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Sajida S. Alvi (born 1941) is an academic of Pakistani origin in Canada. She is a historian of Islam in South Asia and was the inaugural appointment to the chair in Urdu Language and Culture at the Institute of Islamic Studies from September 1987 until her retirement in June 2010. [1]
Alvi moved to Canada in January 1967 as a Post-doctoral Fellow at the University of Toronto. She accepted a teaching position at the Institute of Islamic Studies, McGill University, Montreal, in 1972; she taught there for five years and then moved to the University of Minnesota in 1977. After receiving tenure and promotion at the University of Minnesota, she returned to McGill University in 1986.
She is the first appointee to an endowed Chair in Urdu Language and Culture (funded by the Government of Pakistan, Department of Multiculturalism, Government of Canada and McGill University), and is a Professor of Indo-Islamic History at McGill University.
Alvi has lectured in Canada and the United States on Islam, aspects of Islamic civilization, and women's issues, and works with the Canadian Council of Muslim Women regarding women's issues. She also worked various Boards of Education in Ontario to support and enhance the instruction of heritage languages programs with special reference to Urdu with funding from the Department of Multiculturalism. [2]
Amongst Sajida Alvi's contributions her efforts to make Mughal sources more accessible has won her scholastic acclaim; [3] these include her critical edition of Aurangzeb's history, Mir’at al-‘Alam: History of Emperor Awangzeb Alamgir (2 vols); and her translation and edition of a mirror for princes from the reign of the Mughal emperor Jahangir Advice on the Art of Governance: An Indo-Islamic Mirror for Princes (Mau‘izah-i Jahangiri) of Muhammad Baqir Najm-i Sani.
She has contributed chapters and brief notes to the Encyclopaedia of Islam, Encyclopædia Iranica, The Muslim Almanac: A Reference Work on the History, Faith, Culture, and People of Islam, Encyclopaedia of the Modern Islamic World, and Encyclopaedia of Religion. Her current two-volume research project in progress is: “Khanqah and Madrasah and Chishtiyya Sufis: Agents of Social Change and Spiritual Rejuvenation in the British Punjab (1750-1850).”
She directed and edited a pioneering Urdu Instructional Materials Development Project. With the team of 10 members and 5 Boards of Education in Ontario Province, Alvi developed first set of books for junior and senior kindergarten and grade one, Urdu for Children: Book One (4 volumes plus set of two audiocassettes) in 1997. The second set of books in the series for grades two and three, Urdu for Children: Book Two (7 volumes and a set of two CDs) was published in October 2004. This project was sponsored and funded by the Canadian Government, and Urdu texts and related materials were published by the McGill-Queen’s University Press.
On the hijab, [4] Alvi undertook another major project at the request of the Canadian Council of Muslim Women, and completed it in collaboration with two colleagues from Concordia University as co-editors and contributors along with some graduate students. It culminated in the publication of Muslim Veil in North America: Issues and Debates in 2003.
Nur-ud-Din Muhammad Salim, known by his imperial name Jahangir, was the fourth Mughal Emperor, who ruled from 1605 until his death in 1627. He was the third and only surviving son of Akbar and his chief empress, Mariam-uz-Zamani, born to them in the year 1569. He was named after the Indian Sufi saint, Salim Chishti.
Mughal architecture is the type of Indo-Islamic architecture developed by the Mughals in the 16th, 17th and 18th centuries throughout the ever-changing extent of their empire in the Indian subcontinent. It developed from the architectural styles of earlier Muslim dynasties in India and from Iranian and Central Asian architectural traditions, particularly Timurid architecture. It also further incorporated and syncretized influences from wider Indian architecture, especially during the reign of Akbar. Mughal buildings have a uniform pattern of structure and character, including large bulbous domes, slender minarets at the corners, massive halls, large vaulted gateways, and delicate ornamentation; examples of the style can be found in modern-day Afghanistan, Bangladesh, India and Pakistan.
Sadat e-Bara sometimes pronounced Sadaat-e-Bahara, are a tribe of Indian Muslim Sayyids, originally Elite or Noble Sayyid families situated in the Muzaffarnagar district of Uttar Pradesh in India. This community had considerable influence during the reign of the Mughal Empire. Its members were also found in Karnal District and Haryana, Gujarat & Karnataka, Maharashtra state in India.Some of the members of this community have migrated to Pakistan after independence and have settled in Karachi, Khairpur State in Sind and Lahore. Sadat e Bara or Sayads of Barha or Saadat-e-Barha Saadat Bara/Saiyids of Barha
The Qadiriyya are members of the Sunni Qadiri tariqa. The tariqa got its name from Abdul Qadir Gilani, who was a Hanbali scholar from Gilan, Iran. The order relies strongly upon adherence to the fundamentals of Sunni Islamic law.
Aḥmad al-Fārūqī al-Sirhindī, also known as Imam Rabbani, was an Indian Islamic scholar, Hanafi jurist, and member of the Naqshbandī Sufi order. He has been described by some followers as a Mujaddid, meaning a “reviver", for his work in rejuvenating Islam and opposing the newly made religion of Din-i Ilahi and other problematic opinions of Mughal emperor Akbar. While early South Asian scholarship credited him for contributing to conservative trends in Indian Islam, more recent works, notably by ter Haar, Friedman, and Buehler, have pointed to Sirhindi's significant contributions to Sufi epistemology and practices.
