An introduction to Race, Class and Gender identity politics & left-wing ideologies

Learn the major streams of political and ethical thought underpinning modern left-wing politics, from its origins in Continental Philosophy (Kant, Hegel and existentialism) and Marxist thought through to their evolution co-joined with with post-structuralist (postmodernist) critique, and their current application in relation to race, class and gender today.

Last Updated: 6/2021

This course includes:

30hrs taught classroom sessions delivered over 10 weeks

10 Tutorial sessions for additional support

10 Downloadable course materials

1 Coursebook

Course to begin on 29th July 2022- reserve your space now

What You Will Learn

The major streams of political and ethical thought underpinning modern left-wing politics, from its origins in Continental Philosophy (Kant, Hegel and existentialism) and Marxist thought

How to engage with the left-wing, or those of the youth who've been exposed to left-wing politics

How to critically examine theories of justice from an Islamic basis and discuss potential Islamic responses

A foundation in understanding the core creeds, justifications and value systems upon which the political philosophies of modern Western debates on equality, justice and identity politics are based.

The ability to deliver informed advocacy and the call to Islamic solutions within the Muslim world.

Instructor

Abdullah Al-Andalusi

Abdullah is a regular instructor at the Occidentology Department at The Quran Institute. He has 15 years of experience critically engaging secularism, liberalism, zionism, atheism, christianity and judaism across a variety of platforms. He teaches the reality behind Western philosophies, political systems, values and intellectual self-justifications.

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Course Curriculum

This is what will be covered in this course

Session 1: Introduction to race and gender as case-studies of left-wing causes

• Course Overview, Objectives & Outcomes

• Understanding the preliminary bases of political philosophy

• Can Muslims adopt ethics and morals from non-Islamic sources?

• Approaching studies with an Islamic objective

• Who and what are ‘left-wing’ movements?

• Modern day examples (e.g., US Democrat party, UK Liberal Democrats & Labour, [various European] Socialist parties, “Wokeism”, Social Justice Activism)

• Left-wing approaches to Race & Gender as notable current case studies

• Other notable left-wing cases studies:

• LGBT equality

• Animal Liberation & Sentientism

• Lesser causes: anti-ableism, anti-ageism and body positivism

• The Opponents of the left-wing: Who and what are the “right-wing”?

• Current Right-wing conceptions of race and gender

• The “Culture Wars” inside the West

• The Genealogy of modern left-wing ideologies

Session 2: History of the concept of Race and Gender in the West, Islamic world and the Sciences

Ancient to Classical period pre-Western concepts of race and gender

* Ancient & Classical Greek

* Roman

* Chinese

Medieval Muslim & Western Christian conceptions of race and gender

* Muslim & Islamic thought on race and gender

* Western Christian before 11th century

* Western Christian post-Crusading era

Western Christian conceptions during the Early-Late Modern period

* Western Renaissance and Age of exploration

* Enlightenment Era

Liberalism and liberal treatments of race and gender

* Citizenship, foreigners and Slavery

* Early Marriage and family laws

* Liberalism’s anti-racism 1st wave reforms: The Abolition of Slavery in the West & American Civil War

* Classical Liberal Feminists & Liberalism’s anti-sexism 1st wave reforms: women’s suffrage & property laws

Session 3: Origin of Continental Philosophy and its connection to the modern left-wing

* Plato’s Ontology of Mind-Body duality

* Plato’s Republic

* Plato’s Republic reborn: Thomas More’s Utopia

* The European Reaction to the renewed challenge of skepticism

* Empiricism (Realism) vs Rationalism (Idealism)

* Rene Descartes

* Supremacy and transcendence of the Human Mind

* Liberality in politics

* The other philosophical stream in the West: Anglo-saxon and modern analytical philosophy

* The first ‘left-wing’ political movements

* The First Feminist: François Poullain de la Barre and social Cartesianism

* Jacques Rousseau and the social factor to individual freedom

* The Radical Enlightenment faction of “the Enlightenment”

* The Bloody French Revolution

* Birth of the “Right-Wing” & “Left-Wing”

Session 4: Socialism & Marxism and gender & race

• German Idealism (Kant & Hegel)

• Dialectcal Idealism, Weltanschuan, Zeitgeist and progress (Hegel)

