 All right, I think I'll start. Welcome everybody to this event at the Pakistan Center and the South Asia Institute at SOAS. I'm really excited this week. We have Dr. Taha Qazi, who holds a PhD in anthropology from SOAS, as well as an MA I've just learned. So a long time part of the SOAS community. And she will be talking about her new book published in April with Indiana University Press, Religious Television and Pious Authority in Pakistan. Finally, we get some good academic literature about something that I would assume most of us have been pretty aware of for the past 20 years or so. What we're going to do is Dr. Qazi will talk about her book for 30 to 40 minutes. And at that point, we'll open it up to questions from the group. You have got a Q&A box in the bottom of your screen in which you can type questions. It'd be great to hold off toward closer to the Q&A period. But if anybody would like to speak directly, then please raise your hand and our moderators will let you in. Without much further ado, let me hand it over to Dr. Qazi, please. Thank you very much, James. And thank you so much for hosting the show at such short notice. And also, thank you very much, Sunil, for putting this event together. So I'm very happy to be here to talk about my book, which was published this year in April. I've prepared some slides, which are very basic, but they will serve as a sort of roadmap for the talk. So I'll just see if I can get them up. Yeah, I don't know why they're not going up. Anyway, I'll just carry on without them. There seems to be some problem with the laptop allowing me to put them up. So in the book, basically I explore the introduction of religious talk shows to Pakistan. And these shows emerged as a popular genre of religious programming in the year 2002, shortly after the liberalization of Pakistani media by General Parvez Musharraf. So when the first religious talk show, Harlem Online aired on Geo-television, it marked some important transitions in the format of religious programming. Prior to the liberalization of media in Pakistan, it was customary for religious shows on the state channel PTV to generally invite one scholar. And this scholar would generally come in and employ a didactic mode to sermonizing. And he would also generally restrict himself to providing a detailed summary of some select Quranic verses and prophetic traditions. By contrast, contemporary religious talk shows tend to favor a more pluralistic format. And by this I mean they invite two to three religious scholars of varying educational and doctrinal backgrounds. The shows are also a lot more discussion-based and interactive. They invite viewer call-ins on everyday matters of religious practice. And so the viewers will generally call in and they'll ask questions about the proper forms of fasting or praying or the correct method for calculating Zakat, et cetera. And the scholars present are also encouraged to hold discussions on issues of wider import in the Islamic world. Another major feature of these shows, which was different, which made them different to shows which were previously, is that they tend to also invite celebrity preachers. And these are people who generally have not received their credentials from the historically established institution of the Madrasa. Rather, these scholars have either acquired their religious expertise through self-endever or through their enrollment in secular institutions. So I think the celebrity preacher Javed Ahmed Gandhi is a very good example. He would frequently be invited on the religious show, Alif, which aired on Geo-television. And this was despite his lack of affiliation with any reputed Islamic Institute. In fact, Gandhi owes his recognition as a religious scholar and exegete almost exclusively to his appearances on these shows. In the book, I consider these preachers, like Gandhi, as distinct from their traditional Madrasa-based counterparts, mainly because this is how these categories of scholars perceive themselves. So for instance, most traditional scholars I met within Karachi would argue against granting Gandhi legitimacy, interpretative legitimacy. They would argue that he's not equipped to deal with the fine issues related to religious interpretation and practice. Also, this distinction was upheld by religious show viewers who would generally express a marked preference for one source of religious authority over the other. So this would generally depend on the viewer's own affiliations and religious orientations. Another aspect of religious shows that the book addresses is the incorporation of religious show hosts, who are an important feature of the new format. So previously, the religious scholar would come and address the viewers directly, but now they sort of have these religious show hosts who mediate between them and the religious specialists who are invited. Some religious show hosts, like Amir Lyakath Wasen, however, extend their role. And they also assume religious authority for themselves. And by this, I mean that they sometimes bypass the religious specialists who are present, and they sort of deal directly with the viewers' queries, drawing on their own religious understanding. So in the book, I analyze all these programming developments in terms of their implications for religious authority, piety, as well as for the dynamics of sectarian politics in Pakistan. And the book is based on ethnographic fieldwork and qualitative interviews, which were conducted in Karachi. In the period between August 2013 and September 2014. And for those who don't know, Karachi is the largest and most cosmopolitan city of Pakistan with an estimated population of more than 20 million. It is home to people of distinct religious and ethnic sensibilities and affiliations. And most importantly, for me, it was the production site of the popular religious talk show, Alem Online. And since I did want to get in and observe the recordings, I thought that it made sense for me to locate myself in Karachi. While in the city, I located myself in multiple social and institutional settings, including in the production studio of the religious talk show, Alem Online, with religious talk show viewers, producers, presenters, religious show hosts, and also clerics and religious scholars situated in Pakistan's seminaries or kutabs or mosques, et cetera. I was especially careful to elicit the perspectives of scholars belonging to all four major schools of thought in Pakistan, including the Twelver Shia, the Sunni Barelvi, Sunni Dio Bandi, as well as the Sunni LA Hadith scholars. And this was especially important because my book deals with pluralism. So I wanted to make sure that I got all the doctrinal schools perspectives when considering the impact of pluralism in particular. Excluding the introduction and the conclusion, the book is organized into seven chapters which examine various aspects of the transformations enabled by religious talk shows. So I will briefly describe each chapter and then elaborate on a few key propositions and findings contained in the book. In the first chapter, I recount some of the key developments that took place vis-a-vis the representation and treatment of religion on Pakistani television. The chapter progresses from the introduction of television to Pakistan under the leadership of Field Marshal Ayyub Khan. And then it moves on up until the liberalization of media under General Parvez Musharaf. So in the chapter, I outline how different governments tended to favor varied representations of Islam on television and how these representations were often closely aligned with each government's political agenda. I explore both the modifications that took place on television in general programming culture. And I also look at the reconstitution of religious programming, which went from being a subject of state control to a sort of consumer good, almost, after media liberalization. In the second chapter, I examine the editorial control features and format-related changes initiated by religious shows. So the chapter basically draws on my in-studio observations of the recordings of the religious talk show Alim online. I sat in on the studio and I also sat in on some sessions which took place before the recordings. So I drawn all my observations during these sessions. I also recount my meetings with the religious show host Amil Yakad Hossein, who was very kind and allowed me to pick his brains on the number of issues. And I also base my observations in this chapter on my meetings with religious television presenters, both within and outside the context of the Alim online studio. So the chapter analyzes sort of the various options that are available to producers for regulating the content of these shows. And some options that I analyze in the chapter are the selection of topics, the selection of more compliant scholars sometimes, the allocation of airtime between the different religious specialists who are present on these shows, and also decisions regarding whether they should air these shows live and pre-record or pre-record them. Because pre-recording allowed producers to edit out problematic show content, but the live airing also had its own advantages. The chapter also looks at the contractual obligations of religious scholars and the key production intents and concerns undergirding them. So in this chapter, I basically clarify a role for religious talk shows in privileging the influence of non-scholarly actors over religious content, which is transmitted on television. And by non-scholarly, I mean the people who ended up controlling a lot of religious show content were channel owners, religious producers, religious show viewers, commercial sponsors, as well as the Pakistani state. So an important feature of these shows is that they do not confine themselves to any one representation of Islam, but rather they seek to incorporate the doctrinal diversity characterizing the Muslim population in Pakistan. In the third chapter, I focus on the implications of this development for sectarian politics. So the chapter basically draws on my meetings with scholars and clerics, et cetera. And excuse me, I identify some traditional scholarly concerns and I say