GENERAL READING

Further Reading

Updates!

Edward Lane Craig. Philosophy, A Very short Introduction (download ebook)

The Passion of the Western Mind.

A very good article on education by Dorothy Sayers: http://www.gbt.org/text/sayers.html

Culture, Education and Public Discourse

Albert Memmi, The Colonizer and the Colonized.

Bernard Shaw, Plays Pleasant.* (Anything by Bernard Shaw is recommended. His analysis of the motives that drive socially normative behaviour is very useful. His work brings out the injustices hidden behind the overtly harmless forms of behaviour. Shaw is essential for understanding oneself as it points out the subtle and perhaps unconscious motivations driving one’s own behaviour.)

Bernard Shaw, Plays Unpleasant.*

Eric Fromm, Fear of Freedom. (One of the most insightful books on social psychology. Fromm’s thesis is that people are fearful of making independent choices, because they can’t handle freedom. Bureaucracy is a prime example. Life is lived within the narrow parameters of existing patterns. There is little experimentation, little exercise of freedom.)

George Orwell, 1984.* (A chilling account of a society in which the state (the Party) has complete control over information and censorship. Orwell offers insights on how language can be manipulated to promote official doctrines and to create beliefs and control public discourse which will destroy any chance of individual liberty and freedom. There are ample contemporary parallels.)

George Orwell, Essays.*

Jerry Mander, Four Arguments for the Elimination of Television. (Jerry Mander is one of the brilliant cultural critics of this time, in the line of critics such as Lewis Mumford and Marshall McLuhan). It is difficult to enjoy television after this book.)

Jerry Mander, In the Absence of the Sacred. (Discusses the value of older traditions and customs and the valuable knowledge that these traditions carried down the generations, but which is increasingly being wiped out because of globalization.)

Leo Tolstoy, Master and Man.* (Tolstoy was one of the greatest writers ever. Tolstoy’s short stories are more accessible than his longer novels like War and Peace.)

Leo Tolstoy, Kreutzer Sonata and other Short Stories.*

Lewis Mumford, Myth of the Megamachine: The Pentagon of Power. (He is the pioneer of criticism of technology and its adverse affects on our culture and psyche, and it is his legacy that is continued by writers like Jerry Mander and Neil Postman. His work is less accessible than the later writers on the same subject.)

Marshall McLuhan, Medium is the Message.

Michael Rosen, Breakfast at Spiro’s in Journal of Management. (The author of this article went undercover as an employee of a successful advertising firm. The article is the product of this empirical research. This article is about the various modes of behaviour and presentation at various social functions and events that tacitly endorse and consolidate social and economic relations in a corporation. A very interesting, even amusing, piece.)

Neil Postman, Amusing Ourselves to Death. (A critique of the vacuous glory of meaningless activities that the modern world has so obsessed itself with. On the top of the list is of course television.)

Neil Postman, Conscientious Objections. (Some of the best essays on cultural criticism. From the emptiness of television to the superficiality of consumerism, these essays survey aspects of our contemporary culture which are undermining our humanity.)

Neil Postman, Technopoly. (Highly readable account of how technology has influenced our judgement for the worse. Postman discusses influence on education, specifically on information has replaced understanding.)

Politics/Economics/History: Understanding the Modern world

Noam Chomsky, Understanding Power.* (www.understandingpower.com)

Interview of Noam Chomsky by Tim Sebastian (BBC)

Howard Zinn, People’s History of the United States.* (The book begins with a chapter on Columbus' shocking and merciless exploits in the American continent, killing and brutalizing natives with abandon. It goes into the details of the ruthless genocide of the natives that followed. One begins to understand the darker realities behind US political supremacy, and that its policies today are not a departure but a continuation of what it always stood for: genocide, murder, rampage, loot; all for ourselves, at any cost.)

Noam Chomsky, Manufacturing Consent. (An important book to understand the modern world of media. The argument is water tight: media corporations cannot work against their interests, and their interests are same as those of their advertisers, namely very large corporations which pretty much control everything, and thus make the wrong kind of news (sponsor wars, pollute environment, release toxins in the environment etc.). The structure of the media makes it impossible for this kind of news to come through. Most media coverage is hence quite useless.)

