Theses and Dissertations from UMD
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New submissions to the thesis/dissertation collections are added automatically as they are received from the Graduate School. Currently, the Graduate School deposits all theses and dissertations from a given semester after the official graduation date. This means that there may be up to a 4 month delay in the appearance of a give thesis/dissertation in DRUM
More information is available at Theses and Dissertations at University of Maryland Libraries.
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Item SUFIMINISM: THE SEXUAL, THE SPIRITUAL, THE SELF(2018) Haq, Sara; Tambe, Ashwini; Women's Studies; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)My dissertation addresses the question: what does an exploration of sexual politics within Islam look like if the mandate of respectability is refused? It explores the possibilities of Sufi thought as an epistemological approach to thinking about sexuality studies and reframing the relationship between Islam and sex. Existing scholarship on Sufism, Islam, and feminism tends to overrely on legal framings of sexuality and heavily exegetical engagements with religion, and offers too many unstated concessions to respectability politics. I argue that by centering the poetic, the everyday, and the transgressive, Sufism can offer alternative understandings of counter-hegemonic Islamic traditions. I use an expansive range of texts such as Sufi qawwali (spiritual songs), Sufi poetry, Qur'anic exegeses, hagiographical texts, and oral storytelling to explore pivotal concepts in sexuality studies: heteronormativity, consent, and the divide between licit and illicit sex. In addition to textual analysis, I present interludes of experiential narratives that are drawn from semi-structured interviews with sexually marginalized Muslims as well as from autoethnographic reflections; they illustrate the complex relationships between religio-spirituality and sexual expression. Each analysis chapter is focused on distinct Sufi tropes, such as wisal/firaq (union/separation), niyyat (intentionality), ‘ubudiyya (servanthood), pain-and-pleasure, kanjri (whore), zaat (being), and izzat (honor). Together, these chapters challenge imperatives of marriage and sex, make the case for affective consent, reflect on unconventional sexual practices such as kink/BDSM, and reframe a conversation about sex work beyond the binary of licit versus illicit sex. I conclude by discussing the possibilities of future research on the contemporary resurgence of feminism and Sufism in South Asian popular culture, as well as my vision for a queer and interdisciplinary approach I call Sufiminism.Item Not your terrorist: Case studies examining the intersectional identities and aspirations of Arab American Muslim middle school boys(2017) Shafey, Dina; Turner, Jennifer D.; Curriculum and Instruction; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Arab Muslim boys living in the United States have experienced varying levels of public scrutiny since 9/11 and prior to. Public perceptions of these experiences are centered on media-driven representations; often inaccurate depictions of the nuanced lives of these boys. While Arab Muslims have lived in the United States more than a century, their lived experiences, particularly experiences while in school are missing. This research study examined how Arab American Muslim Middle School boys perceived their intersecting identities while navigating instances of bias. To address this, one overarching research questions guided this study: “How do key intersecting social classifications race, gender, culture, and religion, impact Arab American middle school boys’ ethnic identity perceptions?” To further explicate on these nuances four sub-questions were addressed, including: “How do these boys define success and achievement in relation to schooling?”; “How have middle school Arab American boys experienced cultural bias/or how have they perceived cultural bias?”; To what extent do Arab American boys seek out resources (community family, religion), through their social networks?” and “How have they navigated schooling as framed by these experiences of cultural bias?” Using an Intersectional Identities Theoretical Framework (Crenshaw, 1989; Phelan, 1991; Collins, 2009), this study explored the multifaceted nature of identity perception, namely the boys’ experiences with power relationships resulting from these identifiers. Four themes surfaced including how they operationalized power and oppression across identity categories namely, Religion, Culture, Gender and Race. To delve into these questions and to represent the experiences of each boy with detail, a qualitative case study design (Bodgen & Biklen 2003; Erickson & Shultz, 1992; Merriam, 1998; Yin, 2006) was used to analyze and produce rice and detailed narratives. This study will promote discussion about the very nature of the lived experiences of Arab Muslim boys growing up in the United States. It will also serve as a platform for administrators and policy makers in the daily decisions, for example curriculum decisions, impacting this scrutinized population.Item Service, Sacrifice, and Citizenship: The Experiences of Muslims Serving in the U.S. Military(2013) Sandhoff, Michelle; Segal, David R; Sociology; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)The events of 9/11 and the subsequent "War on Terror" activated long standing stereotypes in the United States that portrayed Muslims as fundamentally different from other Americans. In this project, I interview 15 Muslims who have served in the U.S. military since 9/11 to determine if and how the activation of this us/them boundary shaped their military experiences. I find that the us/them atmosphere that characterizes civilian discourse about Muslims is present in the military. However, most of my respondents felt that it had little practical effect on them. I discuss this in terms of the presence but irrelevance of this boundary. I connect this finding to the history of racial integration in the