Alternative Centers of Shiʿi Islam

Abstract

The introduction discusses the fundamental transformations of Shi‘i thought and conceptions of religious authority that occurred in tandem with the expansion of Shi‘i religious education in colonial India and Pakistan throughout the 20th and 21st centuries. In particular, this section introduces the reader to the three key analytical lenses of the book, namely the evolving nature of sectarianism, the salience of transnational connections, and the creative potential of local religious authority when engaging with the Shi‘i scholarly tradition. The introduction adopts a model of “impetus” and “response” to elucidate the travel of ideas between the Middle East and South Asia, while also paying attention to their translation from Arabic and Persian into Urdu.