John Perkins, Confessions of an Economic Hit-man.*

John Ralston Saul, Voltaire’s Bastards.

John Ralston Saul, The Unconscious Civilization.*

Arundhati Rai, The Algebra of Infinite Justice.*

Howard Zinn, The Zinn Reader.

Noam Chomsky, Deterring Democracy.

Edward Said, Reflections on Exile.

Science

Richard Feynman, The Pleasure of Finding Things Out, Take the World From Another Point of View, Symmetry in Physical Law (Youtube)

Michael Talbot, Mysticism and the New Physics.

Richard Feynmann, Surely you’re joking, Mr. Feynman! Adventures of a curious character.

Peter Godfry-Smith, Theory and Reality.

Philip Johnson’s webpage on Science and Religion. (Contains interesting articles on Darwinism.)

Philip Johnson, Nihilism and the End of Law.

Philosophy & Ethics

Bertrand Russell, The Problems of Philosophy.*

Famous Debate on radio between Bertrand Russell and Fr. Copleston (1948)

Philip Johnson, Reason in the Balance.

Patrick Glynn, God the Evidence: Reconciliation of Faith and Reason in the post-Secular World.

J. P Moreland, Scaling the Secular City.

Edward Lane Craig, God? (A simple and easy to follow debate between Craig and an atheist.)

Arthur Leff, Unspeakable Ethics, Unnatural Law (On whether morality is possible without God.)

Edward Lane Craig, The Indispensability of Theological-Metaethical Foundations of Morality.

Philip Johnson. Darwin on Trial. (One of the finest critiques of evolution.)

Philip Johnson. Reason in the Balance. (Muslim students in the west should definitely read this work. The book helps us understand that contrary to the popular conception of reason = science is problematic. There are many more aspects which need to be considered. A very exciting work, and important for modern theological discourse.)

Modernity

Rene Guenon, Reign of Quantity and the Crisis of Times.*

Seyyed Hossein Nasr, A Young Muslim’s Guide to the Modern World.*

Seyyed Naquib al-Attas, Islam and Secularism.*

Islam

Movements from the Sunni Tradition (A short introduction to the major deviant movements from Sunni Tradition. Also contains a short bibliography of books on Islam.)

William Chittick, Vision of Islam.* (William Chittick is a perennialist. See “Movements from the Sunni Tradition” above for details. Aside from the perennialism that mars certain sections of this book, it is a very good introduction to Traditional Islam.)

Roger de Pasquier (trans. T. J. Winter), Unveiling Islam.* (An accurate introduction to Islam-very well written. A rare achievement.)

http://www.masud.co.uk (There are many good articles on this website. See especially those by Nuh Ha Mim Keller and Abdul Hakim Murad, including: The Place of Tassawwuf in Traditional Islam, Islamic Spirituality: The Forgotten Revolution, Understanding the Four Maddhabs, The Obligation of Following the Four Maddhabs)

Imam al-Ghazali (trans. T. J. Winter). Remembrance of Death and After-life.

Imam al-Ghazali (trans. T. J. Winter). Breaking the Two Desires.

Imam al-Ghazali. Deliverance from Error (al-Ghazali’s journey from doubt to guidance)

Nuh Keller, Reliance of the Traveller. (A translation of a classic manual of Islam of the Shafi’ school (originally written by Seyyed Naqib al-Misri). Contains many other books on holding the tongue, enormities, and a detailed section on biographies of Islamic scholars. This is an indispensable work in English.)

Biography

Howard Zinn, You can’t be neutral on a moving train.

Alex Haley, The autobiography of Malcolm X.*

Benjamin Franklin, The autobiography.

Upton Sinclair, The autobiography.

Paul Feyerabend, Killing Time. (Insights into the intellectual culture of 20th century.)

Intellectual History

Charles van Doren, History of Knowledge.

Richard Tarnas, The Passion of the Western Mind.

· Available from local bookstores.

Available Online

Bohm’s Dialgoue (a collection of articles and papers on the dialogue techniques developed by the physicist David Bohm).