POLS 078. Iran, Islam, and the Last Great Revolution

Described as the site of the last great revolution of the Modern Era, this course explores Iran's recent political history as the expression of an "authentic" modernity, conceived by Iranians and articulated in local terms, both Islamic and pre-Islamic. Rather than treat the post-revolutionary politics of the Islamic Republic as a break with modernity or "a force spinning Iran back thirteen centuries in time," the course examines continuities between the policies of the current regime and more than 200 years of effort in Iran, stretching back to the Qajar and Pahlavi monarchies, to reconcile European (and later, North American) modernity to Iranian culture and history. Special attention is given to ideology and political Islam, nationalism, the educational system, and the concepts of post-Islamism and social non-movements, particularly since the Green Movement and Arab Spring. The course places Iranian encounters with modernity into comparative perspective by looking at similar processes taking place in countries like Egypt and Turkey, and in Latin America.
Social sciences.
1 credit.
Eligible for ISLM
Catalog chapter: Political Science
Department website: http://www.swarthmore.edu/political-science

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