Many researches and scholars consider the internet as the real reason for the flourishing of the so called "Islamic Virtual Ummah", what do you think?
Answer
Insofar as "virtual" :) today has become 'virtually identical' to cyberspace, this is certainly correct. Further, there is no doubt that the Internet has contributed greatly to a new growth of 'pan-Islamic' feelings among many of its Muslim users. This phenomonen should, however, not be regarded in isolation from its social and historical context.
Today, many more Muslims are living in the 'diaspora', in countries and social environments that are not predominantly Muslim, and many of them are seeking to revitalize their Islamic identity in a more reflected way, one that is not simply content with practicing whatever traditions in the social context one has been born into prescribe.
Muslim activists on the Internet have been drawn first and formost, in the beginnings, in the 1990s, from among these circles, and they have found in the Internet an ideal medium to share reflections on their beliefs, identity, practicies, policies, social life, moral ways, etc. -
in other words, to think of themselves as a community in new ways that were more self-reflected, and less bound by tradition, than tended to be the case 'back home'.And this new community is often referred to, or thought of as, a 'virtual ummah'.
But please allow me one more remark: 'Virtual communities', as 'imagined communities', have existed long before the Internet. The Muslim Ummah, in itself, as an idea, has always been a virtual community, since it is not one that is realized in one particular social locale. And people have used media - oral lore, books, myths, song, newspapers, radio, TV - all along to 'imagine' their community.
The Internet is thus less revolutionary than it is often made to appear. Rather, it is the latest incarnation in a long development of media that have helped Muslims (among other people) to imagine their belonging.
Name
KM Ashraf
- India
Profession
Question
True infomation itself is a problem maker. With the right information provided through research or the Internet (easy method!), of course we will be forced to take a clear stand. Will it be a radical stand? If George Bush and all the imperialist forces past and present are called radical, then we are not radicals at all, otherwise we are! comment please.
Answer
Your question is at heart a political one, and very legitimately so. America itself is divided over the presidency of George W., as you well know.
As regards the Internet, I detect in your formulation a rather facile assumption that "right information" is "easily accessible". This has been an important part of the discourse of the early Internet enthusiasts -
namely, that the Internet opens up the field of information, breaks down barriers for publishing and accessing information, and so helps to create a more participatory communicative space. While the Internet certainly has helped to change the boundaries of established media hierarchies, it has not displaced them.
And established media players have been quick to assert their positions in the Internet information landscape as well. As a consequence, many Internet users are channeled through information (or infotainment) channels that are controlled by established giants in the media field, or players that are structurally similar. MSN is the prime example.
The challenge for radical (progressive) politics is therefore to attract enough attention among and in between these 'hegemonic' portals to exert mass influence. It's not impossible, but it's not a given.
Thank you..
Name
Zahrah
- Netherlands
Profession
Question
In how far do you think what happens on the Internet has any effect on 'real' life? Especially in the context of the murder of Theo van Gogh in the Netherlands: the murderer apparently used texts from the extremist websites in the letter he left on the body of his victim.
Answer
The Internet is a medium; media, consumed, are part of people's socialization and can influence their thoughts and acts. To say so much is trivial - but it has to be said since some people still question the effect of the net on 'real' life.
Exactly how, and to what extent, media influence people's thoughts and acts is, however, a very different question. After 40 years of research into the effects of televsion, there is no unanimity among researchs about the nature and quality of these effects.
And the debate continues on how exactly to measure such effects. Comparatively speaking, Internet research is still in its infancy, but the problems are essentially the same.
People are influenced in their thoughts and acts by a great variety of factors, and to posit some simple linear connections between material posted on the net, or people's online activities, and their acts in 'real life', is too simplistic.
All that can be said with some certainty is that the Internet is likely to play an increasingly important role in people's socialization, and that therefore the way material, thought, ideas, social relations etc are presented on the net is going to exert a growing influence on 'real life'.
With regard to Islam, for example, this means that increasinly, only material easily accessible on the net will be considered by the majority of Muslim Internet users in the construction of what Islam 'means', and how one should live properly as a Muslim.
Name
Rola
- Jordan
Profession
Student
Question
Dear Professor Hofheinz..
What impact do you think easy access to the internet has had on the spread of and contact between radical islamist groups?
Answer
The Internet has been a godsend for anyone who wants to communicate easily and quickly with others who are not necessarily sitting next door -- for you and me, primarily (as individuals), but then also, of course, for criminals, academics, pedophiles, democratic activists, neo-nazis, soccer fans, terrorists, you name it.
I'm phrasing my answer provocatively to make a point.
