The task confronting the person who seeks to survey the current state of the literature dealing with Islam as a religion is both enormous and complex. Since Muslims have traditionally considered themselves to be a religious commonwealth whose very identity is fixed by a shared religious commitment, it follows that virtually every writing on any subject whatsoever having to do with Muslims might be considered to fall within the field of religion. Even if one restricts his attention, as we propose to do here, to a more narrow view of religion, the task is still formidable. Muslims have been no less prolific than other major religious communities in producing dissident opinions from within their own fold. The history of Islamic sects, each with its own peculiar thought system and religious practice, is a field of study in itself and one that might well challenge the most energetic scholar. Far from being monolithic, as many of the scholarly cliches about Islam presuppose (e.g. Islam is a religion of Law, Islam is a religion of the Book, etc.), the religious experience of Muslims is diverse and multiform, defying the most sophisticated attempts to reduce it to order and system. No informed approach to the religiousness of Muslims can deal solely with a narrowly marked out “normative Islam”. The deviations from the norm are also part of the reality of historic Islamic experience and cannot be set aside in favor of what one may prefer as religiously or conceptually pure. It quickly becomes clear to the perceptive inquirer that the meaning of Islam is an historical phenomenon cannot be stated in terms of a unified doctrinal system, a universally accepted set of rites, or common institutions.

Ottoman history is the history of the Ottoman Empire. It may seem ridiculous to state so self-evident a proposition; but is is put forth here to indicate the complexities in the study of Ottoman history. For the Ottoman Empire still, at the end of the eighteenth century, included the territories of what are now nineteen independent countries. The lands of twelve future independent countries were yet within the Ottoman borders in 1914 at the start of the war which sounded the death-knell of the sprawling conglomerate. Of course some of these areas were only nominally or very loosely under the control of the Istanbul government. Yet they were still within the empire, and created problems for it, if nothing else.

Commonly, the course in medieval Middle Eastern history serves many purposes. Not only must it detail the changes that transformed the Middle East from the seventh thru the eighteenth centuries but also it should introduce and analyze the rich diversity of pre-modern Islamic society, institutions, politics, and culture. Thus, considerable variation exists in historical treatments of the medieval Middle East. Nevertheless, at present most of these courses are chronological surveys which tend to emphasize political history, although a large number of offerings are topically arranged and give separate attention to many of the several aspects of traditional Middle Eastern civilization and institutions. Actually, the differences between these two orientations are mainly ones of emphasis. For instance, few topically arranged courses ignore the chronological factor in analyzing change.

On May 22, 1966, the eve of the first Tunisian census since independence, President Habib Bourguiba expressed as follows the objectives and uses of this census:

The need for population data has undoubtedly provided an impetus for the collection of such data as well as for demographic research not only in Tunisia but also in other Middle Eastern countries. In recent years, an added impetus for demographic research has been the realization that, in some of these countries, population growth may be threatening social and economic development.

The syllabi on modern Middle Eastern history courses submitted by members of MESA were, not unnaturally, varied in general approach, in time span and in area covered. There were certain common elements, however, within the framework of which this syllabus has largely remained. Four such congruences were most important:

1. 1) the use of a chronological rather than a topical or problems approach in teaching the history of the modern Middle East (while particular topics or problems were often isolated within a particular time period, all of the syllabi submitted used a chronological framework);

2. 2) a general tendency to begin with a brief survey of the medieval history of the Middle East before beginning intensive treatment at the beginning of the nineteenth century;

3. 3) an emphasis on internal development and modernization rather than on political-diplomatic history;

4. 4) the frequent use of reading assignments (a chapter from one work, a number of pages from another) from a variety of semi-specialized or monographic works rather than reliance on one or more texts or readers.

It is, perhaps, not very useful to generalize about the “climate” for research in Morocco, which quite obviously varies according to the type of research to be undertaken, and the general situation in the country or in the government agency with which the researcher may wish to work. What can be said is that no topic is a priori off-limits, and that, for the time being at least, the visiting scholar probably has a better chance to conduct his research successfully in Morocco than in most of the other Arab countries.

The study of Middle Eastern politics at the college level in the United States is fraught with difficulties for both instructor and student alike. For the student, the subject is almost always entirely unfamiliar and too full of details to be grasped let alone mastered in one term or semester. Instability and political turmoil in the area add to the complicated picture. The instructor’s task is mainly to help the student overcome these difficulties. He has to provide adequate organization of the disparate material and relate it to the frame of mind the student already has about politics.

Nearly every current review of research conditions in the Third World (including our first item in this series, MESA Bulletin, Vol. 1, No. 2) now begins with a long exposition of the need to respect local culture and attitudes toward research itself, not only in the name of effectiveness but as part of a social equation between studied and studier. We are far beyond the old era of Third World research—at least as it was stereotypically conceived—of paternalistic scientists studying “quaint” folkways without regard to the subjects’ needs, feelings, or wishes. We may well wonder how accurate this stereotype was, if only on the basis of effectiveness, but in any case the pendulum has swung toward discretion as the better part of valor.