traditional here because I mean madrasabey scholars. So I identify some traditional scholarly concerns in relation to the pluralistic orientation of religious shows. And I outlined some corresponding strategies that different doctrinal schools would employ to deal with this programming development. So a prominent aspect of these strategies was that they were closely tied to the doctrinal schools' respective ideologies as well as the popular and political standing in Pakistan. For instance, I found that the pluralistic focus of religious shows was especially problematic for the Obandi school. And this was because the authority relies heavily on the school's oppositional engagement with Barelvi and Shia intersectional practices. For this reason, the Obandi scholars generally prefer to limit their appearances on religious talk shows. It also looks at the other schools, et cetera, and their various strategies depending on what their ideologies or their standing in Pakistan is. Chapter 4 explores the shift towards the programming shift towards entertaining life viewer queries. And I look at how this shift undermines the madrasa's continued relevance as the central Islamic institution for imparting religious education and advice. So through this analysis, the chapter also exposes the limitations of conceptualizing religious media exclusively in terms of their enabling or their undermining potential for traditional forms of religious authority. In chapter 5, I explore the emergence of two new sources of religious authority, which are celebrity preachers and religious show hosts. I've already talked about both. But both sources owe their recognition and relevance in religious debate exclusively to religious talk shows. So the chapter clarifies the Pakistani ulama's anxieties with respect to the growing lay regard for both sources of religious authority. And it also identifies some of the ways in which the ulama attempt to counter the popularity of both sources. In addition, the chapter also includes consideration of the significance of celebrity preachers and religious show hosts for the Pakistani state and its political projects. The last two chapters of the book focus on lay viewers and their engagements with religious shows. So chapter 6 examines various, the viewer's interactions with the diversity of Islamic discourses on television. And it implicates this diversity in provoking the viewers to seek new ways of discerning religious authority that generally extend beyond a scholar's affiliation with a reputed Institute of Islamic Learning. Some alternative attributes that I identify in the chapter in terms of their increased relevance for scholars who, in terms of the increased relevance for scholars for claiming religious authority, are the scholars' manifest affiliation with a doctrinal group, their ability to demonstrate religious tolerance, their capacity to evoke a shared sense of affinity with their viewers, and their celebrity status even. So through this analysis, I also spotlight the diversity characterizing people's engagement with religious authority. The final chapter of the book illustrates the relevance of contemporary religious shows in provoking disruptions in faith and in enabling forms of lay reflexive engagement that are more selective, more expedient, and as well as critical of the religion. In this context, I also identify aspects of individual reflexive engagement that are not piously driven, but rather involve the practitioner's privileged consideration of their socioeconomic and gendered concerns, as well as their secular liberal worldviews. So I will now go on to talk about some of my key arguments and findings in the book. So to put it very simply, my work foregrounds the complexity of the relationship between religious media movements, religious authority, and piety, and specifically in terms of the outcomes of the issues for religious authority, the book stresses that religious shows can both assist traditional religious scholars in extending their authoritative reach and undermine their monopoly over determining popular forms of religious understanding and practice. So the show's enabling potential for religious authority is a function of their usefulness in facilitating the scholar's access to the wider Muslim community, especially to those people who would otherwise be less inclined to personally visit a religious seminary or seek out a scholar for religious guidance. So during my research, I found this to be especially true for women who found the expressly male-dominated environment at religious seminaries, as well as the strict dress codes prescribed for women at these institutions, highly problematic. Some people simply had very hectic daily schedules, which made it virtually impossible for them to regularly visit the neighborhood mosque or seminary. Yet others also confessed to feeling uncomfortable about discussing their personal issues with the religious scholar in a face-to-face setting. Interestingly, some religious scholars also maintained that their face-to-face interactions with women would undermine their religiosity, so they were also hesitant to meet them. So for all these people, religious shows served as a more convenient option for accessing and imparting religious knowledge. To the extent that religious shows facilitate traditional scholars in accessing a larger group of followers, they also serve to affirm a general understanding of religious authority as essentially vested in the institution of the madrasa. Therefore, one way of approaching them would be to see them as extending traditional scholarly influence. However, religious scholars who employ television to extend their influence pay a heavy price for their enhanced following. And in the book, I highlight some of what I mean by this, which is that inadvertently, they enable the relocation of religious authority from the institution of the madrasa to television. So this is basically, due to religious shows serving as a more convenient option, to the madrasa for many viewers seeking religious guidance. Moreover, television also confers greater legitimacy on those who are associated with it. So for instance, many viewers in Karachi would often confess to me that they saw the televised religious scholars as more credible, learned, and progressive versions of their madrasa-based counterparts. To the extent that religious shows redirect the flow of individual Muslim queries from the seminary to religious television presenters, they also contribute towards alienating the general public from the scholarly majority that is confined to the madaris or seminaries. Thus, they problematize a straightforward conceptualization of religious authority as vested exclusively in the institution of the madrasa. Moreover, television also elicits certain compromises from those who present on it. So within the context of religious shows, religious scholars are exposed to greater viewer scrutiny by virtue of their frequent televised appearances. They are judged for their ability to respond appropriately to viewer questions. At times, they're also relegated to their self-taught counterparts or celebrity preachers for their failure to logically explain or defend their propositions. They are contractually obligated to confine themselves to particular interpretations of religion, mainly those that align closely with the producer's preferences or with the producer's financial considerations even. So in this context, my work also stresses the significance of the commercial and political imperatives undergirding religious show production. In compelling certain changes in the way religious authority is claimed, the commercial impetus driving religious show production is a function of the competitive media environment in which these shows operate post-media liberalization. And religious producers are aware that in order to generate broad commercial appeal for their shows, they must cater to the diverse religious sensibilities of Pakistani viewers. For traditional religious scholars, this implies that they need to tone down their doctrinal school's perspective so as to avoid offending the adherence of other doctrinal schools. And they also need to be careful to avoid perspectives that risk annoying the show's commercial sponsors. The political significance of these shows is linked to their usefulness in garnering broad support for the Pakistani state's political projects. So for example, let's consider the pluralistic shift in religious programming. And as I've already said, one key production in guiding it was the fact that it would enhance the show's commercial appeal. However, there is another production intent also underlying the shift, which is very important. And which is that the pluralistic orientation of these shows serves to set a favorable precedent for more peaceful and accommodative modes of inter-doctrinal interaction. So, I mean, outside the religious shows, there are these scholars and each other's throats and they're sort of issuing fatwas against each other. But within the show context, they're sitting and holding these peaceful and generally, not always, but generally more civilized debates and discussions with each other. So the political significance of this intent, the pluralistic shift and the accommodative modes of inter-doctrinal interaction, these become clear when we consider that pluralism was integrated into the religious show format at a time when President Parvez Musharraf was busy enlisting nationwide support for his agenda of religious moderation, which he referred to as enlightened moderation and also at a time when he was busy participating in the US-led war on terror. So despite also, the interesting thing to note about pluralism is that despite its commercial and political appeal, it tends to be particularly problematic for traditional scholars. And this is for the following reasons. The scholars decision to participate in religious discussions with their counterparts who hold different perspectives to them, renders them complicit in advocating a view of their rulings as perspectival rather than absolute or literal. Thus, they unwittingly encourage a view of religion as a matter of individual