Decolonizing Education

 

PROJECT: DECOLONIZING EDUCATION

 

                                                            Maryam Sakeenah

 

Over the years that I have studied and then taught the GCE/IGCSE syllabi in Pakistan, I have come to realize how some of the contents of the syllabi as well as the ideas, values, attitudes and approaches embedded in them- even the tools for interpretation evaluation- are an extension of the ‘Macaulay’ project which aimed to ‘create a  class of persons, Indian in blood and colour, but English in taste, in opinions, in morals, and in intellect.”

 

Much of the content I teach is rooted in the neocolonialist / neoimperialist idea of the centrality and ascendancy of the Western civilization. It is quite glaringly obvious in the 'World History' syllabus I teach. Quite ironically, ‘World’ History is overwhelmingly the history of Europe and the US, with a passing mention of the ‘non West’ through a heavily tainted Eurocentric (or should I say Orientalist?) lens. While studying the impact of the First World War, the havoc it played in the Middle East, piecing out and redistributing Ottoman territory arbitrarily is glossed over, among so much else.

 

The Sociology syllabi trace the origin of the study of Society to the European Enlightenment, failing to even acknowledge what sociology owes to 'Umraniyat' of Ibn Khaldun's Muqaddimah. All social themes are analyzed through the lens of Western philosophies of Structural Functionalism, Interpretivism, Marxism and Feminism. Students are expected to cite examples not from the societies around them, but from British society as that is the prime subject of the entire study. As a teacher I find it tragic that my students are to base their understanding of how society works in the structure, norms and trends belonging to British society primarily, and only secondarily their own- as a postscript to the course syllabus.

 

As a student and then a teacher of CIE Pakistan Studies History, I never knew there was such a thing as the Great Famine of Bengal which resulted due to exploitative economic policies of the British. I had no idea about the strategic destruction of the local cotton industry and its nightmarish impact on the economy and society, for British economic interests. I had no idea about the systematic degradation of the Madrassah as a casualty of Macaulay's grand colonial educational project... These ‘blind spots’ on history I harbor profoundly affect my understanding of my present social context. My understanding of my present will always be superficial and partial, always coming from a tainted lens.

 

 

It is true that this system provides students with skills to think critically, formulate opinions and construct arguments- and that at present this is quite plainly missing from our local educational systems. What is required therefore is to update our own syllabi and examination strategies in order to replace this system. Educationists in the country need to understand the need to decolonize education and initiate such a project.

 

The prevailing system also very discreetly establishes the primacy of the English language over and at the cost of the local and national languages. Students passing through the system therefore, adopt the language of the colonizer as their first language, and its baggage of values, ideas and attitudes alongwith it. The narrative that comes wrapped up in the language is absorbed uncritically as one’s own.

 

The profound disconnect that all this produces between the present generation and its roots is tragic and grave. It is a crisis of identity, a loss of a heritage... The rich legacy of Urdu literature gets shrouded in oblivion. The entire treasury of literature in local languages will soon be lost to our children- inaccessible, remote, unfamiliar, alienated.  

 

Generations of students have passed through and will continue to pass through this system... the consequences are enormous. The need to decolonize education and to decolonize our intellect is immense. We start by prioritizing communication and learning in our own language(s), as well as developing an affinity with locally produced content in local languages. This is especially important at the primary level as the ‘tabula rasa’ of the child’s mind uncritically accepts whatever is presented by a superior. Learning a foreign language as one’s first has been proven through research to be highly damaging to the child’s communication skills and sense of identity.

 

If this project to decolonize education is not taken up with urgency and seriousness, we will be doomed to watch our brightest minds turn into colonies of uncritically, unreflectingly borrowed ideas.

Blasphemy and the Prophet of Islam PBUH

 

                 BLASPHEMY AND THE PROPHETIC CONDUCT

Maryam Sakeenah

Offensive criticism and mockery directed at the person of the Prophet PBUH is not of modern origin, although the Communication Revolution has made such content more easily accessible and widely available. In the earliest phase of his mission at Makkah, the Prophet PBUH was targeted for ridicule, insult and slander in the most heinous ways. While the Quran refers to these instances and responds by giving solace to the Prophet PBUH through faith or by elevating his honour in the ethereal realm, it never orders reactionary measures or punishment in that phase of Da’wah. The patience and forbearance of the Prophet PBUH in particular and the Muslim community in general at that time are well documented. Scholars of Islam explain this divinely sanctioned strategy of tolerance through the concept that when religion has not been firmly and completely established in a community, rejection or hateful speech against religion cannot be penalized. That is because before being made liable to accountability, everyone in the community must be given fair and ample chance to consider faith in its completeness and make a free, informed choice about it (Itmam al Hujjah). Religious law must also have been established as the law of the land, with everyone being made fully aware about the consequences of defying the law.

