PRAISE FOR MEDIATING ISLAM
Shows that media practice in Muslim societies cannot be reduced to an ideological framework or structural explanation [but] is a complex entanglement between ideology, political economy, and personal reflection on religious values.
Fadjar I. Thufail, Research Center for Regional Resources of the Indonesian Institute of Sciences
Simultaneously intimate and sweeping in its scope, Mediating Islam provides us with portraits of a range of Muslim journalists, from conservative scripturalists to pluralist cosmopolitans. The result is a must-read book, not just for scholars of journalism, but for anyone interested in media, democracy, and religion in modern Southeast Asia and the broader Muslim world.
Robert W. Hefner, Pardee School of Global Studies, Boston University
With this book, Steele makes a richly important contribution to the study of the international news media and moves us past stale thinking that the principles of professional journalism are uniquely Western. This is a critical read for anyone trying to understand how truth via Islamic news media in Indonesia and Malaysia is determined and projected, especially for diplomats and aid professionals who want to engage Muslim journalists and intellectuals in a more meaningful way.
Katherine Brown, Center for Strategic and International Studies, Georgetown University
Mediating Islam examines the values [the journalists] embrace and the motivations, particularly the religious ones, that guide their professional work. A very worthwhile subject.
David T. Hill, professor emeritus of Southeast Asian studies, Asian Research Centre, Murdoch University
This book represents an important advance in de-Westernizing media studies. Janet Steele investigates how Muslim journalists in Indonesia and Malaysia apply their religious principles. Rejecting univocal, monolithic notions of religion, the book introduces us to a rich tapestry of media organizations and practitioners, showing how Islam has inspired a wide range of ideological stances and professional role perceptions. For journalism studies, the book invites a rethink of secular liberalism as the only foundation for journalisms that value independence, truth, and justice.
Cherian George, author of Hate Spin: The Manufacture of Religious Offense and Its Threat to Democracy
Steele has written a readable, insightful book about how journalists in Indonesia and Malaysia define professional identity and practice. The analysis is packed with analytical gems and original data that show how journalistic norms conventionally identified with Western journalism, such as truth and justice, are reinterpreted in the context of Islamic culture. With the keen eye of a historian and the sharpness of a longtime scholar of the region, Steele offers important lessons for those interested in understanding the cultures of professional journalism in a globalized world. The book shakes off stereotypes and invites us to study the complex nexus between religiosity and journalism.
Silvio Waisbord, professor of media and public affairs, George Washington University
CRITICAL DIALOGUES IN SOUTHEAST ASIAN STUDIES
Charles Keyes, Vicente Rafael, and Laurie J. Sears, Series Editors
CRITICAL DIALOGUES IN SOUTHEAST ASIAN STUDIES
This series offers perspectives in Southeast Asian Studies that stem from reconsideration of the relationships among scholars, texts, archives, field sites, and subject matter. Volumes in the series feature inquiries into historiography, critical ethnography, colonialism and postcolonialism, nationalism and ethnicity, gender and sexuality, science and technology, politics and society, and literature, drama, and film. A common vision of the series is a belief that area studies scholarship sheds light on shifting contexts and contests over forms of knowing and modes of action that inform cultural politics and shape histories of modernity.
Imagined Ancestries of Vietnamese Communism: Ton Duc Thang and the Politics of History and Memory, by Christoph Giebel
Beginning to Remember: The Past in the Indonesian Present, edited by Mary S. Zurbuchen
Seditious Histories: Contesting Thai and Southeast Asian Pasts, by Craig J. Reynolds
Knowing Southeast Asian Subjects, edited by Laurie J. Sears
Making Fields of Merit: Buddhist Female Ascetics and Gendered Orders in Thailand, by Monica Lindberg Falk
Love, Passion, and Patriotism: Sexuality and the Philippine Propaganda Movement, 18821892, by Raquel A. G. Reyes
Gathering Leaves and Lifting Words: Histories of Buddhist Monastic Education in Laos and Thailand, by Justin Thomas McDaniel
The Ironies of Freedom: Sex, Culture, and Neoliberal Governance in Vietnam, by Thu-hng Nguyn-v
Submitting to God: Women and Islam in Urban Malaysia, by Sylva Frisk
No Concessions: The Life of Yap Thiam Hien, Indonesian Human Rights Lawyer, by Daniel S. Lev
The Buddha on Meccas Verandah: Encounters, Mobilities, and Histories along the Malaysian-Thai Border, by Irving Chan Johnson
Dreaming of Money in Ho Chi Minh City, by Allison Truitt
Mapping Chinese Rangoon: Place and Nation among the Sino-Burmese, by Jayde Lin Roberts
The New Way: Protestantism and the Hmong in Vietnam, by Tm T. T. Ng
Imperial Bandits: Outlaws and Rebels in the China-Vietnam Borderlands, by Bradley Camp Davis
Living Sharia: Law and Practice in Malaysia, by Timothy P. Daniels
Mediating Islam: Cosmopolitan Journalisms in Muslim Southeast Asia, by Janet Steele
Mediating Islam is published with the assistance of a grant from the Charles and Jane Keyes Endowment for Books on Southeast Asia, established through the generosity of Charles and Jane Keyes.
This book is also supported by a grant from the Donald R. Ellegood International Publications Endowment.
Copyright 2018 by the University of Washington Press
Printed and bound in the United States of America
Composed in Minion, typeface designed by Robert Slimbach
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All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording, or any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.
UNIVERSITY OF WASHINGTON PRESS
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LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING-IN-PUBLICATION DATA
Names: Steele, Janet E., author.
Title: Mediating Islam : cosmopolitan journalisms in Muslim Southeast Asia / Janet Steele.
Description: Seattle : University of Washington Press, [2018] | Includes bibliographical references and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2017026660 (print) | LCCN 2017027213 (ebook) | ISBN 9780295742977 (ebook) | ISBN 9780295742953 (hardcover : alk. paper) | ISBN 9780295742960 (pbk. : alk. paper)
Subjects: LCSH: Islamic pressSoutheast Asia. | Religious newspapers and periodicalsSoutheast Asia. | JournalismSoutheast Asia.
Classification: LCC PN5449.A789 (ebook) | LCC PN5449.A789 S74 2018 (print) | DDC 079.59088/297dc23