choice, rather than as something that is binding for the followers. And this I will talk about has important implications for Piety in the country. More over within the pluralized show environment, traditional scholars are also faced with the difficult task of, excuse me, paradoxically having to defend their propositions against alternative notions of Islam without openly critiquing the other groups, religious concepts and ideas. So in order to avoid engaging in any form of conflict on television, some scholars also tend to adopt a more generic approach to sermonizing, which involves them confining themselves to matters of social conduct on which there's broad doctrinal consensus. However, in doing so, these scholars then forego the advantage of television for popularizing their school's beliefs and practices. And they also risk being viewed by their doctrinal group's adherents as insincere or hypocritical on account of their failure to represent their doctrinal school's ideology adequately. Conversely, scholars who refuse to abandon their doctrinal perspectives also risk endangering their reputation. They risk being critiqued for their failure to rise above Muslim politics or for their role in fomenting sectarian rivalry. So either way, the scholars are sort of stuck no matter what they do because of the pluralistic focus of these shows. Another important argument that I address in the book is to do with the forms of piety these shows enable. So the pluralism of religious shows and the fact that these shows also tend to confer legitimacy on multiple sources of religious authority and multiple Islamic perspectives precludes a clear designation of authority as residing in a particular group or religious specialist understanding of Islam. So religious viewers are thus implicitly encouraged by the show's pluralistic orientation to rely on their own prior knowledge and understanding of Islam when determining the merit of scholarly propositions. So one question that I ask in the book is that how does this increased self-reliance affect the practitioner's engagement with Islam? And I explore this question in the book mainly from the perspectives of lay Muslim women whose commentaries I have privileged in the last two chapters of the book. My emphasis on these women's voices was to give them more of a voice in an otherwise male dominated Islamic realm where women generally tend to be excluded from religious public debate. Since religious shows predominantly cater to women and women are the main targets of local male clerics hegemonic discourses on piety, I felt that their opinions would be more relevant for these chapters where the focus was on everyday religious practice. My analysis of the forms of piety religious shows enable also encapsulates the sensitivity to the varying religious subjectivities of the women. And I'm also careful to acknowledge the multivalent significance of Islam in their lives. At the same time, I also consider the imbrication of these subjectivities with the women's lived experiences of Islam including the religions exploitation by various governments and religious political groups in the country in the past. So this approach has allowed me to identify forms of Muslim reflexivity that are not just piously driven but also shaped by the women's concerns regarding the religions imposition on their life or their considerations regarding the religions compatibility with their gender and socioeconomic class positions. So celebrity preachers like Javed Ahmed Gamdi have played a very important role in provoking such modes of reflexivity. Because these preachers generally lack the conventional madrasa credentials that allow traditional scholars to naturally assume religious authority, they're under greater pressure to establish their authority by alternative means. And in Gamdi's case in particular, his popular appeal has benefited greatly from his ability to foreground practical and easier understandings of Islam that are critically positioned against the Pakistani ulmas normative emphasis. And by focusing on the contemporary applicability of Islamic norms, Gamdi has unwittingly enabled forms of Muslim engagement with Islam that involve the Muslim practitioners moving in and out of different interpretations and sort of following their own ideas about what Islam means. So the practitioners in a sense who are following Gamdi are freed from the burden of conforming to a particular normative order, one that they cannot reconcile with their contemporary modes of living or their contemporary worldviews. And within this emerging reflexive space, a scholar's authority is also contingent therefore on their ability to accommodate their followers everyday concerns and notions of piety. So in the book, I narrate instances when some women's increased exposure to multiple and at times conflicting discourses on television inspired them to engage more selectively and critically with established Islamic practices, certain Islamic practices and principles. The women would generally employ this critical regard for Islamic concepts that they perceive to be affecting their gender unequally, excessively or unfairly. For instance, during my research, I found women frequently referencing one of Gamdi's televised sermons to refute the obligatory status of certain Islamically prescribed forms of female dress such as the hijab or head covering or Nikaab or veiling. So in the sermon, Gamdi had declared both practices superfluous to contemporary modes of female piety. And following the preacher, these women now argued that these practice constituted more superficial elements of piety and that they should be relegated to other more meaningful religious endeavors such as the women's internal moral and spiritual transformation. So in the book, I contextualize the women's contentions on these practices also in the women's lifestyles, their class, their educational background, which made it particularly difficult for some women to adopt these practices. Moreover, the tendency to refute the importance of the hijab and Nikaab was also culturally mediated, which is why some women would argue that the practices were more congruent with Arab Islamic culture than with the way Islam had traditionally been practiced by South Asian women. For these women, that's the benefits of viewing religious shows were manifold and they involved more than the desire to lead biased lives. They could invoke the interpretative differences between religious presenters to excuse their own non-conformity. They could also consider themselves devout and practicing Muslims without making the requisite sacrifices that they would otherwise have been required to make under the traditional Olimah's normative emphasis. And most importantly, they could accommodate their class and gender-based concerns without relinquishing their pious subjectivity. Alternatively, in the book, I also elucidate instances when religious shows inspired forms of these women to engage even more critically with the religion itself. And to the point where these women were willing to reevaluate their affiliation with the religion, where their pious subjectivity no longer mattered to them. And such reevaluations were generally provoked by religious shows that while disseminating guidance to viewers, also inadvertently drew the viewers' attention to Islamic provisions that conflicted the viewers' secular and liberal value systems. For instance, scholarly presentations on television that represented Islam as undermining the values of citizen equality or gender parity, in particular, provoked some women to threaten apostasy. They would come to me and they would say that we believe our religion if he ever finds out that women and men are not equal in Islam. So in this context, my work sort of looks at how religious shows with their instructional emphasis do not simply allow viewers to lead more Islamically conformant lives. They also sort of prompt them to perceive Islam as a constraining or invasive presence rather in their lives. And this is mainly on account of the belief that God's commands are absolute and above reconsideration. And this belief and taken together with the difficulties of applying God's commands to contemporary life in Pakistan, then promote a view of Islam as incommensurate with current modes of living, et cetera. So up until these women believed Islam to be congruent with their current modes of existence, they could afford to subscribe to its principles. However, when they perceived Islam to be interfering with their rights and status in society, they felt compelled to appraise it more critically or even resist it. So in the book, I sort of have used these understandings of female piety, which are rooted in the women's rejection of certain established ritual practices and closely tied to their secular liberal goals and class culture and gender-driven aspirations to sort of talk about how a diverse Muslim life is and how being Muslim can mean different things to different people. And this sort of I've also in the book provoked more cautious following all these women commentaries. I've also sort of urged a more critical and cautious application of Islam as a discursive tradition, which is a idea of Islam that has been proposed by Talal Asad, one that would lead us to view the Muslim evaluations of and contentions over scholarly propositions as entailing these women's heightened or uncritical regard for what is enjoined by the foundational text. Instead, I've tried to show that the Islamic, I've sort of proposed a view of the Islamic tradition that locates its persisting relevance in Muslim lives in the tradition's ability to be seamlessly integrated into the viewer's contemporary lifestyles and value systems. And in the book, I maintain that these important glimpses into the complex nature of religiosity and the equivocal outcomes of religious media movements because most people assume that these movements will improve piety, but in the book I've shown they don't necessarily, they can actually lead to the opposite of that. We can only access these sort of complex forms of Muslim religiosity, et cetera, by broadening the scope of anthropological analysis