This course examines the formation and encounters of Islamic Law with Legal Others from roughly the 8th century CE to the early formation of the Ottoman Empire. The Islamic legal tradition arose in a complex historical context in which legal traditions mapped onto, and gave legal cover to, imperial polities. As the Islamic polity expanded, so too did the imagination of jurists having to contend with new realities (political, geographic, economic, and otherwise). This course will introduce students to the formation of Islamic law in a context of contending legal orders, its ongoing encounters with legal orders in the course of Islamic expansion, and the retraction of Islamic legal orders and institutions as a tradition that anticipated political sovereignty experienced the limits of that sovereignty. Examples will be drawn from the Middle East, Africa, South Asia, and South East Asia. The course will introduce students to the disciplinary focus of Law and History through a focus on doctrine, institution, and the implications on both as territory and people are subject to varying waves of imperial designs and local resistance.
This course examines the formation and encounters of Islamic Law with Legal Others from roughly the 8th century CE to the early formation of the Ottoman Empire. The Islamic legal tradition arose in a complex historical context in which legal traditions mapped onto, and gave legal cover to, imperial polities. As the Islamic polity expanded, so too did the imagination of jurists having to contend with new realities (political, geographic, economic, and otherwise). This course will introduce students to the formation of Islamic law in a context of contending legal orders, its ongoing encounters with legal orders in the course of Islamic expansion, and the retraction of Islamic legal orders and institutions as a tradition that anticipated political sovereignty experienced the limits of that sovereignty. Examples will be drawn from the Middle East, Africa, South Asia, and South East Asia. The course will introduce students to the disciplinary focus of Law and History through a focus on doctrine, institution, and the implications on both as territory and people are subject to varying waves of imperial designs and local resistance.
