Putt putt

As has become obvious, my writing here is currently sporadic compared with the nearly daily updates I used to have. I’ve been preparing for a trip for a month of intensive study in philosophy. It’s now nearly time for me to enter into this month-long immersion, so, my apologies that the old pace of writing [...]

Teachers and preachers

Below are excerpts from Jalal Al-e Ahmad’s writings, a “central figure in the construction of the Islamic authenticity discourse in Iran” (1) prior to the 1979 revolution. Al-e Ahmad was, earlier in his life, involved in and a leader of secular socialist political movements, retreating, after the 1953 CIA-backed coup that overthrew Mosaddeq’s secular [...]

Ayatollah Ahmad Jannati, the head of Iran’s Guardian Council

(First published at Elm-e Iran)
Iran’s Guardian Council, a prominent branch of the country’s political system, is often in the spotlight both inside and outside of the country, and at its head sits Ayatollah Ahmad Jannati, a man of long political experience.
This twelve member government organ has been at the centre of many announcements regarding official [...]