to also include Muslims who are themselves critical of various aspects of Islamic thought or for whom the cultivation of piety does not constitute the single most important dimension of their lives. So I'll leave it here and I would be happy to answer any questions. Now on the talk. Great, thank you very much for that. I mean, this is extremely rich and there's many different dimensions to all of the, like from the interest objective to the state to the mass society scale and even bringing in neoliberal capitalism. So I think, right, so we've got two questions already in the Q&A box and I invite everybody to put in more. Why don't we start with Sarah Holtz? Very nice to see you here, Sarah. She says, while scholars tone down their doctrinal difference, why do they attack particularly women speakers on such shows often very viciously? How are these practices connected to commercial interests and contractual commitments? So this is actually very interesting because considering that, so it's actually very complex the answer to this question because when they critique women, they don't do so openly a lot of the time. So they would sort of critique certain practices that might be connected to women that they perceive are more liberal or more modern is how these scholars would perceive them and for them, these types of women aren't that many. So, I mean, if you're looking at the, there is a Muslim population that would sort of agree with the scholars and this sort of becomes obvious if you look at some of the ways in which women have also engaged with scholarly discourse, both on television and on social media where a lot of them agree with what these scholars are saying because they're attacking particular ways of being Muslim women. So I think that works well with the commercial interests of these shows. And I don't think the contractual obligations are linked to them not annoying women. They're sort of trying to inculcate a very particular form of piety. Also at the time that I was doing my research it was soon after General Musharraf's period and it was a time when media was very different. So now the contract, how religious shows present has also changed because we have a different government and we have sort of like different intents and different political projects that these shows are also looking for. And we know that the current PM sort of caters to the more pious section of the Pakistani population. So that also might have something to do with it. Sarah, if you'd like to follow up at all, I'm sure that we can get a sort of voice conversation going. If so, feel free to raise your hand and Sunil will let you in. If not, we can move on to Anna Koch who says, thank you very much for this interesting presentation. I'm curious whether you've compared the discourse of religious talk shows and political religious content in popular Pakistani serials since they're primarily geared towards women. So I assume like drama serials. Yeah, I haven't really. I mean, obviously there's gonna be some similarities and this is a very interesting area to look into in the future, but no, I haven't really looked at this in a lot of detail. So I wouldn't be aware of a lot of the political or religious content in Pakistani dramas, but I know that they've recently generated a lot of controversies. And this is also true for some religious shows, especially the ones hosted by Amir Liyakad Hussein. So I'm sure there are some interesting parallels to draw here. Great. And Ashwarya Thakur asks, has the trend of increased revived religiosity in Pakistani society after 2001 been a response to xenophobia or TV has played some role in it too? This is actually something that I was wondering because like to expand the question a bit, you know, it's like on the one hand, you know, the sort of reflexive and the reflexive view that this seems to inculcate, right? It sort of unmoors authority from the madrasa, whether it be Duhlandi or Burundi or whatever. And instead kind of places the individual as a slightly more privileged position in arbitrating what's good and what's right. And what even fits with their sects. And this can lead in a number of directions. One of them is a pluralist direction, but it can also lead to, you know, well, like vigilante blasphemy enforcement and things like that. Absolutely. So yeah, because in the book, I also looked at pluralism as sort of stirring some viewers' anxieties in relation to their current belief systems. And these are pious viewers also. So I've looked at the more critical forms of engagement in the talk today, but the book also covers this aspect of it. And I've said that it sort of also leads to the hardening of sectarian tendencies or Muslim tendencies. And then it also generates discourse such as I'm just Muslim, which means that a sort of a basement of all sectarian differences. But then also problematic because then you are saying that mine is the correct Muslim version, which is just Muslim rather than sectarian defined by the sectarian ideology. So yeah, I mean, obviously the book is a lot more complex and it does deal with it. And absolutely it does cause the hardening of sectarian tendencies. And especially then there are debates between religious scholars with the scholars at least. When I spoke to them, a lot of them would be looking at these debates in terms of who won. They wouldn't actually be looking at it in terms of finding the true meaning of what is intended by the religion. They would be looking at our scholar didn't get enough of a chance or we didn't get enough airtime. And they favored the other scholar, the other school's scholars more. And they would be more interested in, did their scholars represent them adequately? Did they put their superior scholars on there who had good dialectical skills? So these were all the concerns that came through. So yeah, I mean, it's sort of, all this can also result in fermenting sectarianism. And with Amir Leakad in particular, initially he had a very big controversy associated with one of his shows where he spoke against the Emadiyah community. And shortly after the episode aired two Emadis were killed in the country, which was shocking. And when I spoke to him about that, he said it wasn't him and it's his enemies who sort of have put it on him. And he sort of tried to get out of it and beagle his way out of it. But, you know, so yeah, there are instances when this would happen. And also it's not that the scholars always stay within it. It also depends on how influential the scholar is. So if the scholars are very popular and if you're influential and already have a large following, they have more say in programming content than say a scholar who's less well known and therefore has less clout and is indispensable. Because, you know, the influential wants know they'll get repeated invites even if they don't cater to what the producers want or to the line. So it's all, it's very complex. I've sort of tried to put it very simplistically across. But yeah, there are all these complicated things which obviously discussed in greater detail in the book. Thanks. Yeah, do we have any more questions at the right now? If not, one of the things that really struck me is exactly this complexity that you're talking about. And like these sort of forms of reflexivity and sort of criticality that sort of spiral out into or sort of kaleidoscope out into as many different directions as possible. And a lot of what's driving it is like all of these new sets of interests that have never really, certainly in Pakistan's electronic media never really come into play before. You know, like commercial interests and all of these things like playing absolutely new roles in religious authority that, you know, and thereby transforming the nature of what religious authority is and can be. I have so many questions like leading off from this. One of them would be, do you see any, like the media situation of Pakistan is so unique in that it went from this really monologic PTV into almost overnight, you know, all of these shows like Aleph, like what you're talking about, but also the Jasmin Art and all of these things that, you know, in those early years. And like it was all of a sudden. So do you see any parallels like in your, as you were writing this, did you find any sort of parallels elsewhere in the Islamic world where religious authority had changed in similar ways? I could easily see how unique it is actually. So some scholars have written about, you know, I think Yasmin more writes about televangelists in Qatar or, and then there are some, where sort of like the scholars authority becomes dependent. And then there's, I think, James Hestri who's also written about the scholars authority being dependent on how women saw them. So I found that very interesting. And Yasmin Mool has looked at issues of affinity with viewers and how they take to storytelling. But she's also looked at, and that's also there in my book, I think Yasmin's is more recent that, you know, she's also looked at a sincerity coming into question. And this is something that I also came across, which is that, you know, people perceiving the television presenters is also insincere because, ooh, they're too commercial or they're doing some other agenda or, you know, they're listening to somebody or like I said, that they are considered hypocritical for, or, you know, or, you know, even religious scholars who come in Amelie Akhet's shows sort of looked at as hypocritical and why are they coming on this guy's show because he's so controversial now, you know. So obviously in the current environment, what's happened is that we don't have this one scholar coming and just talking. And it's like you said, that it's more of a dialogue and it's getting queries or it's having debates. And it's not this person just coming and sermonizing and going away, which sort of worked very well for them. So in history's view, you know, there was this scholar and I think he got married again and a lot of women got very annoyed at the fact that he'd done that. So that sort of led to a fall in his popularity. So yes, I mean, I think the new forms of media sort of subjecting religious authority to the viewer's