International Islamic scholar to speak at Centenary College
november 7, 2016
SHREVEPORT, LA — Dr. Amanullah De Sondy, Senior Lecturer in Contemporary Islam at University College Cork in Ireland, will visit Centenary on Wednesday, November 16. His presentation, “Islam between Text and Lived Realities: a Conversation,” highlights some of the tensions that Muslims face living in the modern world as they uphold ancient texts and traditions. Dr. Spencer Dew, Chair of Religious Studies at Centenary, will serve as Dr. De Sondy’s conversation partner. The 7:00 p.m. event in the Whited Room in Bynum Commons is free and open to the public.
“Centenary is indeed privileged to welcome Dr. De Sondy to our campus and to Shreveport,” says Jenifer K. Ward, Provost and Dean of the College. “It is fitting that we should deepen our understanding of one of the great world religions as part of our ‘Religion Matters’ series, and the form of the event—a conversation—signals Centenary’s commitment to open inquiry and exchange. As a college related to the United Methodist Church, we welcome the opportunity to find points of connection in the beliefs and values of our different traditions.”
De Sondy joined the faculty at University College Cork in 2015. He previously taught Islamic Studies at Ithaca College and the University of Miami in the United States and at several Scottish universities, including the University of Glasgow where he earned his Ph.D. in 2009.
De Sondy’s first book, The Crisis of Islamic Masculinities, was published by Bloomsbury Academic in 2014 and is the first monograph on the construction of manhood in the Qur’an and South Asian history. His research connects the study of Islam to key themes of gender, ethnicity, race, and pluralism, and he has written on gender and sexuality in classical and contemporary Islam in relation to Islamic practice and the Qur’an. Additionally, De Sondy specializes in Muslims in Celtic lands (Scotland and Ireland)/Europe/Pakistan and Religious Education (RE) in high schools in these global locations.
Centenary’s “Religion Matters” series is a set of lectures designed to generate wide-ranging conversations about the intersection of religion and other cultural issues across the larger Shreveport-Bossier community. De Sondy’s visit to Centenary is generously underwritten by the Attaway Professorships in Civic Culture Program.