Cultural brokerage in premodern Islamic societies /
"When we speak of 'Islamic societies' or 'Islamic civilisation', we often imply that there is something distinctive about cultures wherever Islam is prominent. Yet historians have rarely examined in detail how these cultures that we call 'Islamic' were formed in re...
| Other Authors: | , |
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| Format: | Book |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
Edinburgh :
Edinburgh University Press Ltd,
[2026]
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| Series: | Edinburgh studies in classical Islamic history and culture.
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| Subjects: |
| Summary: | "When we speak of 'Islamic societies' or 'Islamic civilisation', we often imply that there is something distinctive about cultures wherever Islam is prominent. Yet historians have rarely examined in detail how these cultures that we call 'Islamic' were formed in relation to neighbouring ones. This volume addresses that gap by focusing on cultural brokerage: the process by which an individual mediates between different cultural spheres, transferring and translating ideas, practices and institutions across boundaries, often with lasting effects. The collection proposes a robust, historically grounded theory of cultural brokerage and demonstrates its significance for understanding the formation and evolution of culture in Islamic societies. Through a series of empirically rich case studies, the contributors explore how cultural brokers operated in contexts including China, Mongolia, Central Asia, Byzantium, Iran, Iraq, Syria, Palestine, Egypt, North Africa and the Iberian Peninsula. Ranging from the seventh to the fifteenth century, and across domains such as theology, medicine, and the arts, the book reveals how brokers shaped Islamic culture in dialogue with other traditions, offering new directions for research into the making of Islamic civilisation." -- |
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| Physical Description: | xvi, 496 pages : illustrations, map ; 24 cm |
| Bibliography: | Includes bibliographical references and index. |
| ISBN: | 9781399528689 1399528688 |