critique and critical appraisal, yeah. And very dependent. So they're making authority very dependent on the viewers and the scholar has to sort of work harder now to claim authority. But I also saw this general fear in scholars because, you know, I mean, in Pakistan people look at scholars, they tend to think of them as these great lords who are sitting there telling women what to do. And nobody can really argue against them because they have these wonderful tools, Islamic tools at their disposal and they've sort of weaponized religion against women. But the religious scholars would actually be scared. So a lot of them wouldn't like me recording them. And I could sense that they also nervous. They have, they sort of also feel vulnerable. So it's not that they're these all powerful lords who have religion at their disposal and they can do anything. They would generally say, please don't report this or record this or I don't want this going out. And so, you know, I mean, it's sort of an interesting complex dynamic there. That's actually something that I hadn't considered when I was listening to your discussion but it makes perfect sense. And like, you know, there was a time, you know, in the 80s and since like mostly in the 80s and early 90s when the women's movement like elsewhere in the Islamic world was actually focused on, you know, trying to look at Islamic texts and sort of point out that, you know what? They don't have to be read this way. Your religion doesn't have to say this. But they were so routinely outmaneuvered by these scholars with their sort of, you know, formalized tools that the women's movement kind of abandoned that and, you know, most parts of it that I know of at the time sort of said, no, this keeps on happening. We have to take an uncompromisingly secularist stance. Nowadays, that's open for debate again. And I wonder if it's because number one, you know, this reflexivity in the general audience but possibly number two, I mean, the ulama possibly because of all of this and because it's become almost a consumerist good. You know, one that's open to unprecedented levels of competition and, you know, user mediation and like end user kind of approval and things. I mean, they might actually, you know, there might be new chinks in the sort of unassailability of these scholarly tools that there hadn't been before. Yeah, so a lot of scholars would tell me that they have taken to looking at secular forms of logic and reasoning also to sort of justify their arguments. And these are traditional Madrasa educated scholars. So there is a change coming in them. They are adapting. They recognize that they have to cater to audiences and that if they want to stay relevant, they need to also be accepted now. And then there's a new breed of social media religious scholars that are also coming up. And there was one in Pakistan, a very controversial Vantarik Masood who recently came under a lot of criticism because he said some demeaning stuff about women. And then he sort of had to come and engage with that and engage with women because women attacked him on social media. So, you know, I mean, these scholars command, I feel that in the current environment, they have to sort of sort of balance their authority with catering to others. It's become really important now for them to stay relevant. Otherwise they're out if they don't. And, you know, I mean, one scholar that I met actually complained to me about this and said that his sect normally had, where's these turbans? And he said that he's seen more and more scholars from his sect who are coming on television discarding these turbans and trying to dress more modernly and sort of cater. And they were very disturbed by it. But I found it very interesting that there's a great number of scholars who's also adapting and themselves. So religious authority is adapting and religious interpretations are adapting. And if you don't have these scholars, you know, then people will turn to other scholars who do sort of cater, you know, to what they believe religion should be. So I think Islam is also sort of getting, it's no longer the, I mean, according to me, the discursive tradition that is unruptured or, you know, it's something that's constantly being reconstituted, reformulated, evaluated sort of also. So it's not just religious authority. It's also the religion itself because you can interpret it in different ways. And, you know, I forget the woman, I think Lali or something who's done the Quranic interpretation. And it's very different to the interpretations by the male scholars, especially in relation to certain gender-based prescriptions in the religion. So yeah, it's definitely changing and it's a complex time. And I don't know how, yeah, what will happen but yeah, it's interesting to watch. I mean, absolutely. So we've got another question from Farah Diba. But before that, I kind of want to, because we've got plenty of time, keep on this train of thought for a little while, not too long, Farah, we'll get to it. But so in contrast to all of what we've been talking about, I mean, have you, so, you know, like a place like Jamiah Ben-Oriah or something, they've got a really well-established Darulif thought where, you know, people like, you know, a place where people write to them, ask for a fatwa in a particular Masala, like an issue or whatever. And then they issue one from their fatwa writer pool. I went to them and they gave a lot of fatwas on religious shows as well. It was interesting, yeah. Oh yeah, no, those are always like kind of at the top, you know, like of the fatwa that they put on their website, those are always the ones with the most hits, well, quite a little bit underneath sexual matters. But anyway, yeah, no, the televangelism and things like that are really a thing of concern to Jamiah Ben-Oriah and other institutions like it. So do you know, like, are there any instances where they just tried to create their own TV fatwa show and sort of like, you know, forestall any of these processes that you're talking about? So it's interesting because so that the Obandis have this very rigid, the Ben-Oriah ones in particular, I went and I met with those scholars as well. And they sort of have this very particular understanding of television. And so there's this whole debate going on. I've mentioned it in chapter three where I talk about doctrinal schools and their ideologies and they are in it. Where there's this debate going on with whether television is Halal or Haram. And the picture is the main crux of the debate that some people say that the picture is sort of forbidden in Islam. And there are some prophetic traditions that sort of say that. But then there are certain schools like the Barilvi and the El-Hadees, et cetera, who say, no, wait a minute, the television picture is not really a picture in the sense, in the Islamic sense. And there's a whole debate there which is there in the book. But so mainly the Obandis have a major issue because if they come on these shows, they sort of compromise their main position and their discourse and their legitimacy and authenticity sort of built around this discourse which is anti-television, anti-religious shows. They sort of condemn them. They say these are bad shows, one shouldn't go on them. So that the Obandis scholars who do sit on these shows are generally those who are university educated the Obandis or they're less esteemed the Obandis who sort of want more influence. The more influential the Obandis scholars like Mufti Rafi, Usmani and some others, name Mufti name sometimes comes. But I mean, they generally prefer to stay away. And so their whole discourse has been based and the whole legitimacy is that these shows are not good, you have bad content or illicit content being aired on television. We're not gonna encourage our followers to watch television or these shows also. And so they've kept themselves away. There are some scholars who realize that they're forgoing the advantage of television then and they're losing out because of it and they need to be careful. But then, the Obandis have tended to be very strong in Pakistan in terms of their Madrasa networks. They have control of the majority of Madaris. They've had state patronage. They have political parties like the GUI, et cetera. So, they've also made efforts on the political front. So they have all this going on simultaneously. So they tend to dominate mainstream debate even though they're not the majority. They don't represent the Pakistani majority. They dominate mainstream debate. Barelvi is the majority, but it was mainly pushed out by the Diobandi discourse. And so, there's a growing number of people who started to talk about Milaz and Barelvi practices as Bidda, which is like novel innovations and sort of illegitimate within Islam. So the Diobandis felt less compelled. So they recognize it. So they might eventually, I mean, some scholars said they might eventually start their own channel because then they can keep that channel fully halal and sort of abide by their own whatever rules and regulations they have. Also the very stringent in terms of how they interact with women, you know, for them to go and sit on a religious show. I mean, when I would visit these Madrasas, I was told by the guy who introduced me to the scholars there and I sort of got in with them. I would be fully covered. I mean, it would be, it was terribly hot at that time in Karachi, but I would be covered to the extent that I would be made to wear gloves and socks to just go meet them. So I resented that, but I also did it because, you know, I was sort of like, I needed them. They didn't need me. So I did put on that whole thing with the full niqab and the burqa and the abaya and the whole, I put that on and I went because they wouldn't have met with me. And even then there were scholars who even with this whole thing didn't want to talk to me even because they said that we can't talk to a woman, not even on the telephone. So there were times when I would be asked to leave and the scholar doesn't wanna talk to you, you're a woman and they can't talk to you. You better go to the Benori town, Madrasa or whatever if, because they have the proper protocols