Polylog (Germany), Vol. 2 (2001), 1-35. “New Dances with Diversity,” 15 Policy Options (Ottawa) (Dec 1994), 14-17. "Islam and Human Rights - Congruence or Dichotomy?" Temple International & Comparative Law Journal, Vol. 4 (1990), 23-34. "Towards a Systematic Appraisal of Human Rights Orientation in Foreign Policy", chapter, Human Rights, Development & Foreign Policy, ed. I. Brecher. IRPP, 1989. “Much ado about tilting: Canada and the Palestinians.” International Perspectives (Ottawa), Vol. 16:5 (1983), 628. Book Reviews Review, Minority Rights in the Middle East, by Joshua Castellino and Kathleen Cavanaugh (Oxford, 2013). Ethics & Global Politics, Vol. 7:1 (2014), 41-45. Review, Olivier Roy, Holy Ignorance: When Religion and Culture Part Ways (Columbia, 2010). Muslim World Journal of Human Rights, 8:1 (2011). Review, Islam, the Shari’a and Alternative Dispute Resolution, by M. Keshavjee (I.B. Tauris, 2013). Oxford Journal of Law & Religion, August 14, 2014. Review, Doug Saunders, The Myth of the Muslim Tide: Do Immigrants Threaten the West? (Random House, 2012). Canadian Review of Sociology, 50:4 (Nov 2013), 503-5. Review, Contemporary Arab Political Islam Reader, ed. Ibrahim Abu-Rabi’ (U of Alberta, 2010), Études Ethniques au Canada, 43:1-2 (2011-2), pp. 287-9. Review, Human Rights in Cross-Cultural Perspectives - A Quest for Consensus, ed. A. An-Na'im (1992). Contemporary Southeast Asia 15 (1993), 243-6. Review, Civil Society in Central Asia, ed. H. Ruffin, D. Waugh (U of Washington, 1999). PRAXIS (Fletcher School of Law & Diplomacy), XVI (2000), pp. 161-7. Review, Ernest Gellner, Conditions of Liberty (Penguin, 1994); Ann Elizabeth Mayer, Islam and Human Rights: Tradition and Politics (Westview, 1995). Canadian Journal of Law & Society 11 (1996), 307-15. Review, Human Rights and Revolutions, ed. J. Wasserstrom et al (Rowman, 2000). American Journal of Islamic Social Sciences 18 (2002), 183-6. ... /7
7 Media Features “It’s Theology, Not Baseball: Misunderstanding Iraq’s Sectarian Conflicts,” Religion Dispatches (University of Southern California), August 12, 2014. “Faith in Rights: Ethics of the Public Square,” Open Democracy, 14 May 2014. “On the Road to Damascus” (secularism, Mideast political history). Open Democracy (UK), 13 Aug 2012. “A win for ‘secularists’ in Libya? It’s not what you think.” Christian Science Monitor, July 19, 2012. “Religion has a rich tradition of taking animal ethics seriously.” The Guardian, 10 June 2010. "Civility and Its Discontents – Or How Not to Think About Pluralism." Open Democracy (UK), 19 July 2005. "More than just a few bad apples" (torture at Abu Ghraib in Iraq). Calgary Herald, 13 May 2003. “Our closed open minds” (post-Sept 11 liberties & tolerance), The Globe and Mail (Toronto), June 6, 2002. “No ticket to paradise,” (“religious” violence), The Guardian, 4 Sept 2001. “It’s time to take war crimes more seriously,” The Jakarta Post, 12 May 1996. "Toward a Muslim Modernism." Asian Wall Street Journal, 17 Jan 1994. Review of Development as Freedom, Amartya Sen (Knopf, 2000). Vancouver Sun, April 8, 2000. Review of Thomas Janoski, Citizenship and Civil Society (Cambridge, 1998). The Times Higher Education Supplement, 2 Oct 1998. Review of Patti Waldmeier, End of Apartheid and Birth of the New South Africa (Norton, 1997). Policy Options (Ottawa), Vol. 18:7 (Sept 1997), 46-48. Review of Samuel Huntington, The Clash of Civilizations and the Remaking of World Order (Simon & Schuster, 1996). Vancouver Sun Review, 1 Feb 1997. Review of Ronald Thiemann, Religion in Public Life: A Dilemma for Democracy (Georgetown University, 1996). TRENDS (Singapore), October 26-27, 1996.
