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Islam in America: Adventures in Neo-Orientalism

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  09 March 2016

Denise A. Spellberg*
Affiliation:
The University of Texas at Austin

Extract

In July of 2006, I published an article in the journal Eighteenth Century Studies that I trust none of you ever read. Why should you? Eighteenth-Century Studies is not a venerable site for the study of the Middle East or Islam. However, it was the journal where I first considered a question in early American history that has since gained some currency in contemporary American political discourse. The question: “Could a Muslim be president?”

Type
Special Section: On Orientalism at Thirty
Copyright
Copyright © Middle East Studies Association of North America 2009

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References

End Notes

1 I remain grateful to former MESA president Mervat Hatem for her invitation to participate on this plenary. For a more detailed account of this debate, see Spellberg, Denise A., “Could a Muslim Be President? An Eighteenth-Century Constitutional Debate,” Eighteenth-Century Studies, 39 (2006), pp. 485506CrossRefGoogle Scholar. My thanks go to Julia Simon, the journal’s editor, who granted permission for me to re-use formulations initially published therein.

2 Stirman, Marcia, “Why I’m a Republican,” Alamogordo Daily News, October 21,2008. http://www.alamogordonews.com/ci_10772782?source=most_viewed (accessed October 25, 2008)Google Scholar.

3 Sinno, Abdulkader H., “Muslim Underrepresentation in American Politics,” pp. 6995 in Sinno, Abdulkader H., ed., Muslims in Western Politics (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2009), p. 94Google Scholar, n. 31.

4 How the News Media Covered Religion in the General Election: Obama Gets Most Coverage, Much of It on False Rumor He Is a Muslim,” http://pewforum.org/docs?DOCID=372 (accessed November 20, 2008)Google Scholar.

5 Said, Edward W., Orientalism (New York: Vintage Books, 1978), p. 3.Google Scholar

6 Scribner, R.W., For the Sake of the Simple Folk: Popular Propaganda for the German Reformation (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1994), pp. 1823Google Scholar, plates 150–2; Matar, Nabil, Islam in Britain, 1558–1685 (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1998), pp. 15383.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

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8 See Allison, Robert J., The Crescent Obscured: The United States and the Muslim World, 1776–1815 (New York: Oxford University Press, 1995), pp. 35, 579.Google Scholar

9 Hayes, Kevin J., “How Thomas Jefferson Read the Qur’an,” Early American Literature 39 (2004), pp. 24761.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

10 Hutson, James H., ed., The Founders on Religion: A Book of Quotations (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2005), p. 116.Google Scholar

11 Ford, Paul Leicester, ed., The Writings of Thomas Jefferson 10 vols. (New York: The Knickerbocker Press, 1893), vol. 2, p.103Google Scholar; Locke, John, Epistola de Tolerantia, A Letter on Toleration, ed. Klibansky, Raymond, trans. Gough, J.W. (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1968), p.145.Google Scholar

12 Ford, , Writings, vol. 2, p.238.Google Scholar

13 Ford, , Writings, vol. 1, p. 62Google Scholar; Hayes, ,”Thomas Jefferson,” pp. 2589Google Scholar; Allison, , Crescent, pp. 67.Google Scholar

14 Amar, Akhil Reed, America’s Constitution: A Biography (New York: Random house, 2005), p. 166.Google Scholar

15 Elliot, Jonathan, ed., The Debates in the Several State Conventions on the Adoption of the Federal Constitution, as Recommended by the General Convention at Philadelphia, in 1787, 5 vols. (Philadelphia: J.B. Lippincott Company, 1888), vol. 4, p. 192Google Scholar. The entire debate is contained in the fourth volume, pp. 191–215, and can be accessed online at the Library of Congress website http://memory.loc.gov/ammem/amlaw/lwed.html.

16 Whichard, Willis P., Justice James Iredell (Durham, North Carolina: Carolina Academic Press, 2000), p. 45.Google Scholar

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22 Orth, John V., ed., The North Carolina State Constitution: A Reference Guide (Westport, Connecticut: Greenwood Press, 1993), p. 4.Google Scholar

23 Spellberg, , “Could a Muslim Be President?” p. 499.Google Scholar

24 Elliot, , Debates, vol. 4, p. 198.Google Scholar

25 Borden, Morton, Jews, Turks, and Infidels (Chapel Hill, North Carolina: University of North Carolina Press, 1984), p. 6.Google Scholar

26 Elliot, , Debates, vol. 4, pp. 1989.Google Scholar

27 Elliot, , Debates, vol. 4, pp. 1989.Google Scholar

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29 Elliot, , Debates, vol. 4, p. 215.Google Scholar

30 How the News Media Covered Religion in the General Election: Obama Gets Most Coverage, Much of It on False Rumor He Is a Muslim,” http://pewforum.org/docs?DOCID=372 (accessed November 20, 2008)Google Scholar. See also Sinno, , Muslims in Western Politics, pp. 867.Google Scholar

32 Anonymous email sent to author, February 12, 2008, “Who Is Barack Obama?”

33 Allison, , Crescent, p. 40.Google Scholar

34 Perfect Conclusion: First Muslim Congressman Replies by Borrowing Some Pages—the Koran—from Jefferson,” The Houston Chronicle, January 3, 2007Google Scholar; Sinno, , Muslims in Western Politics, pp. 879.Google Scholar