in place. So yeah, the Diobandis have a very different view. Absolutely. And yeah, it's taken up majorly in the third chapter of the book. Makes me wonder about the future. Now that the Taliban themselves in Afghanistan have kind of softened their stance towards television because they realized how useful it is. I mean, maybe they'll provide a model. Yeah, yeah. It's interesting how at least there, I mean, they've done nothing else. They carry on otherwise being exactly the same as they were, but they sort of gotten in on the fact that they need to stay popular, you know. They've discovered mediation, yes. And they sort of like image, they're becoming more image conscious than they were earlier which is interesting because it is the media world and everything depends on that. Right, let's move on to Farah Diba's question. Do you think that these Ramzan transmissions are creating more problems for religious pluralism? Maybe Farah, if you could elaborate on the particular, oh, so maybe you could elaborate on which Ramzan transmissions you're talking about. Because the ones that I have watched, you know, I mean, if you look at these religious game shows that have become a big thing in Ramzan, you know, where they have an entertainment and religious format sort of welded together and you have scholars from the different schools coming and sitting on them and sort of imparting advice. So they are sort of also propagating pluralism. I mean, Amelie Akkad's game show Aman Ramzan always had these three or four scholars sitting there and sort of having this whole me in the middle with all these games and stuff going on in the background. So they always had a section. So I don't know if there's a particular sort of Ramzan transmission that you had in mind. Right, no, I mean, I can think of several different varieties, you know, from the ones that are kind of like almost comedic variety shows to the Amelie Akkad kind, then they had those where they would have these people in touch with spirits and all and sort of doing these exorcism rites on television. But so yeah, there's a whole variety of them. I mean, some obviously they're like, there are these channels like Madani, which is a basically Adavate Islamic channel, you know, which is not pluralistic. But then when these shows come, these are the mainstream shows. So these channels are mainly for a particular group of followers or their content goes viral sometimes because, you know, people, a lot of people don't relate to it and so it gets viral and so that people can watch it and sort of discuss it. Right, well, we have plenty of time left to everybody. So please, if you've got anything weighing on your mind, type it into the chat box or raise your hand in the Q&A box, any which way. And I was wondering if we could, I mean, one of the, again, one of the things that struck me is really, really interesting, unique everything about this work is that, you know, again, the really distributed nature of the kinds of inputs, you know, that come from producing these shows in conditions of consumer capitalism, right? So now you've got like, the commercial interests are also the sponsors. You also have the producers. You have all these different layers of like things pressing on the final product, which is this religious show. Can you give us any examples of like where these things produced really interesting outcomes? Like for instance, the producer's preference making people head in one direction for the sponsors, yeah. Yeah, so there was one incident where I met this religious television presenter and he was telling me that he debate on television on the Islamic standing of riba or financial interest. And so he said that he was speaking against the practice and there's other scholars. There were two, three other scholars on the show and they sort of condone the practice. And he was very surprised. And he said that in the transmission in the advertising break, the producer of the show came to him and he said that, look, you can not talk against this financial interests because one of the sponsors of the show is a multinational bank and they are very big sponsors and you need to keep quiet if you are not going to condone the practice. So the scholar said he refused and he was very upset about it. And he told me that I refused and they asked me to leave. So the show was then aired without the scholar present. So yeah, I mean, then there are also sort of topics that they would take which were politically sort of relevant at the time. For instance, one of the recordings of Alem online I attended were on the sort of standing of the Taliban in Pakistan. So there was this the Obandis scholar present. And you know, the Obandis have been very, the Taliban's follow the the Obandis school. They are from the trained at the Hakani mother or whatever, which are the Obandi essentially. And so this one scholar was the Obandi and the other was Alehadees at the time. And the Obandi scholar was sort of hesitant to say anything against the Taliban. And the show was held at a time when there was a military operation going on in the northern areas of Pakistan against the Taliban. You know, it was Azerbaijan or something, you know there was a military operation going on at the time. And so in the transmission break Amelie Akkad told the scholar that look you're going to get into serious trouble if you don't condemn them openly. The viewers are going to see you as sort of supporting them and defending them and it's not going to go well for you. So then after the break when the show was there the scholar very hesitantly sort of condemned the Taliban because earlier he just wouldn't he would sort of try and defend them but he had to and he was the Obandi and I'm sure it was very problematic. So these scholars sometimes were put in a situation then there were also times when like I heard a discussion going on before the recording and that particular show was going to be prerecorded that I attended because Amelie Akkad Hussain was going off somewhere and he decided that he'll prerecord it. So, you know, and the guy there was very upset one of the scholars about the prerecording of the show because he said that I want to talk about certain things today and I want them to go live. And if you guys prerecord then there is a great chance that you're going to edit out all that I say because it's too controversial. So some scholars actually prefer to talk on live transmission, some prefer to prerecord it. So, you know, if you look at the topic so you look at the instructions or whatever then there was another example where a scholar for instance told me that on that the contract that they sign they are not allowed to say anything about India. And I was very surprised and I said really because you people love talking about India, you know and especially if you're a religious scholar they saw their whole discourses, you know around anti-Hindu or whatever. So I said you can't say anything against India or Hinduism. And he's like, no, because the channel is also broadcast in India. So it'll get banned. So we can't say anything that goes against it. So, you know, there were these small, yeah, instant. I came across many, there were many more. Oh, that's fascinating. Well, and in terms of interests arising in the Pakistani context, Osama Malik asks the question that I was hesitating to ask, how does religious shows content intersect with the interests of the all-encompassing Pakistan army? Like when General Bajwa was appointed somebody accused him of being a member of the Ahmadiyya faith. And many religious shows started suddenly defending Bajwa and his faith. And later at the Blegi religious preacher on live television used to praise and pray for General Bajwa. So definitely, I mean, there are a lot more control now in Bajwa's time than they were when I was conducting my research and this also extends to religious shows. So if they want to put a particular narrative out there and they will and religious scholars will sort of always get employed in these state projects. I mean, Javed Ahmed Gamdi sort of became this popular figure on religious television because he was very strongly backed by Musharraf. And he was sort of key to pushing Musharraf's agenda of enlightened moderation, you know. And he was giving this counter narrative and he was very useful at a time when Pakistan was sort of participating in the American war on terror. And he was very useful for calling out the Ulama who was supporting the Diobandis, et cetera. And sort of encouraging this reconstitution of Islamic thought in Pakistan. And so, I mean, obviously religious shows are very, very implicated in these political agendas and projects. They're a very important part of it. Do you see any competition in this field from like popular preachers elsewhere in the world? I'm thinking of like the likes of Zakir Naik and these films. Absolutely. So Zakir Naik is sort of also relevant for Pakistan and I have considered him very slightly though, barely there, but he is there because some people do follow him very closely. And then there's like this Noman something who had become very popular so that these Mufti Mank, I know that a lot of people, he's like the social media preacher and a lot of Pakistanis follow him. So yeah, I mean, these global preachers are becoming very, very popular in Pakistan as well. And sometimes they're even more relevant to people because of the sort of discourse they are putting forward. Then there's a section in Pakistan. It's difficult to sort of say how large the section is, but they don't really follow Madrasa Bay scholars in Pakistan. They tend to see them as less educated or less progressive generally. So then for these people, these scholars are more important always. Thanks Osana for that one. Actually that raises a good question. I mean, to what extent does social media sort of interact with this field, as so much more decentralized and like user driven but yet it's never completely separate from other electronic media like Tel Aviv. Absolutely, it sort of adds other media content also and it also adds to it and it adds it. So it is a very important part. I mean, I didn't really study social media