U.S. military, arguing that characteristics of the military, including an emphasis on policies of equal opportunity, the ability to compel certain behaviors, and the nature of military service, which promotes close contact among diverse individuals, can mitigate some of the negatives effects of being othered. While most of my respondents had positive experiences, in some units the us/them discourse was exacerbated, creating atmospheres of distrust and suspicion which led to negative outcomes including harassment, accusations, and decisions by Muslim service members to leave the military. A theme that emerged in exploring this dichotomy of experience among my respondents was the role of leadership. Leadership that saw value in diversity and was invested in supporting it, mitigated negative effects of othering, making this an irrelevant frame. However, leadership that repeated stereotypes or fears reinforced this tension, creating toxic environments in which Muslim service members felt excluded. I began this project with the expectation that citizenship would be a central narrative for Muslim service members, as it was for Japanese Americans in World War II. However, the respondents in my sample rarely use their military service to directly make claims on citizenship. They do however express institutional motivations to serve and engage in dialogue, bridge building, and other aspects of everyday citizenship.Item Building a Muslim-American Identity: An Islamic College(2011) Zaman, Ahmed; Kelly, Brian; Architecture; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)In contemporary American culture Islam is often misrepresented and misunderstood. This thesis seeks to revive the Islamic intellectual tradition by using architecture and campus planning to construct a more accurate understanding of Islam in an American context. Designing an institution for Islamic higher learning will provide American-born Muslim scholars with the opportunity of assuming a positive role in society. The thesis explores repurposing and retexturing of West Berkeley, California as a method of weaving the Muslim American narrative in the design of Zaytuna College, America's first liberal arts Islamic College. The college itself will house students of diverse backgrounds, both Muslim and non-Muslim, accommodate prayer facilities for the neighboring Muslim community, and engage in interfaith and civic dialogue. The thesis will speculate on how the campus will evolve over time and identify a scale that is appropriate to its context.Item Unveiling the Inner Self(2008-05-15) Chishty, Mahwish Kamran; Ruppert, John; Art; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Contradiction between the visible (zahir) and the veiled (baatin) creates this dialog of what we see and what the reality holds within; "They find as what they seek..." I have found my secret hide-outs, the Sanctuaries as my divine peace and every time I am in contact with them, I reveal myself onto myself. My early life experiences of not settling down in one place and moving from Saudi Arabia to Pakistan and later to America have left me with this sense of homelessness. In order to find connections between my roots, and myself, I started building my own comfort spaces within the spaces that were available at that time. By allowing my viewers to interact with the sculptural installations,I invite them to explore the concept of self-actualization and self-realization. For the past two years I have been investigating Kufic calligraphic fonts in my artwork. In the tradition of Sufism, the whirling and spinning helps one to know how to travel into the presence of the Divine, purify one's inward from filth, and beautify it with a variety of praiseworthy traits.Item The Political Struggles of the Ulama of Dar-ul-Uloom Deoband: Identifying and Operationalizing the Traditionalist Approach to Politics(2005-12-13) Hamid, Myra; Glass, James; Government and Politics; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)This paper uses the example of the political struggles of the religious scholars (ulama) of Dar-ul-Uloom Deoband, a highly influential Islamic seminary founded in North India in the 19th century in the wake of Muslim defeat in the Mutiny of 1857 against the British, to identify the salient features of the traditionalist approach to politics and examine how this approach can be operationalized. The paper compares the traditionalist orientation to politics, which the school at Deoband and the movement that emerged from there came to represent, with modernist and fundamentalist/Islamist approaches. It proposes that the understudied but extremely important traditionalist paradigm provides the basis for more creative, balanced, fruitful, and Islamically authentic political engagement than either of the two opposing trends popular in the Muslim world today.Item Of Saints and Sharifian Kings in Morocco: Three Examples of the Politics of Reimagining History Through Reinventing King/Saint Relationship(2005-05-27) Ghoulaichi, Fatima; Wang, Orrin; Comparative Literature; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)The relationship between sainthood and the sharifian monarchy in Morocco has attracted much attention from researchers within the area of Moroccan studies. The analysis of this relationship can offer invaluable insights into the dynamics of Moroccan history because the king and the saint are widely regarded as the two most salient actors in this history. Yet, the study of the relationship between these two figures has suffered a tendency towards downplaying its historically dynamic nature, and essentializing the cultural constructs upon which it is predicated. In this thesis, I offer a revisionary reading of king/saint relationship through analyzing three examples from the 'Alawite dynasty. I argue that this relationship has been highly dynamic, and has capitalized on baraka and sharifism as versatile cultural constructs. More significantly, the dynamics of king/saint relationship in Moroccan culture allows the strategic reinvention of history in order to meet the demands of changing historical contexts.