Islamic Studies is not a single discourse, but a constellation – spanning centuries, disciplines, and tongues. Making sense of this complexity requires more than navigation; it calls for orientation. The section offers just that: an evolving taxonomy designed to illuminate the major questions, tensions, and intersections that animate the study of Islam and Muslims today. Rather than imposing fixed categories, this framework traces the contours of inquiry as they move across disciplines – from Qur’anic hermeneutics to environmental ethics, from classical jurisprudence to contemporary media. It serves as both index and invitation: a way to locate research within broader trajectories while opening space for new conceptual linkages. Scholars, educators, and students can follow pathways across theology, law, anthropology, political theory, education, and beyond; to remind us how seemingly disparate discourses converge, diverge, and evolve. In gathering this dispersed knowledge into a coherent structure, the section doesn’t just organize a field: it helps reimagine it and support integrative research that is both conceptually rigorous and attuned to the realities shaping Muslim life, past and present. These thematic groupings are neither absolutist nor exhaustive; they offer a heuristic scaffold rather than a rigid taxonomy. The purpose of these frameworks finally extends beyond categorization; they serve to orient scholars within an expansive and evolving field, promoting intellectual cross-pollination while welcoming contestation, recognizing overlaps, and embracing the dynamic nature of Islamic Studies.
