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#115889 11/14/03 06:59 PM
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sjmaxq Offline OP
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Thanks, maahey. I hadn't thought of reading it that way. If anything, that confirms my original complaint, that the piece had not been written clearly enough. Since my Dad grew up and went to school in what is now Pakistan, and the (now)elite boarding school he attended has had its chapel converted into a mosque, the notion that Pakistan was not included as a Muslim nation made me smile.
Wa-as salaam alaikum


#115890 11/14/03 07:46 PM
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Maahey

All the writer seems to say, is that Turkey might have been the FIRST Muslim nation to involve itself with the post-war reconstruction. The operative word seems to be - first.

Interesting take. One way of looking at it might be that India too, could be viewed as a Muslim nation, since only Indonesia (as far as I am aware) has more than India's 150 million+ Muslims. So India is the world's second largest Muslim state. Or is that figure now out of date?

cheer

the sunshine warrior


#115891 11/14/03 08:30 PM
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>One way of looking at it might be that India too, could be viewed as a Muslim nation, since only Indonesia (as far as I am aware) has more than India's 150 million+ Muslims. So India is the world's second largest Muslim state


Which reminds me of an article I read arguing that Partition was disastrous for Muslims on the subcontinent, that their political clout in a unified India would have been much more significant than the situation as it stands today.


#115892 11/15/03 12:24 AM
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My dear shanks!!!

India too, could be viewed as a Muslim nation, since only Indonesia (as far as I am aware) has more than India's 150 million+ Muslims. So India is the world's second largest Muslim state.

I shall admit that I was somewhat thunderstruck by this. India does have a large number of Muslims, but that CANNOT and DOES NOT make it a Muslim state. [shudder] [hysterical ]
For one, Hindus are the majority in India and outnumber the Muslims. So, just simply in terms of numbers, that statement does not hold. India is the largest democracy in the world and its commitment to secularism is written into the constituion. And then, a nation can only be called a Muslim state if IT professes to be one and openly wears its religion on its sleeve, which Pakistan does. I would not call Turkey or Somalia Muslim states. And lastly, the generals (from Ayub to Perverse Pervez)actually used the mullahs and the ulema in Pakistan to quell democratic uprisisngs. General Zia was the man most responsible for the increasing Islamisation of Pakistan and for effecting the firm entrenchment of the Shariah law in Pakistani society.

oftroy, thank you for your post. I agree with each one of your points wholeheartedly.
the US press is guilty of 'presenting facts' about islamic/muslim countries in just that sort of way

Ed Said wrote a marvellous book on just this in the early eighties. Even then, misrepresentation by the media, was felt acutely enough by large sections; enough for him to write a great book. The subject matter was just as relevant then as it is now and a new edition was released with a new preface in the late nineties or 2000. The book is, "Covering Islam". (note the clever pun) What a giant of a man he was. I wept when he died.


#115893 11/15/03 12:51 AM
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India does have a large number of Muslims, but that CANNOT and DOES NOT make it a Muslim state.

I agree, By shank's reasoning we could say that Chicago is a Polish city.


#115894 11/15/03 02:00 AM
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regularly, comments are made about NYC having the second largest population of irish men and women (living in cities.. (only dublin has more) and NYC is the second largest jewish city, with only Jerusalem having more, and for a while it was true of Italians, (Rome), PR, (san jose), and even Poles (and NYC is not known as a city with a large Polish population) and so on, and so on... (NYC might be only the third largest city of filipeno's.

as NYC immigrant population nexis has shifted to asia, it's becomes 'the largest city of 'hunan chinese(second to some small city in that 'state' of china), (since immigration from specific areas of asian countries might be large, but many chinese cities are larger than NYC sub-population)

certainly, the 'evident' population of muslims in US has grown -(the first in NYC were some time in 1600's!) --i judge this by 2 aspects..1) there are more mosques in NYC, and 2)(bless their hearts)muslim's in NY have gained enough political power to demand that alternate side of the street parking be suspended on their religious holidays too, (for years, alternate side of the street parking has been limited to christian 'holy days of obligation', and jewish holidays.) Now our dear muslim brethern have added another half dozen days! makes me want to say, praise allah!
(i am waiting for the buddist to get to work..., and i don't now why santeria holidays aren't observed with suspentions.. surely there are shinto holidays that are being slighted...i love differsity!)




#115895 11/15/03 08:40 AM
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Maahey

Dear oh dear. I didn't intentionally mean to tail-tweak. I apologise.

But, for instance, India is the world's largest Parsi country, and Bombay the world's largest Parsi city, even though the Parsi's are in the majority nowhere in the world. It is, as such, their homeland, and it seems a bit mean (?) to deny them that.

India is, similarly, the world's largest Sikh country, and the world's largest Jain country. No?

So although India is (if I remember my Preamble to the Constitution correctly) a Sovereign Socialist Democratic Republic, and secular to boot, is it really that incorrect to say that it is also a large Muslim country? Or is that lack of correctness simply based upon different ways of assuming that words work?

After all, by that token, India is not a Hindu country either, but you would be hard pressed to find anybody who does not, in casual use, describe it as that.

I dunno. But I apologise if I offended...

cheer

the sunshine warrior


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What on earth do religious holidays and 'suspension of alternate side of the street parking' have to do with each other?

I'm not even sure what alternate side of the street parking is? Some sort of system where car A has to park on the left, car B on the right, car C on the left and so on?

Bingley


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#115897 11/15/03 11:44 AM
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Yikes! Shanks!! I was NOT AT ALL offended!! It takes a lot more than a thread like this to offend me. Whatever gave you the notion? Am very curious to know what it was in my post that made you think I was? Was it the hysterical shudder!? My dear, I thought that would make everyone laugh! I constantly fret at this way of communication; it is sometimes rather hard to transliterate the tone of a post, isn't it? Rest assured, I wasn't.

Coming back to the issue -

The problem is in the intermixion of religion and nations, shanks. Whenever you adjectivise a religon and tag it on to a nation, the immediate implication is one of a fundamentalist state. India, like the rest of the world, has invested significant time and effort in keeping religion and governance separate and in maintatining that divide. Which is why I baulked at the loose construction. These things catch on before you know it and will sooner or later, set the vicious cycle of misrepresentation to serve petty interests rolling.

It is not mean to deny any community the right to tag on their relgion to the name of a state. Religion is a private business, is not the business of the state and I strongly feel, that any religious or sectarian group that would like that position altered, should NOT be pandered to. Nations like India that are intensely culturally diverse and that have always prided themselves on that fact, should always be on their guard to preserve unity in diversity.

Relax! oh cheerful one!


#115898 11/15/03 12:38 PM
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maahey

Huge sigh of relief from this side of the Thames.

I entirely agree with what you say about a diverse country like India doing its best to maintain its diversity and not pin to the mast the colours of any one religion. I fear, and you may know more about this than I do, that the current Hindutva movement is turning India into a less than salubrious place for followers of other religions, with Muslims in particular being targets.

I left India a little over 10 years ago, just a few years after the appalling Babri Masjid fiasco, but a few months ahead of the bombs and rioting in Bombay that set the stage for the steady decline to follow. I may be wrong about this, but my parents still live in Bombay, and as far as I can tell, the Hindutva idea has taken root as something of a fait accompli. I don't know if the majority of Indians still take the secularist stance, but if not, it will be the beginning of the end of a great tradition.

the sunshine "gloomy about India" warrior


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