Decentering the Human: Moroccan Islamism and Rights

This essay draws on the language of Moroccan islamiyūn to identify an existing rights discourse that does away with both the abstract human and the empathetic person, instead centering on God and God's injunctions. I analyze ordinary language interviews with over 100 islamiyūn from Morocco'...

Full description

Saved in:
Bibliographic Details
Published in:Human rights quarterly 2017-08, Vol.39 (3), p.606-630
Main Author: Khanani, Ahmed
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Articulation
Democracy
Discourse
Empathy
Field study
Focus groups
God
Grammar
Human rights
Injunctions
Islam
Islamism
Justice
Language
Muslims
Philosophy
Secularism
Traditions
Universalism
Online Access:Get full text
Tags: Add Tag
No Tags, Be the first to tag this record!
Description
Summary:This essay draws on the language of Moroccan islamiyūn to identify an existing rights discourse that does away with both the abstract human and the empathetic person, instead centering on God and God's injunctions. I analyze ordinary language interviews with over 100 islamiyūn from Morocco's two most popular groups to argue that, to my interlocutors, rights are both from and for God. This articulation of rights fundamentally transforms rights from a secular quest for justice to aspirations that always hold both worldly and extra-worldly significance. Finally, the language of rights employed by Moroccan islamiyūn broadens the Muslim tradition by bringing God and God's Prophet to bear on a distinctly modern discourse.
ISSN:0275-0392
1085-794X
1085-794X
DOI:10.1353/hrq.2017.0034