SPRING WELCOME AND PROGRAM UPDATES
Dear Friends of the Program on Law and Society in the Muslim World,

We hope this message finds you and your communities staying as well as possible in these times and we thank you for your engagement with our program in our new virtual world. We are pleased to share exciting updates from our faculty and fellows and announce our upcoming programming and activities.

If you have any questions or comments, please do not hesitate to reach out to us. We would love to hear from you!


Here are some highlights of our recent work and activities:

Faculty Director Professor Kristen Stilt was named the Maury Green Fellow at the Harvard Radcliffe Institute (2020-2021). At the Radcliffe Institute, Stilt is completing a book project, "Food, Faith, and the Future of Planetary Health." This book is the first to focus on animal welfare, human health, and the environment within the global halal industry. Behind the halal label on animal products are contentious, widespread, and high-stake debates over what halal is and what it should be. There is not one halal, but rather many halals, all competing in the global marketplace of products, beliefs, technology, and environmental constraints. These debates, and their outcomes, have profound significance for the physical and spiritual health of human consumers; for the welfare of animals who are raised, transported, slaughtered, and consumed; and for the health of the planet at a time when climate change poses an existential threat. The book explores these issues, using multidisciplinary research methods to take the reader to animal markets and slaughterhouses, transport ships, corporate boardrooms, supermarkets, and laboratories seeking to create halal "clean meat."

Visiting Fellow J. Andrew Bush published his new book, Between Muslims: Religious Difference in Iraqi Kurdistan (Stanford University Press, 2020). Between Muslims provides an ethnographic account of Iraqi Kurdish Muslims who turn away from devotional piety yet remain intimately engaged with Islamic traditions and with other Muslims. Bush offers a new way to understand religious difference in Islam, rejecting simple stereotypes about what ethnic or sectarian differences mean and illuminating the interplay of attraction and aversion to Islam among ordinary Muslims.

Harvard Law Today published an article on November 16, 2020 entitled "Training the Next Generation of International Women's Rights Advocates," which highlighted the teaching and advocacy work of Associate Director Salma Waheedi to advance gender justice and legal equality in different Muslim communities. The article emphasized Waheedi's collaborative lawyering model and the work of HLS students to support the pioneering activism of local and regional Muslim women's advocacy groups.

Visiting Fellow Gehan Gunatilleke's article "Justifying Limitations on the Freedom of Expression" was published in the peer-reviewed journal Human Rights Review in November 2020. The article critiques the "proportionality test" and presents a case for a "duty-basedapproach to justifying limitations on the freedom of expression.

On January 7, 2021, Gunatilleke participated in a Zoom panel entitled "The Forced Cremations of Covid Deceased in Sri Lanka." The panel, which was organized by the Cordoba Foundation, focused on Sri Lanka's policy of forced cremation of persons who died of COVID-19 and its implications for minority relations and rights.

The Alwaleed Islamic Studies Program at Harvard University interviewed Visiting Fellow Mary Elston, the winner of the 2020 Alwaleed Bin Talal Prize for Best Dissertation in Islamic Studies, about her dissertation, "Reviving Turāth: Islamic Education in Modern Egypt." In the podcast interview, Elston shares her findings about the history of reform at al-Azhar since the 19th century and the contemporary movement to revive "turāth," or Islamic heritage, through the eyes of Muslim scholars, their students, and the Egyptian state.


Watch recordings of our Fall 2020 events:

Indian Muslim Women's Movement: For Gender Justice and Equal Citizenship
Indian Muslim Women's Movement: For Gender Justice and Equal Citizenship. Featuring Zakia Soman and Dr. Noorjehan Safia Niaz, Co-Founders of Bharatiya Muslim Mahila Andolan (BMMA); Alex McCarthy, Communications Program Officer, Musawah.

Freedom of Religion and Public Interest: A Look at Sri Lanka, Pakistan, and Europe
Freedom of Religion and Public Interest: A Look at Sri Lanka, Pakistan, and Europe. Featuring Gehan Gunatilleke, Visiting Fellow, Program on Law and Society in the Muslim World; Yee Htun, Clinical Instructor, Harvard Human Rights Program.

Muslim Women Creating New Futures: The Campaign for Justice in Muslim Family Laws
Muslim Women Creating New Futures: The Campaign for Justice in Muslim Family Laws. Featuring Zainah Anwar, Musawah Executive Director; Marwa Sharafeldin, MENA Region Senior Expert at Musawah; Hala Al-Karib, Siha Regional Director; Salomé Gómez-Upegui, LLM '18, Women's Leadership Consultant.
 
Movement Lawyering and Social Change: A Spotlight on LGBTQ Advocacy in Lebanon
Movement Lawyering and Social Change: A Spotlight on LGBTQ Advocacy in Lebanon. Featuring Tarek Zeidan, Executive Director of Helem; Youmna Makhlouf, Legal Agenda Attorney; Kareem Nammour, Legal Agenda Attorney; Afsaneh Rigot, MENA Officer at Article 19 and Berkman-Klein Center Affiliate.

RCPI Webinar: Author Discussion with Rashid Khalidi on The Hundred Years' War on Palestine.
Organized by the Religion, Conflict, and Peace Initiative and co-sponsored by the Program on Law and Society in the Muslim World. Featuring Professor Rashid Khalidi, Columbia University; Professor Rosie Bsheer, Harvard University; Hilary Rantisi, RCPI Associate Director.

Law, Empire, and the Sultan: Ottoman Imperial Authority and Late Hanafi Jurisprudence
Author Discussion: Law, Empire, and the Sultan: Ottoman Imperial Authority and Late Hanafi Jurisprudence. Featuring Professor Samy Ayoub, University of Texas at Austin; Dr. Mary Elston, Visiting Fellow, Program on Law and Society in the Muslim World.


Register for our Spring 2021 upcoming events:


Author discussion with J. Andrew Bush, Visiting Fellow, Program on Law and Society in the Muslim World

Discussant:Tamar Shirinian, Postdoctoral Teaching Associate, Department of Anthropology, University of Tennessee, Knoxville

Wednesday, February 10, 2021, 11 am - 12 pm EST
Zoom Webinar: Registration


With Nurul Huda Mohd. Razif, Evans Fellow, University of Cambridge and Postdoctoral Researcher, Centre Asie du Sud-Est, CASE

Discussant: Dominik Mueller, Professor of Cultural and Social Anthropology, FAU Erlangen-Nuremberg

Thursday, February 18, 2021, 12 pm - 1 pm EST
Zoom Webinar: Registration


With Afsaneh Rigot, Senior MENA Researcher, Article 19 and Affiliate, Berkman Klein Center for Internet and Society

Discussant: Kendra Albert, Clinical Instructor, Harvard Cyberlaw Clinic

Wednesday, February 24, 2021, 12 - 1 pm EST
Zoom Webinar: Registration


Author Discussion with Noora Lori, Assistant Professor of International Relations, Boston University

Wednesday, March 3, 2021, 12 pm - 1 pm EST
Zoom Webinar: Registration

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