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Ta'ifah, sect and sectarianism: from the word and its changing implications to the analytical sociological term
Author
Source
Issue
Vol. 1, Issue 2 (31 Aug. 2018), pp.53-67, 15 p.
Publisher
Arab Center for Research and Policy Studies
Publication Date
2018-08-31
Country of Publication
Qatar
No. of Pages
15
Main Subjects
Abstract EN
This article, a chapter from the author's recently published book (March 2018) titled, Ta'ifah, Sectarianism and Imagined Sects, attempts to build fundamental conceptual idiomatic distinctions between community according to religious or confessional affiliation (at-tai'fah), sectarianism (at-ta'ifiyyah) and confessionalism (al-madhabiyyah) – concepts and phenomena that are deeply intertwined.
The author also explores related concepts such as identity, religious affiliation, sect, difference, fanaticism (taasub), and others.
Bishara analyzes the linguistic and semantic conceptual evolution of the term sectarianism, as well as the evolution of the term through the concepts of confession/group (firqa), sect (tai'fa), and craft (hirfa) - concepts that reflect on the ways (turuq), the occupational and professional congregations as well as the Sufi orders, within Islamic society.
All of these developments are examined to reach an understanding of the widespread modern Arabic term sectarianism - sectarianism being a modern term, and sect an old one.
Through a critical debate with the modern Western sociological concepts of sectarianism (al-ta'ifiyyah or al-firqiyyah), the study attempts to develop the term “sect” as an analytical sociological term that can be used to analyze the formation, evolution, and characteristics of new contemporary imagined communities, according to religious communities that the author calls imagined sects in his book.
One of the major theses in this work is that modern religious communities (tawa'if: plural of tai'fah) do not produce sectarianism; rather, it is sectarianism which breeds the imagined communities that the author calls imagined sects.
American Psychological Association (APA)
Bisharah, Azmi. 2018. Ta'ifah, sect and sectarianism: from the word and its changing implications to the analytical sociological term. AlMuntaqa،Vol. 1, no. 2, pp.53-67.
https://search.emarefa.net/detail/BIM-965134
Modern Language Association (MLA)
Bisharah, Azmi. Ta'ifah, sect and sectarianism: from the word and its changing implications to the analytical sociological term. AlMuntaqa Vol. 1, no. 2 (Aug. 2018), pp.53-67.
https://search.emarefa.net/detail/BIM-965134
American Medical Association (AMA)
Bisharah, Azmi. Ta'ifah, sect and sectarianism: from the word and its changing implications to the analytical sociological term. AlMuntaqa. 2018. Vol. 1, no. 2, pp.53-67.
https://search.emarefa.net/detail/BIM-965134
Data Type
Journal Articles
Language
English
Notes
Includes bibliographical references : p. 66-67
Record ID
BIM-965134