Freitag, Ulrike

At about 20 years of age she studied Arabic in Damascus. At 29 she took her PhD and took up a university teaching position in London. At 40 she habilitated (i.e. qualified as a lecturer) and now, age 44, she runs the Centre for Modern Oriental Studies (Zentrum Moderner Orient or ZMO for short) in Berlin, the only research institute in Germany devoted to an interdisciplinary and comparative study of the Middle East, Africa, and South and Southeast Asia from an historical perspective. In the meantime she has also married, had two children and moved house several times. So what’s next?

Professor Ulrike Freitag hails from Freiburg, Germany, and has had an international career. As a young woman she travelled through Tunisia and attended a language course in Egypt – she now has a perfect command of Arabic and Turkish. She went on to do research in Singapore and Java, London, Munich and finally Bonn, where she earned the title of professor of Islamic studies.

Back in 1982, when she made up her mind to go in for Islamic studies, history and modern German literature in Freiburg, she knew she’d have to spend time in an Islamic country at some point – no easy decision for a woman. A one-year scholarship from the German Academic Exchange Service (DAAD) enabled her to study Arabic and history at Damascus University in Syria. That was 1984/’85: the Middle East was embroiled in the first War in the Gulf and Syrian president Hafiz al-Assad was ruthlessly cracking down on the Muslim Brotherhood. That was more than enough to dispel any starry-eyed notions of the Arab world. Says Ulrike Freitag: “I studied there, I love that city, but that doesn’t mean I see everything going on there through rose-tinted glasses.”

What is the Arab world?

Arabic is the language of the Koran. But is there such a thing as Islam, an “Arab world”, wonders Freitag, if it isn’t even clear who is an Arab and who isn’t? The Arab League consists of 22 countries, including Somalia, the Sudan and the Comoro Archipelago. Most of the world’s 1.2 billion Muslims dwell outside the regions traditionally settled by Arabs: they live in Pakistan, Bangladesh, India and Indonesia.

Based on their comparative history, Ulrike Freitag takes an inclusive view of the Middle East, Africa and South India. She finds it a shame that these regions are studied separately at university. By dint of a broad geographic approach covering every society of an Islamic stamp from Mauritania to Indonesia, her institute explores connections, e.g. transnational networks of young Koran scholars, that are overlooked in a purely regional approach. The ZMO’s latest research project is a case in point: “Muslims in Europe and Their Societies of Origin in Africa and Asia”.

Likewise, Freitag has always found it wrong to view Islamism (as opposed to Islam) as an ideologically fixed entity. “Islamists” come in all sorts of different shapes and colours, so epithets like “Islamic Fascism” are entirely misleading. “The term (obscures) the diversity of Islamist movements. Abu Musab al-Zarqawi would be bewildered to hear himself named in the same breath as Muqtada al-Sadr, the leader of the Shiite militias in Iraq, especially since he has called on his followers to fight the Shiites. The Sunni Hamas and Shiite Hezbollah may enter into strategic alliances, but their main orientations diverge along both political and religious lines. ‘Islamic Fascism’ ignores these distinctions, which are essential to analyzing and combating Islamist movements, and invites a wide range of misapprehensions.”

Modernization trends

”We concern ourselves not with current political issues, but with longer-term trends so as to give the globalization debate not only some historical depth but also some non-Western perspective,” resumes the Islam expert. She points out, for example, that the young monarchs or presidents of Syria, Jordan and Morocco all studied law and economics in England. The forces of inertia are still strong in their countries, but in Morocco, for instance, the king has pushed through radical changes in family law.

Women’s organizations are also on the rise: despite their close ties to the traditional Muslim Brotherhood, they’re struggling for the right of women to take part in public life. “Many Islamic women have now taken up the cause; others have even more radical aims and seek to blame latter-day jurists’ patriarchal interpretations for the constraints on Islamic women that are traditionally said to be based on religion.”

"Landmark" in a "Land of Ideas"

The ZMO, which is celebrating its 10th anniversary this year, grew out of East Berlin’s Akademie der Wissenschaften. It is currently housed in a villa designed by Hermann Muthesius in Nikolassee, Berlin, along with a library of 50,000 volumes and 90 different academic journals. Ulrike Freitag works here with a staff of 27 researchers – when she’s not busy giving lectures at the Freie Universität or – as of late – on a teaching assignment in Edinburgh.

And she’s successful in her work: in early 2006 the German Scientific Council found “very compelling reasons for recommending the centre be kept going after the current funding from the German Research Association [which co-funds the ZMO along with the State of Berlin] runs out on 31 December 2007”. In what form it’s to be kept up and running, however, remains to be seen. If it were up to Freitag, no doubt about it: as independently as possible.

What’s more, the ZMO has recently been designated a “Landmark” in the “Land of Ideas”: in an annual contest sponsored by the German federal president and the business community, 365 winners have been picked this year from among roughly 1500 entries. Every day of the year 2007 one of these “landmarks” will be officially honoured and introduced to the public at a special event spotlighting its ideas and innovations. The ZMO is going to present its work on 19 April 2007.