The Global Islam Track will extend the category “global” beyond the traditional boundaries of the Middle East, Africa, South and Southeast Asia. Students will be trained to integrate the various contestations, innovations, traditions, and revisionist discourses among Muslims into a mega-conversation about the meaning and impact of Islam across space and time. This will include training in the accurate reading and critical analysis of the textual tradition of the Islamic religious sciences, in conversation with modern tools of investigation and analysis.
Students will also have access to multiple disciplinary perspectives, e.g., international relations, gender studies, political theory, race and ethnicity studies, anthropology, media studies. USC’s Center for Islamic Thought, Culture and Practice will be a site for intellectual exploration and exchange, affording students direct access to leading scholars, intellectuals and practitioners from around the world.
Mandatory Global Islam track courses include REL 525, REL 625 and REL 650.
Language Requirement
Required to demonstrate advanced ability in the primary lingua franca of Islamic civilization to ensure the ability to conduct original research. Secondarily, students are generally encouraged to acquire facility in a secondary language within traditional Muslim religious and secular literature. Students are also encouraged to acquire facility in one European research language where deemed appropriate.
- Arabic: Classical and Modern Standard, as the primary research language.
- Persian: Classical and Modern, as a possible secondary research language.
- French or Spanish: (Elective) a reading knowledge to conduct research on or in specific modern communities.
Faculty in Global Islam
For information on faculty areas of study and advisement, please click here.
Related Research Centers:
Contact Us
Chair
Cavan Concannon
concanno@usc.edu
Academic Program Manager
Angie Guerrero
angiegue@usc.edu
USC School of Religion
825 Bloom Walk, ACB 130
Los Angeles, CA 90089
religion@usc.edu
Director of Undergraduate Studies
Jill Hicks-Keeton
jill.hk@usc.edu
Director of Graduate Studies
Max Strassfeld
strassfe@usc.edu