The Muslim at the End of the World
by Marchella Ward
The discipline in which I teach – known as Classical Studies – depends on linear time both for its constitution as a unit of study, as well as for its modes of investigation. The easiest way to tell you what I do is to locate it in time – to tell you that I research and teach the so-called ‘ancient world’. But that ‘ancient world’ is famously lacking in clear boundaries, either geographical or chronological. Despite the fuzziness of these disciplinary boundaries, with both its beginning and its end point shrouded in argument and mystery, one thing remains clear: the timeline of Classics, in most framings, ends before the coming of Islam. This is a well-known reflex of historiographical writing framed around a ‘clash of civilisations’ narrative, which deliberately excludes Islam from the paradigm of the classical in order to Orientalise it.
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