Feisal G. Mohamed
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Feisal G. Mohamed is an associate professor in the Department of English and the Unit for Criticism and Interpretive Theory at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. His work has appeared in the the New Times series "The Stone" and he is a regular contributor to Dissent Magazine. His latest book is Milton and the Post-Secular Present: Ethics, Politics, Terrorism (Stanford University Press, 2011).

Blog Entries by Feisal G. Mohamed

The Cynicism of Obama's Endorsement of Marriage Rights

(21) Comments | Posted May 13, 2012 | 2:42 PM

Barack Obama has chosen quite a moment to realize that marriage is a basic civil right. Just as a kangaroo court is in session in the dungeon he promised to close, just as young voters are feeling less than enthused about his re-election, just as less than stellar job numbers...

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Yet Another Republican Provides Exactly the Wrong View of Politics and Faith

(145) Comments | Posted April 8, 2012 | 9:45 PM

In the Easter forum on politics and faith held by NBC's Meet the Press, Representative Raul Labrador (R-Idaho) articulated, though that is using the term loosely, exactly the wrong view of the relationship between politics and faith:

But going back to your question about Mormonism th-- everyone...

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Rick Santorum's Fuzzy First Amendment

(345) Comments | Posted February 26, 2012 | 7:35 PM

Appearing on ABC's This Week, Rick Santorum elaborated on his statement that watching John F. Kennedy's 1960 speech to the Greater Houston Ministerial Association made him want to "throw up." Especially purgative, apparently, is the idea that a president should openly declare his reluctance to take advice from...

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Can There Be a Digital Humanism?

(7) Comments | Posted December 28, 2011 | 3:40 PM

Stanley Fish addresses in his blog this week the rising currency of "digital humanities" and its strong presence at the convention of the Modern Language Association -- an academic conference, he rightly implies, to which one goes expecting more faddism than scholarship. I have previously voiced...

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Inside The U Of I Law School's Book-Cooking Scandal

(10) Comments | Posted November 11, 2011 | 11:54 AM

The University of Illinois issued its final report this week on the goosing of class profile data posted by the College of Law publicly and reported to the American Bar Association. This really does look like déjà vu all over again. The university's last admissions debacle...

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A Farewell to Due Process: The Assassination of Anwar Al-Awlaki

(3) Comments | Posted October 3, 2011 | 6:00 PM

The habeas right to demand cause for being detained is the only right explicitly named in the original Constitution. And though the meaning of the due process clause of the Fourteenth Amendment is often debated, it is seldom denied that citizens should have knowledge of the charges for which they...

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The Revolution in Context: Alaa Al Aswany's On the State of Egypt

(1) Comments | Posted August 23, 2011 | 5:40 PM

After almost six months of uncertainty, Hosni Mubarak has found as of August 3 a residence befitting his dignity: the dock of an Egyptian criminal court, where he faces charges of killing demonstrators during the revolution leading to his ouster, using his power for personal profit during his reign, and...

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Evaluating the Post-Secular Return to Belief

(0) Comments | Posted August 18, 2011 | 10:08 AM

"Prometheus: I stopped mortals from foreseeing doom.
Chorus: What cure did you discover for that sickness?
Prometheus: I sowed in them blind hopes.
Chorus: That was a great help that you gave to men.
Prometheus: Besides, I myself gave them fire.
Chorus: Do now creatures...

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The Assassination President?

(30) Comments | Posted July 19, 2011 | 5:31 PM

If George W. Bush was the torture president, Barack Obama's pet human rights violation is extrajudicial killing. As early as May 2009, the UN's Special Rapporteur on unlawful execution chided the Obama administration. And Human Rights Watch worried in an important letter to Obama last December that the...

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"See Something, Say Something" And Impunity for Profiling

(2) Comments | Posted June 29, 2011 | 3:44 PM

An earlier version of this post appeared at AslanMedia.com.


Imagine that you are traveling in Washington, DC or New York. You take a few photos of the sights, perhaps even a few minutes of video. You make a couple of calls or jot off a few...

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On Republican "Leadership"

(10) Comments | Posted June 21, 2011 | 12:01 PM

Republican politicians use the word "leadership" as though they expect it to have an aphrodisiac effect. For the arousal they perceive it to generate they part from their ethic of barking in monosyllables. And in the same stroke they reveal their ideal view of society: uncharitable souls might think of...

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Against Historical Fundamentalism: Jill Lepore on the Tea Party

(2) Comments | Posted June 6, 2011 | 5:06 PM

With Sarah Palin making headlines for a supposed gaffe on Paul Revere's Midnight Ride, and with her loyal adorers modifying Wikipedia to suit her version of events, it seems an apt time to pick up Jill Lepore's The Whites of Their Eyes: The Tea Party's Revolution and the...

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