Of course the Internet has helped 'radical Islamists' (whoever you may refer to by that - see Ahraf's questions earlier on for a possible alternative use to that dominant in the Western press)to organize better and to spread their ideas. But the net is often *blamed* almost singlehandedly for the rise of extremism - and that is much too facile a conception. What happens on the net is much more a reflection of larger social realities than some of the more sensationalist observers want to make us believe.
If you look at majority use of the Internet in the Arab world, the picture quickly changes - away from the focus on 'radical' groups, and more to a discovery that the net is used to broaden one's social and intellectual space.
Name
Esther
- Egypt
Profession
Question
Do you think that the Internet's effect of reducing and simplifying complicated and rich cultural and religious traditions will eventually lead to a loss of Islamic knowledge and traditional authority? And do you think this is necessarily a dangerous or undesirable development?
Answer
Primarily it is an unavoidable development that should not be lamented so much as be taken as a challenge.
And secondly, the simplification of the scholastic canon that is speeded by the Internet (but which in itself is a development that started much earlier, in the 18th century C.E.) is but one side of a larger development which at heart is dialectical. One the one side, the complicated scholastic tradition is reduced to relatively simple 'truths' - but on the other hand, these 'truths' get reappropriated by many more people than ever before, and in the process of this appropriation new ways of thinking are engendered, which in turn will lead to a new culture, or rather, new rich cultures, and new traditions, over time.
Thank you..
Name
Taha
-
Profession
Question
In your opinion, to what extent is islam represented on the internet? And in comparison to other religions?
Answer
Good question, and honestly I am not sure I can answer it. But I'll give you my impressions.
With regard to the first part of the question, it is noticeable that the representation of Islam on the Internet started 'from the periphery' so to speak - from the US- (and European) based diaspora.
For long, their voices on the Internet were much more prominent than voices from the established centers of Islamic learning in the Muslim heartlands, and that has 'set the tone', to an extent.
What are the most popular Islamic websites on the net? It is not al-Azhar, or the Zaytuna, or Deoband.
Rather, it is sites like Islam Online, Amr Khaled, Islamweb, al-islam.com, Islam Today, ...
Sites that operate from 'the sides' of the old establishment, if you will (and I include Islamweb from Qatar and al-Islam.com from Sakhr among the 'sides' here).
So, the representation of Islam on the Internet clearly has changed from what it was before. And one may also argue that for seasoned users - those who know how to find things - the plurality of voices has dramatically increased.
If one knows how to find, one can find pretty much anything on the net today, including pretty much any of the many representations of Islam.
With regard to how this compares to how other religions fare on the net, I have not done any systematic research on that, but my overall impression is that you can find the same plurality there as well.
Thank you..
Name
jad
- Mauritius
Profession
Question
Dear sir,
Islam is a religion that is not well understood by many .In a world dominated by multimedia as the main and quickest source of information, the most easy and accessible way of propagating the real message of islam remains the internet.Islam has never been against science and will never be . In fact the now destroyed archives in baghdad would have shown the world how science has progressed during islamic civilization. Therefore in my opinion Islam on the internet is neither progress nor a sign of radicalism it just the next natural step in the evolution of daawa of God's word . God's word will always find a way to humankind and internet is just a part of it.
Answer
Dear Jad,
As most often in the publishing business (whether in media or in academic life), the publishing house is to blame for the title, not the author :)
If you write that Islam on the Internet is 'just the next step' in a longer evolution, that is exactly what I said in my answer to Zahrah. It is up to the users - you! - to make the best of it.
Name
Saki
- Thailand
Profession
Teacher
Question
Our young Muslim in Thailand addict with game online and wasting time by chating. How can we solve this problem by Islamic Teaching?
Answer
First, I'm not a mufti, so I can't give you a normative rule. But I'll offer two observations:
a) the allegation that youngsters are wasting away theire time chatting and gaming is not particular to Thailand, nor to the Muslim world, but is made by conserned elders worldwide.
Even though it is true that a lot of the online activities of young people are devoted to chatting and gaming, the picture that they are *only* doing this, is overdrawn.
And the implication that they are automatically morally wasted by these activities is simplistic and cannot be scientifically upheld - see my earlier answer on the difficulty of establishing a clear cause and effect relation in media studies.
But people are clearly socialized to an extent by their chatting and gaming activities.
b) They are drawn to these activities because they find them attractive, and often the attraction lies to a large extent in the feeling that they can expend their personality there more freely than in their immediate ('real') social environment.
And thus the challenge to Islamic teaching lies in offering these people something to match.
Since the beginning of history men have complained that the world is going down the drain. Chatting and gaming are just the latest incarnations of this supposed drain. But complaining doesn't help - you have to take up the challenge constructively.