• The left-wing developments in the 19th century

• The Utopian Socialists (Comte, Saint-Simon) and Anarchists

• Socialism & early concepts on gender, race and sexuality

• Hegel turned on his head: Karl Marx and the origins of Marxism

Key Marxist concepts:

• History & Dialectical Materialism

• Human nature & Human Society

• Marx’s measurement of value

• Exploitation of Surplus Value of the Working Class

• Commodity Fetishism

• Self-Alienation • Ideology & Super-structure

• The inevitable self-destruction of Capitalism

• Revolution not Reform

• Marxism on race and gender stratification in Capitalist [liberal economic] societies

Session 5: The reformation of [Western] Marxism: Existentialism, Psychoanalysis and development of Neo-Marxism

• Beginning of Existentialism (Søren Kierkegaard, Friedrich Nietzsche)

• The doctrine of the impossible objective interpretation of truth (Nietzsche)

• Psychoanalysis of society and it’s discontents (Sigmund Freud)

• The failure of [Western] Marxism

• The Frankfurt School & the search for a new strategy against Capitalism

• Ideologiekritik ‘Critical Theory’ (Horkheimer, Adorno)

• Injustice as emergent from “Structure” (Althusser)

• Rise of the Critical Social Studies Movement

• Gramsci & Cultural Hegemony

• Early Critical Theory on Race and Racism

• Early Critical Theory on Gender and Sexism

• Orthodox Marxism strikes back: Marxist Feminism & Marxist analysis of ‘racial stratification‘ in Capitalist Society

Session 6: The effect of Post-Modernism (Post-Structuralism on Western Political Discourse and Post-Marxism

Later developments in Existentialism: Existentialism as -Humanism (Jean-Paul Sartre)

Living an authentic life (Jean-Paul Sartre)

The end of objective interpretation of truth (Nietzsche)

Post-Structuralism (Lyotard)

Binaries & Deconstruction (Derrida)

Narrative, Truth & Power (Foucault)

Anti-Essentialism / Anti-Foundationalism (Nietzsche and Foucault)

Neo-Marxist engagement with later ‘Post-Modernism’ (Gramsci)

Neo-Marxism gives way to Post-Marxism

Session 7: The centre-left: [Social] liberalism on gender & race

The failure of [Classical] Liberalism (Tocqueville, Mill & Dickens)

The three waves of Liberal reform

Social Idealism (F. H. Bradley, T. Hill Green, B. Bosanquet & J. Royce)

The influence of Socialism on Liberalism: John Stuart Mill and the new Social Liberalism

Liberalism’s affect on Socialism: Social Democracy & gradualism

Liberalism’s anti-racism 2nd wave reforms: Civil Rights Movements & anti-racial discrimination laws

Liberalism’s anti-sexism 2nd wave reforms: Liberal Feminism and the Women’s Liberation Movement

Liberalism’s anti-racism 3rd wave reforms: Hate Speech laws

Liberal Multiculturalism

Liberal Egalitarian-Feminism and Difference Feminism

Session 8: Divergant Feminist schools of the second, third and fourth waves

Why Waves of Feminism?

Marxist feminism

• Material

• Autonomist

Anarcho-feminism

Radical feminism

• Separatist feminism/political lesbianism

• Female supremacist feminist streams

• Cultural feminism

Emergent trends out of the Feminist Sex [civil] wars of the second-wave:

• Reactions to Sexual Liberation:

• ‘sex negative’ feminism

• ‘sex positive’ feminism

• Counter-reactions to anti-stereotyping of gender

• Difference feminism

• Lipstick feminism

• Reactions to Transexual rights movement

• trans-exclusionary feminism

• Transfeminism

• Reactions to Environmentalism: Eco-Feminism

• Reactions to Race & Sexuality rights movements

• Black Feminism

• Postcolonial feminism

• Lesbian Feminism

• Intersectionality

Session 9: Critical Race Theory

Initial Emergences from Marxist and Neo-Marxist Critical Theory toward CRT

• Critical Legal Studies

• Black Marxism & the critique of a purely Marxist analysis of racial stratification in Capitalist society Critical

Theory on race vs Critical Race Theory

Key Tenets of CRT:

