Showing results by author "Nick Danforth" in All Categories

Western pundits and nostalgic Muslim thinkers alike have built up a narrative of the caliphate as an enduring institution, central to Islam and Islamic thought between the seventh and 20th centuries. In fact, the caliphate is a political or religious idea whose relevance has waxed and waned according to circumstance.

Erdogan recently declared that, starting immediately, Turkish students would begin studying the Ottoman language in school. But for anyone who has ever struggled to learn the notoriously difficult Ottoman language - sometimes described as a practical joke played on historians - forcing it on a generation of schoolchildren might be the quickest way for Erdogan to destroy his popularity (and the Ottoman Empire's as well).