Although most universities in the Muslim world publicly recognize and support the teaching of Western literature, the exploration of some Western literary themes (for example, self-determination, sexual liberation, and gender equality) is viewed negatively by authority figures as well as by some professors and students. To reconcile this concern with Lewis's view that the mutual study of litera...

Despite the perceived importance of media in the spread of and resistance against Islamist extremism, little is known about how Muslims use different kinds of media to get information about religious issues, and what sources they trust when doing so. This paper reports the results of a large, random sample survey among Muslims in seven countries Southeast Asia, West Africa and Western Europe, w...

Religious Minorities and Provision of Public Goods: Evidence from Rural West Bengal Religious and ethnic minorities across the world face partisan treatment with regard to provision of public goods, either as outcome of discriminatory practices or due to historical antecedents, such as the caste and religious divides in India. In several districts of West Bengal in India concentration of religi...

Chinese Muslims have actively maintained religious endogamy. However, no research has assessed the role of local residential context in individual Muslims’ marital choices, nor have sociologists examined the heterogeneity in individual Muslims’ responses to such contextual influences. Using Chinese census data between 2000 and 2005, this paper offers a first investigation of such micro– macro i...

It will be seen that the incidence of stone is much lower in Sikhs than in the other two communities, being only half that in Hindus and less than one-third of that in Muslims. The figures for cataract were obtained partly to serve as controls and partly to find out whether any significant differences existed in the prevalence of cataract among the members of the three communities. The percenta...

This article explores the relationship between religion, caste, infant mortality and fertility across Hindus and Muslims in India using recent data from the 2006 National Family Health Survey. The analysis shows that Muslims exhibit lower infant mortality rates relative to Hindus, and that this difference is not adequately explained by socio-economic status, location and policy variables. We ar...

Our 2005 representative national survey (2,972 interviews) shows an overwhelmingly common and strong religious intolerance towards Western churches that are legally deemed “non-traditional” and are commonly perceived as foreign to Russia. Most Russians would not let Western groups build churches, establish religious schools, or engage in other basic religious activities in their hometowns. West...

Background: While religious beliefs and values influence health behaviors, conventional health disparities research rarely examines health outcomes by religious affiliation particularly within multi-ethnic minority communities. Methods: Using a systematic strategy we searched the Medline literature to identify empiric studies that report on health disparities between American Muslims and nonMus...

slam and Christianity are today facing each other in a more hostile way than ever before. Recent events, including terrorist attacks, Western armies on Muslim soil, and the Israel/Palestinian conflict, have created a lot of enmity. Much has been said about these serious confrontations in the press, on TV, and in other media. Most of this is negative and colored by suspicion and mistrust on both...

Islam is the second largest religion in the world and Muslims constitute approximately 22% of the world’s population. According to latest data, the total number of Muslims in the world is over 1.5 billion. In Europe Muslims constitute approximately 7% of the overall population. In the UK the size of the Muslim population is estimated to be close to 1.6 million, constituting 2.7% of the overall ...