April 6, 2007

'Schooling Islam: The Culture and Politics of Modern Muslim Education'

By NINA C. AYOUB

In Arabic, the first meaning of "madrasa" is "school" — in a generic and nonsectarian sense. Borrowed into English, however, the word usually means much more. It is the term's secondary definition, indicating schools devoted to Islamic instruction, that is both known and deemed fearfully relevant.

Not surprising, says Robert W. Hefner, an anthropologist at Boston University and director of the program on Islam and civil society at the university's Institute on Culture,