Akbar Ahmed

Ambassador Akbar Ahmed

Ambassador Akbar Ahmed is currently the Ibn Khaldun Chair of Islamic Studies at American University in Washington DC; the First Distinguished Chair of Middle East and Islamic Studies at the US Naval Academy in Annapolis; and a Nonresident Senior Fellow at the Brookings Institution. He has taught at Princeton, Harvard, and Cambridge Universities and has been called “the world’s leading authority on contemporary Islam” by the BBC. He has advised myriad US agencies and organizations on Islam and foreign policy. Regularly interviewed by CNN, NPR, BBC, Fox, he has appeared several times on Oprah, and has also been a guest of The Daily Show and Nickelodeon. Ahmed was the Pakistan High Commissioner (Ambassador) to the UK and Ireland. He is the author of over a dozen award-winning books, including Discovering Islam, which was the basis of the BBC six-part TV series called Living Islam, and the critically acclaimed “Journey into Islam: The Crisis of Globalization”. His book Journey into America: The Challenge of Islam (Brookings Press, 2010), culminated in the full length documentary, “Journey into America”, and won the American Book Award for 2011. His Pukhtun Economy and Society was re-published in 2011 as part of the Routledge Revivals—“restoring to print books by some of the most influential academic scholars of the last 120 years.” Ahmed most recently published a book of verse, Suspended Somewhere Between (2011), and is currently working on a study which examines the role of America and the conflict between tribe and state in the Muslim world, to be published by Brookings Press in 2012. On September 11, 2011, Ahmed gave a sermon as part of the memorial service commemorating the decade since 9/11 at the Sunday service at St. Alban’s Church, the National Cathedral, Washington, D.C.  The renowned American historian Professor Stanley Wolpert called him “the greatest scholar of Islam in America and the world…nobody else stands so high…” he is “..the Dara Shikoh of modern Islamic leaders” (Pakistan Link, 30 December issue, 2011).


Suspended Somewhere Between: A Book of Verse

Suspended Somewhere Between: A Book of Verse

SKU: 9781604864854
Author: Akbar Ahmed • Foreword by Daniel Futterman
Publisher: PM Press / Busboys and Poets
ISBN: 9781604864854
Published: 4/2011
Format: Paperback, mobi, ePub, PDF
Size: 5 x 8.25
Page count: 152
Subjects: Poetry, Islam



Praise

“Anyone wanting to understand Islam today must read Akbar Ahmed’s collection. We are given rare glimpses into the dilemmas, pain, and despair but ultimately love and hope of Muslims through the verses of this true renaissance man.”
—Greg Mortenson, author of Three Cups of Tea

“Akbar Ahmed is a national treasure. Allow him to lead you through his tumultuous, thrilling life in this gorgeous collection of poems, written across five decades and three continents—a life of loss, despair, child-like wonder, and love.”
—Daniel Futterman, actor (A Mighty Heart, as Daniel Pearl, 2007) and Oscar-nominated screenwriter (Capote, 2005).

“Ambassador Akbar Ahmed is a brilliant and wise authority on Islam, and now we have the chance to see what a beautiful soul he has. In these poems, we see the mix of the personal, political, historical, and lyrical. This book is deeply inspiring.”
—Walter Isaacson,  president and CEO of the Aspen Institute, author, former chairman and CEO of CNN, and former editor of TIME magazine.


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