A very instructive and deeply inspiring example of how the Prophet PBUH dealt with hate and insult directed his way is when the Prophet PBUH came across a slur (meaning ‘The Blameworthy’) coined for him by twisting his beautiful name:

Narrated Abu Huraira: Allah's Apostle said, ‘Doesn't it astonish you how Allah protects me from the Quraish's abusing and cursing? They abuse ‘The Blameworthy’ and curse ‘The Blameworthy’, while I am Muhammad, ‘The Praised One.’ (Sahih Bukhari, hadith 3533)

The wisdom of this approach lies in the understanding that those who commit blasphemy do so to spite their own faces. Their blasphemy does absolutely nothing to take away anything from the sublime, eternal glory of the Prophet PBUH. Therefore the paranoia to hunt down and crack down on any blasphemous intent in any context is ill advised. The Prophet PBUH and all sacred personalities are venerated passionately in the hearts of millions and celebrated in the heavens. They do not need our puerile attempts to defend their honour.

However, when blasphemous actions and speech are pre meditated, planned and orchestrated in an organized manner calculated to offend, provoke and sow the seeds of ‘fitnah’ in society, the law has to act to check it and snub it effectively. When conditions of Itmam al Hujjah are already present, the capital punishment has to be deployed.

Once again, we have precedents from the Prophet PBUH for this.

 It has been narrated on the authority of Jabir that the Messenger of Allah said: Who will kill Ka'b b. Ashraf? He has maligned Allah, the Exalted, and His Messenger. Muhammad bin Maslama said: Messenger of Allah, do you wish that I should kill him? He said: Yes. — Sahih Muslim, 19:4436

On the occasion of the Conquest of Makkah, the Prophet PBUH ordered the execution of Al-Huwayrith ibn Nuqaidh who was killed by 'Ali ibn abi Talib He was among those who insulted the Prophet PBUH (Ibn Ishaq)

 

It becomes clear in the light of the above that while one-off incidents of blasphemy in the absence of Itmam al Hujjah should not provoke us into a furore of vengeance, organized blasphemy in Muslim societies must be dealt with by Islamic scholars, the state and its machinery. The details of the laws for the punishment of blasphemy vary slightly in the schools of Islamic jurisprudence regarding its commission by Muslims or non Muslims, but all concur to the applicability of capital punishment in major and organized instances of blasphemy committed by Muslims in a Muslim society. In a situation wherein the conditions for Itmam al Hujjah have been fulfilled and the Deen has been established with the sovereignty of Islamic law, organized, deliberate and repetitive blasphemy must be punished with death. However, each case must be thoroughly examined by seasoned jurists, foolproof evidence gathered through transparent investigation. When this is not done, laws are misused to victimize for personal vendetta, innocents are made to suffer, vulnerable minorities targeted unfairly and a mockery made of the law of Islam.

In the case of secular societies like France, while the examples and laws cited above may not apply, what needs to be understood is that blasphemy is a violation of human rights. In fact, it is one of the most excruciating violations of one of the most sacred human sentiments: reverence on the basis of personal faith. It is not about free speech and freedom of expression because blasphemous content is not intellectual disagreement or critique, but anti intellectual, ill intended, malicious, provocative and obscene invective directed at the very seat of religious faith: the heart and soul. You can very well be secular, but you must understand what faithful devotion and reverential love means to those who believe; you must understand what the person of Muhammad PBUH means to those who follow his legacy, and what it means to love a prophet ‘more than one’s father, one’s children and all mankind.’[1] And you must understand that satire targeting the deeply held faith of a community is not an exercise in free speech but malevolent hate speech that violates the most fundamental human rights.

It is this inability to understand, this stridently secular and blindly apathetic perspective that guides the French state’s paranoid measures to protect itself against its already marginalized Muslims. The mainstreaming and state sponsorship of blasphemy in response to an act of violence perpetrated by a Muslim individual only reflects callous insensitivity, ridiculous myopia and a refusal to understand the deeper issues involved.  Looking at the roots of French secularism and democracy, these policies are a travesty of ‘liberte, egalite, fraternite’; looking ahead into the future, these policies are dangerously self-destructive for France, for Europe and the whole world.