Farrukh Beg, also known as Farrukh Husayn, was a Persian miniature painter, who spent a bulk of his career in Safavid Iran and Mughal India, praised by Mughal Emperor Jahangir as “unrivaled in the age.”
Muhammad Saleh Kamboh Lahori was a noted Mughal calligraphist and official biographer of Emperor Shah Jahan and the teacher of Mughal Emperor Aurangzeb. Though a widely read person, little is known of the life of Muhammad Saleh Kamboh other than the works he composed. He was son of Mir Abdu-lla, Mushkin Kalam, whose title shows him to also have been a fine writer. He is believed to be younger brother of Inayat-Allah Kamboh and worked as a Shahi Dewan (Minister) with the governor of Lahore. He held the title of Sipahsalar.
Suroosh Alvi is a Canadian journalist and filmmaker. He is the co-founder of Vice Media, a digital media and broadcasting brand that operates in more than 50 countries. Alvi is a travelled journalist and an executive producer of film, covering youth culture, news, and music globally. He has hosted and produced documentaries investigating controversial issues, armed conflicts, movements, and subcultures, including conflict minerals in the Democratic Republic of the Congo, the Iraq War, the takeover of Gaza by Hamas in the Israeli–Palestinian conflict, and the rise of the Pakistani Taliban and global terrorism.
The McGill University Institute of Islamic Studies and the Islamic Studies Library were established in 1952 by Wilfred Cantwell Smith, and since 1983 both have been housed in Morrice Hall on McGill's campus in downtown Montreal, Quebec. McGill's institute is the first institute of Islamic studies in North America and hosts 14 full-time professors, 5 visiting positions and 5 professors emeritus.
Sufism has a history in India evolving for over 1,000 years. The presence of Sufism has been a leading entity increasing the reaches of Islam throughout South Asia. Following the entrance of Islam in the early 8th century, Sufi mystic traditions became more visible during the 10th and 11th centuries of the Delhi Sultanate and after it to the rest of India. A conglomeration of four chronologically separate dynasties, the early Delhi Sultanate consisted of rulers from Turkic and Afghan lands. This Persian influence flooded South Asia with Islam, Sufi thought, syncretic values, literature, education, and entertainment that has created an enduring impact on the presence of Islam in India today. Sufi preachers, merchants and missionaries also settled in coastal Gujarat through maritime voyages and trade.
Chausath Khamba, also spelled Chaunsath Khamba, is a tomb built during 1623–24. It is located in Nizamuddin precincts of Sufi Muslim shrines and tombs in New Delhi, India. The name means "64 pillars" in Urdu and Hindi. It was built by Mirza Aziz Koka, son of Ataga Khan, as a mausoleum for himself, at the time when Mughal Emperor Jahangir ruled from Delhi. Mirza Aziz Koka had served several times as Jahangir’s Governor of Gujarat before he died in Gujarat.
Banuri is the family name of Sayyids from the family of the Islamic prophet, Muhammad, being his direct descendants and deriving lineage through Sheikh Sayyid Adam Banuri from the Pakhtun region of Afghanistan including the regions of Kohat, Peshawar, Malakand and Swat. His lineage traces back to Imam Musa ibn Ja'far al-Kadhim from the family of Muhammad.
Islam in Uttar Pradesh is the second largest religion in the state with 38,483,967 adherents in 2011, forming 19.26% of the total population. Muslims of Uttar Pradesh have also been referred to as Hindustani Musalman. They do not form a unified ethnic community, but are differentiated by sectarian and Baradari divisions, as well as by language and geography. Nevertheless, the community shares some unifying cultural factors. Uttar Pradesh has more Muslims than any Muslim-majority country in the world except Indonesia, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Nigeria, Egypt, Iran and Turkey.
Begum is a female title which is also used in Mirza families/lineages, Daughter of Beg or Wife of Beg, a given name and surname.
Guru Arjan was the first of the two Gurus martyred in the Sikh faith and the fifth of the ten total Sikh Gurus. He compiled the first official edition of the Sikh scripture called the Adi Granth, which later expanded into the Guru Granth Sahib.
Native speakers of Urdu are spread across South Asia. The vast majority of them are Muslims of the Hindi–Urdu Belt of northern India, followed by the Deccani people of the Deccan plateau in south-central India, the Muhajir people of Pakistan, Muslims in the Terai of Nepal, and the Biharis and Dhakaiyas of Old Dhaka in Bangladesh. The historical centres of Urdu speakers include Delhi and Lucknow, as well as the Deccan, and in the modern era, Karachi. Another defunct variety of the language was historically spoken in Lahore for centuries before the name "Urdu" first began to appear. However, little is known about this defunct Lahori variety as it has not been spoken for centuries.
Shaikh Farid Bukhari, also known by the title Murtaza Khan, was a leading Mughal noble during the reign of the Mughal emperors Akbar and Jahangir. He served as governor of Gujarat and later of Punjab. He was also well known as an architectural patron in Mughal India, and founded the city of Faridabad in modern-day Haryana, India.
Shaykh 'Ali Shīr al-Ḥanafī al-Bangālī, or simply Ali Sher Bengali, was a 16th-century Bengali author, teacher and Sufi pir of the Shattari order. He was one of the three khalifahs (successors) of Muhammad Ghawth Shattari.
Mufti Yūsuf Bangālī was a 16th-century Sufi pir of the Shattari order. He was a prominent teacher during the reign of the Farooqui dynasty and Mughal emperor Akbar.
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