Jallal Al-e-Ahmad, an Iranian intellectual, coined the term gharbzadegi, or Westoxification – the obsession with popular Western culture. In lecture, we learned about Westoxificiation in the context of the Iranian Revolution. The shah, who was backed by The United States, was overthrown by an anti-Western theocracy led by Ayatollah Khomeini. In his chapter on “Islam in Contemporary Iran,” Buchman explains how “Islam [played] an important ideological role” in the Iranian Revolution (p. 89). The negative connotation of the word Westoxification underlines how Western culture seems to be at odds with traditional Islamic values.

For this week’s blog post I decided to create a video reflecting this Westoxifcation. I downloaded a popular recitation of the adhan, the Islamic Call to Prayer. The adhan is integral to the soundscape around any mosque, as it is called from the mosque five times a day to signal mandatory prayer. The adhan is a key staple in Islamic practices. While the audience hears the traditional call to prayer, I chose to show a brief slideshow of pictures with American magazine headlines. The dichotomy of holy sounds and racy headlines highlights the tension profiled by Westoxification. Buchman poses an interesting question: “is Islam compatible with the modern world” (p. 99)?  Being exposed to the stark contrast of traditional Islamic sounds and images of Western culture, one might think that it’s impossible for the two to coexist.

However, I think the biggest problem is this politicization of Islam – the idea that it is Islam versus modernity. One can see this politicization in the case study of the Iranian revolution. Buchman puts it well that “Islam is a religion of compassion…[but] the [new] regime makes it a religion of destruction” (p. 99). Focusing on the care and beauty of Islam as a religion helps to negate the violent politicization of Islam in other contexts. But the question still remains: how can traditional Islamic values be incorporated with the growing modern global culture that seems to be at odds with Islamic values? Must one culture have to conform more than the other? Compassionate learning helps start the conversation between how two seemingly conflicting cultures can coexist.