• Criticism of Liberalism

• Race Realism, Racism as normalcy

• The social construction of race

• Whiteness as privilege and Property

• Racism as emergent from social “structure”

• Interest convergence/material determinism

• Differential racialisation

• Inadequacy of colour-blindness

• Colour-based standpoint subjectivity

• Wealth redistribution for racial equity

• Storytelling: Counter-narrative campaigning

Divergences within CRT:

• Latino-critical studies

• Asian critical studies

• Critical race feminism

• Critical whiteness studies

• Queer race Critical Theory

• Minority Race-based Nationalism vs Assimilationism

• Anti-essentialism / Intersectionality vs Group/block unification

• Black/White Binary vs Anti-Binary

• Latino and Asian Critical Thought, Critical Race Feminism

Session 10: Internal Western Disputes & Critiquing in light of recent Science & from Islamic Position

Internal Western Disputes over race & gender

• Liberal critiques of Critical Race Theory

• Liberal critiques of Radical Feminism

• Liberal critiques of Marxist Feminism

• Liberal response to Marxist critique on capitalism and race

• Marxist critique of Critical Race Theory

• Marxist critique of Radical Feminism

• Marxist response to Liberal critiques on Marxist Feminism

• Equity Feminism/ Libertarian feminism as a right-wing / Conservative response to left-wing Feminisms

• Conservative responses to critiques of race and liberalist societies

• The internal flaws of Conservative, Liberal and Marxist Critiques

The study of race and gender in Contemporary Science:

• Race and gender according to modern anthropology & biology

• Gender difference and neurology

• Gender difference and modern psychological studies

Islamic Political Philosophy & Political Imperatives

• Basics of Islamic political philosophy

• The Islamic worldview

• Ethics and morality within Islam

• Justice as balance and desert

• Basic unit of society

• Purpose of Politics in Islam

Islamic political imperatives and objectives

• Islamic solutions to racism and gender complementarity

• Navigating Western political discourse and party politics

• Navigating post-colonial Westernised political systems outside the West

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Description

Over this ten week course, attendees will learn the major streams of political and ethical thought underpinning modern left-wing politics, from its origins in Continental Philosophy (Kant, Hegel and existentialism) and Marxist thought through to their evolution co-joined with with post-structuralist (postmodernist) critique, and their current application in relation to race, class and gender today.

The course will give attendees a foundation in understanding the core creeds, justifications and value systems upon which the political philosophies of modern Western debates on equality, justice and identity politics are based.

The course will critically examine these from an Islamic basis and discuss potential Islamic responses. The course will be a must for all those who's work engages with the left-wing, or those of the youth who've been exposed to left-wing politics.

Online Requirements

Anyone with a basic understanding of websites
Should have a desktop computer, laptop, tablet or a mobile device
Should have access to internet via WiFi or Mobile data
Should allow access to the computer to download files

Click "Sign up now" to get:

Full Digital Access (released weekly)

10 additional online tutorial sessions

10 Downloadable course materials

Coursebook

Lifetime online access

for £150

FAQs

+ When and where will the course take place?

The course will start 3rd September 2021 at a venue in East London, UK to be confirmed.

The timings will be 6:30pm - 9:30pm every Friday.

+ Are your courses segregated?

Yes, all our onsite classes are segregated.

There is designated seating for brothers on one side and for sisters on the other.

The rest we leave to taqwa.

+ Course requirements

Absorption levels of all students vary.

However, this course is for anyone who wants to be active for the Palestinian cause whether on university campuses or outside. Other than this, there are no requirements to joining the course.

+ Are there any assignments/ homework?

Yes, Ustadh Abdullah will be giving (optional) research homework and assignments.

This is in your benefit to have a better grasp of what is being taught.

+ Will there be any time for Q&A with Ust. Abdullah?

Yes, the lecture is from 6:30pm to 8:30pm.

After this, there is a 1 hour Q&A session (8:30pm-9:30pm) to answer any questions you may have on the topics being taught.

Alternatively, you will be able to write to him at [email protected]

+ Absences and unforeseen circumstances

In the event of absences or unforeseen circumstances, we recommend purchasing the Online Conversion as only online students have access to recordings (subject to on-site ticket purchase).

This will allow you to become an online student with access to both recordings as well as onsite learning should you wish to come on-site.

Contact

[email protected]