 

 

 

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[1] The Prophet (ﷺ) said "None of you will have faith till he loves me more than his father, his children and all mankind." (Sahih Bukhari book 2 volume 8)

 

On the Single National Curriculum, Islamic Studies Component

 

                                                                                TEACHING RELIGION

Maryam Sakeenah

Most of the criticism to the Single National Curriculum relates to the Islamic Studies syllabi. There is paranoia about it being ‘bloated’ and ‘overzealous.’ This concern stems from the idea that religion and its education are invariably regressive and degenerate. Given our long and morbid history of the political abuse of religion, sectarianism and violence, this is not without grounds. But we will come to that later.

The Western colonial project had deep ideological underpinnings. Post Enlightenment Europe had liberated itself from a degenerate religious orthodoxy after centuries of struggle, hence it emerged as stridently secular. The narrative of religion being essentially regressive, anti intellectual and anti scientific is steeped in the experience of centuries of European history. In the historical experience and cultural consciousness of much of the non Western world, however, this Eurocentric narrative does not hold, at all. It was under the religious state with the Shariah as the law of the land that culture, critical inquiry and scientific development thrived during the Muslim Golden Age in the Middle Ages. This also was the precursor to the Western Renaissance. Elsewhere, such as in Latin America, Protestant Churches and their religious discourse (liberation theology) became the driving force for progressive social change.

Originating from the British colonial masters whose purpose was served well through the systematic marginalization of the madrassah as a centre of enlightenment in pre colonial Indian society, the madrassah and its affiliates have suffered structural exclusion from society. Religious violence involving seminaries and, following the War on Terror coming home, an active campaign of negative stereotyping maligned the Madrassah further. This explains the fears regarding the recruitment of madrassah-qualified religious instructors at schools, and vice versa. Alongwith a lack of acknowledgement of the positive social contribution of the Madrassah, there is also a lack of understanding of the complex historical, social, economic and political factors that have led to this gradual deterioration of the Madrassah. Consequently, there is no realization of the urgent and pressing need to reverse this process.

How pressing this need is can be gauged from the fact that the school and the Madrassah embody two widely differentiated education systems, set upon a head-on collision course. This creates two ideologically opposed social subcultures which overlap the stratification of the society along the lines of social class. The university graduate possesses the cultural capital that eventually makes him gain access to the avenues of power. On the other hand is the deprived religious seminary graduate whose fewer career prospects and the constant fear of poverty breeds resentment which may easily flare into violence. Including secular learning as a necessary part of the Madrassah system and facilitating the interaction and exchange between the seminary and the school may well work as a means to bridge the gaping divides and begin the healing process for a deeply fractured society.  

Memorization is not a skill exclusive to Islamic Studies. Nor does memorization of some course contents preclude independent thinking, critical engagement and logical reasoning. It is a necessary tool for gaining knowledge and complements other skills. So many individuals throughout Islam’s history, having gone through traditional learning, emerged as the greatest minds spearheading critical reform, discovery and innovation: Ghazali, Ibn Tayimiyyah and Ibn Khaldun immediately come to mind in this regard.

Traditionally, Islamic Studies courses taught at Madrassahs have been broadly categorized between the ‘Maqulat’ (rational sciences) and the ‘Manqulat’ (transmitted classical learning). Both are integral to the study of Religion, but just like in the heyday of Muslim civilization the ‘Maqulat’ stood  prioritized, a return to that model can provide space for critical engagement and analytical reasoning within the purview of religion.

Concerns regarding the promotion of sectarianism through the teaching of religion can be addressed by prioritizing the ethical content of Islam over issues of juristic difference, form and ritual. Rights of fellow beings must be highlighted, including for those of other faiths- for which there exists voluminous content in religious sources. Anyone who has read through the Single National Curriculum will know that these contents have been included.

As a teacher of Islamic Studies for many years, I have encouraged critical engagement with religious texts, contextualization of religious interpretations and given space for discussion, debate and questioning. I have encouraged the appreciation of the internal diversity of religion and facilitated the understanding of the relevance of religious ethics and values in our society and the wider world. My students come from a variety of sectarian backgrounds. I enable them to understand differences without judgement. I encourage them to feel free to profess fidelity to personal convictions while respecting the convictions of others different to theirs. I am not an exception. Numberless individuals in the Muslim world and beyond have endeavoured to make faith come alive for seekers of knowledge as a means to positive personal and social change.

Much of the criticism to the Islamic Studies curriculum is based on our unfair biases, negative stereotypes and preconceived notions. These arise from a prejudiced view of religion which is the legacy of our colonial past that still holds some of our most popular academics intellectually hostage. In a country that has suffered religious violence and where instances of religious and sectarian intolerance are not rare, the teaching of religion sincerely, judiciously, insightfully and authentically can show us a way out of the dark alley of obscurantism, hate and ignorance. 

 

The writer teaches Islamic Studies and Social Sciences in Lahore and can be reached at meem.seen@gmail.com.