because I wasn't really looking at it. I focused totally on television but I know for a fact that a lot of the viral content from television goes and gets aired on social media and social media is very important in disseminating and propagating all that viral content. And also very important for making certain scholars controversial because I think Armin Leakert's controversial outtakes from his Al-Iman Lines show came on social media and became viral and that sort of got this whole country looking at him like what happened because initially they were all like following him and there were women who were sort of adoring him and calling in and proposing marriage to him and I'm sure some still do but I mean like the perception has changed considerably regarding him in recent years and social media has a lot to do with it. So in terms of the preachers who are on social media I think it's sort of tricky because they can cater to a very particular audience. They don't have any contracts. They have a lot of independence and I'm just thinking of the top of my head of this Tarik Masood guy who's become very popular recently, this Diobandi scholar and there was recently I saw this sort of like a wrestling poster almost. Tarik Masood versus engineer Muhammad Ali Mirza or something which was sort of like this contest between this scholar who's suprasectarian and doesn't associate himself with any particular doctrinal group and Tarik Masood who's Diobandi and they obviously had some disagreement regarding some Islamic principle and they were gonna meet and contest which never came about but people had posted it on their Twitter timelines and they were sort of making fun of it and laughing about it and sort of saying it's more important than the cricket match. So yeah, I mean but yeah, they have a little more freedom than scholars who on television are sort of I feel more constrained in terms of what they preach and also the social media scholars can have niche audiences that they can cater to whereas the television scholars sort of have to try and cater to the larger population. No, absolutely. I mean, it also provides essentially like instant large scale highly visible feedback whether for good or for negative. Yes, instant, yeah. Yeah. I was wondering in the exact opposite direction do you see any parallels or any sort of points of difference for want of a better word? Like it's like one of the things that struck me was the ways in which this is kind of similar to the conditions way back when Diobandi was first starting which itself was a wave of like decentralized mass mediation just the sudden sort of sudden sort of lack of restriction on lithographic press and suddenly you had all of these like and when you go look in the late 19th century lithographs in the British library in the Urdu section I mean so much like a huge proportion of it is all of this religious literature of all kinds and a lot of it is like really, really idiosyncratic and creative and really interesting and plural. Yeah. But it's also the time that made celebrities out of like the founders of, you know, Amadriza Hanbrinvi and Dioband, you know? Yeah, yeah, yeah. So I think Gamdi is a good example of that. You know, that he's a big celebrity in Pakistan and I mean, even though he was pushed out by the local traditional scholars and he's now in Malaysia, I think, he still comes on various shows and he, I mean, recently I think Imran Khan made some comment about the women sort of having to cover themselves more appropriately if they want to avoid sexual harassment and I think Gamdi came, I saw Gamdi conducting a talk on some show where he was saying the exact opposite and sort of conquering Imran Khan's narrative. So I think that, yes, there are, and that shows that he's still relevant and he's still very important even though he doesn't even live in Pakistan anymore. So yeah, I think that Ameliyakot Hossain became a celebrity sort of, but I think one thing that also happened with print Islam, you know, and with these different, this different literature and these different movements that came about was that they sort of generated confusion and then they also created a lot of rivalry and then it also made people more protective of their religious identities as well. So I think Francis Robinson has written also very well about that aspect of it, but yeah. So definitely these are sort of new movements and a lot of these social media preachers also are celebrities, they're big celebrities and they're big and Gamdi has his own learning center. I mean, I think he's a very good example of sort of like a movement almost, a religious movement that sort of follows Gamdi's understanding of Islam and a lot of people have rallied behind him because he sort of looks at Islam. So he's not drawing on secular argument, he's sort of drawing from Islam to counter the olamas narratives. So he's sort of, you know, got a big group of supporters rallying around him for that reason as well. Yeah, no, I mean, I can think of numerous academics in University of Bashar, Punjab, who I've met, are exactly part of this trend that you're talking about and it's fair to call it a movement, I think. Yeah, absolutely. Okay, another one from Osama Malik. You say that Musharraf promoted Ramadi who in turn promoted Musharraf's enlightened moderation. Now you've got Tarik Jamil on national TV almost every night. In the 90s, you had the hardline Malihullah Murtaza who was given airtime on national TV. Yeah. Which particular sect does the state currently seem to be patronizing these days via television? Or I would ask, like, is it now so much more complex a field than that, that you cannot really say that there's any one patronage thing, although the state is always gonna be disparate? So I think that before the Afghanistan events took place. So historically, the government has always and the state has always supported the Diobandis. But later, lately we saw this changing but the government's slightly also tilting towards the Barilvi sect, but the hardline Barilvi sect. You know, which is the GLP, the Therikilabeg Pakistan. So I know that the Tablighi Jamaat and Tarik Jamil is the Dioband sect, but then you also have. So I think currently, and I think Imran Khan also follows the sort of Barilvi orientation. He's very Sufi and spiritually inclined. And so I think it's a mix really. And I think it's also about who can serve what? Because in the, I mean, a time ago used the TLP, which is Barilvi, and then we've also seen sort of this like Khatmeh and Abua becoming really important. And we've seen the blasphemy law and a lot of it is very Barilvi triggered, you know, because the TLP is a movement that essentially grew out of Mumtaz, Qadri and Salman. I mean, that's where it gained its popularity from. It was around before and it's Barilvi, but it's like very hardline radical Barilvi. It's not the soft Barilvi image that they earlier spoke about. So they have been using them and they have also been sort of looking at towards the Diobandis and especially now that they're promoting the Taliban, the Taliban are Diobandi. They're mostly been educated at the Diobandi school and that's the school of thought that they follow. So I think it's now, it's really whoever serves their projects. Right. I mean, just like it's always been really. Absolutely. Whether in television or other matters. Yeah, absolutely. And then there's geopolitics also that comes into it, you know, because the LA had these, where did they come from and Saudi petrodollar and, you know, the Iran-Iraq proxy wars and there's so much more to it, you know. So it's really a mix. Actually, that's a good question. I mean, because so much of the world media sphere is thoroughly transnational nowadays. I mean, I remember when I was in graduate school, we had a satellite dish and, you know, I just got the Pakistan megapack and I could watch like GEO and ARY and PTV export and like all of these different things just in Philadelphia. So to what extent does this like new sort of treatment of, you know, of Islam almost as a consumer good through these now fully international media spaces sort of transnationalize the, you know, the processes of religious transformation that you're talking about. Or does it matter all that much? I don't know. I mean, I'm pretty sure it matters, but I haven't really looked at it because to answer that question, I would literally have to go here and do a lot of people here in the UK, for instance, and sort of ask them how they engage with these shows or do they at all or do they follow some other personalities? Because I know that, you know, I mean, obviously, like there is a whole community of very pious Muslim believers living in the UK. And then one would have to go to them and sort of ask them. So it's very difficult to answer, but I'm sure they do take it into account. Like I said, like they were not airing any anti-Indian or anti-Hinduism content because they were aware that their show would be aired, you know, in India or their channel and they didn't want it banned, you know, and this was the QTV channel, you know. So, which is a whole channel dedicated to religious shows. Well, we've got one question on the chat box which I've put that's from Facebook. Oh, great. In the chat box. Yes. Where is my chat? Ah, yes, sorry. Oh, yes, from Johan, another longtime friend of ours. Can you please tell us more about audience size and composition, taking into account online viewership of possible? In other words, where slash with whom does TV religion have the greatest impact in terms of undermining institutional authority and exclusivity? Okay, so this was not a sociological study. This was more of an ethnography and it was sort of focused on the particular. So it's very difficult to sort of talk about audience size. I mean, I know it was a lot more earlier. So I can talk in relative terms and say that at least for shows like Arlim online, Amily Akal's show, it's not as much. And I think also the interest in religious shows is also moving towards sort of more focused on Ramzan. I mean, obviously there are some and there's always going to be an interest. Regarding the composition, I think it's generally