Event at Max Mueller Bhawan, New Delhi

Illustrated Talk by Yousuf Saeed
"Popular Islam and Urban Spaces:
The Nizamuddin Shrine in New Delhi"

Jan 22, 2010 06:30 pm

Siddharta Hall
Goethe-Institut/Max Mueller Bhawan3,
Kasturba Gandhi Marg, New Delhi 110001

Yousuf Saeed, member of the HRA project "Satellites of Networks" will give an illustrated talk on "Popular Islam and Urban Spaces: The Nizamuddin Shrine in New Delhi".

The talk focuses on how the popular visuality around the shrine has changed over time in response to the changes brought about by urbanization, movement of pilgrims, new technology, and competition from the more orthodox tableeghi and Wahhabi ideologues in the vicinity? This work-in-progress is part of HRA project "Satellites of Networks" a research and documentation project tracing the transcultural flows between Europe and Asia in Muslim popular iconography at the Cluster "Asia and Europe in a Global Context".

Yousuf Saeed lectures at Heidelberg on India's Popular Islam (24 Nov. 2008)

Nov 24, 2008 - South Asia Institute, Im Neuenheimer Feld 330, Room Z10, 6.15 to 7.45 pm

Lecture by Yousuf Saeed: “Stereotypes of Muslim Piety in India’s Popular Calendar Art and Cinema”

by Iris Mucha — last modified Nov 14, 2008 05:53 AM

The talk is a presentation featuring a collection of popular religious posters/ images used by South Asian Muslims, reflecting various syncretic or plural themes and symbolism, including flows between Hindu and Muslim iconography and devotional practices.

More details here

India's Popular Islam: a presentation in Vienna

India's Popular Islam: A Film Presentation & Discussion with Yousuf Saeed on Nov 28, 2008, at Vienna, Ausria
proLoka, Talaash and the Institute for South Asia, Tibet and Buddhism Studies in Vienna invite you to a film presentation and discussion round to the topic of „India’s Popular Islam“ by Indian film maker Yousuf Saeed, who agreed to come to Vienna for this special occasion.
Date: 28.11.2008,
Venue: Institut fuer Südasien, Tibet- und Buddhismuskunde,
Spitalgasse 2, Eingang 2.7, 1090 Vienna.
The entry is free, the invitation card can be found here.

Popular Culture of Islam and Muslims in South Asia

Many Muslims will ask: what is popular Islam? Islam is Islam, why divide it into popular and unpopular? Why confuse people?

Well, this blog tries to look at some popular cultural traditions associated with Islam found mostly in South Asia (India, Pakistan, Bangladesh...).

Many Muslims will say: all those popular cultural traditions are actually biddats (innovations), and the real Islam has no place for them. Sooner or later, the pure Islam will pervade.

We (the promoter of this site), have no issue with the shariat (the codified Islam), but cannot also ignore the centuries old cultural traditions and colourful rituals found everywhere in Muslim societies. Let us look at some of these...