Document Type : Research Article (Political Thought)

Authors

• Sayyed Yasem Gourabi ¹
• Hamid Nassaj ²

¹ Assistant Professor, Faculty of Political Science, Payam Noor University of Hamedan, Hamedan, Iran

² Associate Professor of Political Science, University of Isfahan, Isfahan, Iran

Abstract

In the present paper, “Self” and “other” and their relation have been questioned. 7 types of political confrontation between self and other and, in a wider scope, between “our” culture and “their” culture are perceivable: conquest, conversion, assimilation and acculturation, partial assimilation: cultural borrowing, liberalism, conflict, and dialogical engagement. The first six were dominant in political history of humankind. But the last type is the only appreciated one that provides the path of development and progress in the shadow of peace and security.
Findings of this article show that although the dialogical engagement is not the dominant type, there are some prominent and obvious cases in the Islamic heritage. Scientific contestation of Imam Sadeq and Imam Reza (PBUT), the believers of other religions and even atheists as well as the encounter of Abū al-Rayhān Muhammad ibn Ahmad al-Bīrūnī and Indians in his everlasting book, India are examples of dialogical engagement.

Keywords

• Self and Other
• Otherness
• Islamic Tradition
• Islamic Heritage
• Dialogue
• Post-colonialism