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Quote by Talal Asad

“To behave "humanely" it is perfectly possible to do without the notion of "humanity."”

Author

Talal Asad is a renowned anthropologist born in 1933. His research focuses on culture, religion, and issues of national identity, offering profound insights into social and cultural changes in the context of postcolonialism and globalization. more

“Certainly in order to understand the natural world one needs clarity, logic, and the capacity for theory building. But that understanding tends to improve because and to the extent that it is provisional, hypothetical, when it looks for disconfirmation in the particular rather than final proof as a universal.”

World Needs Looks Order Understanding Natural Building Particular Theory Capacity Logic Universal Finals Proof Clarity Natural World Hypothetical

Author:Talal Asad

“The propensity to intellectualize is itself both essential and dangerous. I think in our modern world we are much more aware of its essential character than of its dangers, and that is why I think of it as being an expression of transcendence.”

Thinking World Character Modern Dangerous Danger Expression Essentials Modern World Transcendence Propensity

Author:Talal Asad

“I do not criticize religion as such, but I criticize the concept and the definition of "religion" - as I said in Genealogies.”

Said Concepts Definitions Criticize Genealogy

Author:Talal Asad

“I'm not criticizing how people experience what they might call spirituality. I am interested in looking critically at something else - at how people use their language to articulate theories about something they call religion, to say, for example, that "in Islam religion and politics necessarily go together," or to insist that "violence has no place in religion," to universalize it.”

People Use Might Together Spirituality Language Violence Example Theory Islam Criticize Religion And Politics

Author:Talal Asad

“I think the approach to Islam as a tradition is helpful. Tradition helps us to focus on questions about authority and temporality, and about the language used in relation to the two.”

Thinking Two Helping Used Language Focus Authority Approach Tradition Relation Islam Helpful Temporality

Author:Talal Asad

“I think we need to think about Islamic tradition as a way of asking questions that cut across (and transgress) the assumptions of a purely secular world in which we already know how things stand for individual subjects as well as for societies.”

Thinking Knows World Way Needs Wells Individual Know How Cutting Subjects Tradition Asking Assumption Islamic Secular Asking Questions

Author:Talal Asad

“Tradition is not something a man can learn; not a thread he picks up when he feels like it; any more than a man can choose his own ancestors. Someone lacking a tradition who would like to have one is like a man unhappily in love.”

Men Feels Picks Tradition Ancestor Thread Lacking

Author:Talal Asad

“Tradition is an aspiration to connect the Self with the Other. One "internalizes" the Other as one acquires a sense of what one's own tradition is, what one belongs to and what gives valid shape to one's life.”

Giving Self Shapes Tradition Aspiration Acquire

Author:Talal Asad

“You're always under the microscope, and you don't know which mission you're going to get. It's a surprise.”

Knows Surprise Missions Microscopes

Author:Julie Payette

“Definitely you don't become famous by doing something bad; that's a professional death sentence.”

Sentences Death Sentence

Author:Julie Payette

Quote by Talal Asad

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