housewives. I would say middle class housewives that tend to watch a lot of these shows and they were the most ardent admirers of Amily Akal's Hossain also. And as far as online viewership is concerned, it's impossible. I mean, I didn't look at it at all. I wasn't really looking at numbers and all I was, but I mean, where it sort of has an impact is everywhere because I mean, it's sort of difficult to focus it and say that it's these consumers are watching it because content also goes viral. These colors also become very controversial. And literally, I mean, I'm on Twitter and I sort of have a network of academics and they all have these access to the viral content and they all comment on it. And so it's obviously how it works in terms of undermining institutional authority for everyone because they now have access to a number of discourses and these discourses are contested discourses. So they're not taken as absolute or literal discourses. So obviously if there's a very strong Barelvi adherent or the Obandi adherent, they might still go to their leaders and sort of get religious advice and ignore all the other controversies, et cetera, associated with religious shows, but if you're not and if you don't, and if you're sort of in the middle and if you're sort of learning, then there is a great chance that you will look at these scholars and what they're saying very critically and there is a growing number of people who are doing that. So it's very difficult to sort of say that it happens here and it doesn't happen there. I mean, it happens everywhere, essentially. And I think it's gonna keep happening. It's an ongoing process. So yeah, the institutional authority is undermined also because the scholars themselves also have to change how they claim their authority. So it's not just about the audiences either. So yeah, I hope that I managed to answer that question somewhat. Yeah, thanks. I think that was pretty, you know, it strikes me. This was a long time ago, but I have actually seen like reception studies, like sociological reception studies of- Absolutely, yeah. Pakistani media, like in the liberalizing period. And there was something that totally blew me away and they had done like this kind of survey, like questionnaire thing. They went around to like Send Interior and something like 90% of women like in Send Interior said that their cooking habits had changed as a result of satellite TV and like 60 to 70% of people said that their musical traditions had changed. So you would expect like, and, you know, they didn't ask about religion, but I myself, again, remember exactly how much Housewives adored Amar Liaka, you know, in the mid 2000s. So you would- It's so popular then, yeah. You'd have to imagine. I mean, that it would have a pretty extensive reach here. Yes, absolutely. I mean, I would assume so and even when it doesn't, so even Amar Liaka is still watched. So people might not like him, they might not believe in him, they might not find him reliable, but they still watch him and anything that happens in relation to him goes viral on social media. So he's still eliciting a lot of interest from the people and it's still influencing how they think about religion and how they perceive religion. So even if they don't believe in you or they're not driven to you, it's still affecting them in some way or the other. Right. Okay, so actually we do have more questions now. One from Osama again, what are the views of various scholars about the commodification of Rizan transmissions, which used to be very plain when PTV was the only channel, but these are now very glitzy and consumer oriented. I don't know, weren't there those like buck or eat, those kind of things, which actually were really entertaining and sort of, but I could be misremembering. So these are huge, these are very glitzy and so the scholars are not happy about them. They go on them, they go on them sort of grudgingly or at least they pretend to go on them grudgingly. So a lot of scholars would be very dissatisfied with the religious game shows and how Amelie Akkad behaved on them and what he made them do and what he made the audiences or the game show participants do and the sort of games he played. And Amelie Akkad himself, I think is Barelvi. And so the people who would critique him the most were sometimes people from his own sect. So I found these girls sort of complaining about Amelie Akkad and what he was doing and these shows. And a lot of them also have an issue with how they compromise religious ideals on these shows. So, I mean, for instance, they don't have any segregation. They have women and men sort of mixing and sitting together and they have all, but interestingly these shows are also deliberate and they also have, at least at the time when I was conducting my research, they also had a certain political agenda sort of prompting the shows and the composition. So, for instance, Amelie Akkad told me that when he had his game show, he wanted it to be a show where everybody could mix. Sort of all sorts of Muslims, women who have their heads covered, women who are in hijab, women who don't have their heads covered, men with beards, men without beards, you know, and he sort of wanted to make it about and also these shows, they make them this way because they're not just for the pious viewers, they're also meant to attract people who don't necessarily want to view them for piety. They just want to view them for fun. So, I mean, yes, and religious scholars were not too happy, but they still go on them and they still appear on them. So, obviously they're not that push by it, otherwise they would distance themselves from these shows. Right. Also, I think it's the image, the image gets, the religious scholars image gets tarnished when they appear on these shows. And I think that's the biggest concern for them is their image, because they're constantly striving to uphold that scholarly image, which is very difficult for them to do. Yeah, especially when you get sort of the sorts of antics that people were really criticizing. I mean, that's not a very dignified form to be in. Yeah, yeah, absolutely. So then they sort of come under criticism and that's very problematic. So I don't know if it's the shows or the fact that the image gets tarnished by appearing on such shows. Right, so Murat Azar asks, could you kindly expand on the repercussions from the traditional international Muslim academia like scholars from Al-Azhar over any edicts or opinions expressed by religious celebrities on television? Sorry, I didn't get that. What is that? It's kind of like similar to the question of like, what does Benaria think about TV? And you know, what's, and when they... So is he talking about Al-Azhar? So Al-Azhar, what a problem too. So I think the Sheikh Karadavi, who is the biggest Al-Azhar scholar, had a major problem when Muiz Islam, et cetera, came on Egypt Cairo TV and they sort of raised the same objections to these scholars that the scholars I met with would raise for Gandhi. They were almost, they're very similar, you know, and sort of, but Karadavi also had to change himself and his preaching style, you know, so he could not retain the previous Al-Azhar sort of style. And what I found very interesting is that there was recently a fatwa given by Al-Azhar scholars who sort of agreed that Islam promotes gender parity. And this is something our scholars in the Madrasas still haven't spoken about. And the Al-Azhar scholars said that, in fact, if anybody claims it's not so, then they are not sort of interpreting the religion correctly, which to me was very interesting because this is very new and novel. And so even Karadavi, you know, he used to, had to sort of on Al-Jazeera, et cetera, you know, change his preaching style. And yes, he has sort of raised questions about the legitimacy of these new preachers that have also come up on Al-Jazeera television. But yeah, it's essentially very, very similar to how scholars in Pakistan would talk about Gandhi really. Yeah. Right. And we're coming up, you know, this has been quite a lively discussion so far. The last question that we've got here from Osama is do you think that TV has managed to change the tactics of different sects where Barelvis decided to be more radical after seeing Dilbandi was on TV and then Dilbandi's decided to adopt radical positions like Hatham-e-Midwut because they saw Barelvis doing it. In other words, like you've spoken about how this, like encourages pluralism, but can it not also encourage a kind of up-bidding of extreme positions? So the television has definitely changed the strategies of different sects, but I don't think the Barelvis becoming more radical is because of television. I think it could be the opposite, actually, that they would become less radical, de-radicalized themselves. The thing is that, yes, the whole blasphemy content and the Hatham-e-Midwut, et cetera, and the fact that Dilbandi's taken it up, I think a lot of it has to do with politics and rather than with television and to do with different groups seeing what makes certain groups popular really. And TLP is sort of the whole foundation of TLP, the party, what it's become today, which is pretty big, which it's a Barelvi, the Teri-Kilabeg Pakistan, which is the Barelvi party or group, is basically built on Mumtaz Qadri's murder of Salman Taasir and on the anti-Blasphemy laws, and they've managed to accumulate massive following on the basis of that and also on the basis of then arguing for Khatmin-e-Buwat, et cetera. But I think it's also very politically mediated. It's not so much television, it's the politics in there and the fact that they've become these radical groups means that they become more attractive to certain people in the state because this radicalization then gets them a large particular kind of following. But the sort of housewives or the sort of people that watch religious shows, a lot of them are not that radical and they will have a very small section of followers if they tend to follow this because of television. So I think it's politics really, not television that would sort of radicalize these groups. I think television would actually have the opposite effect because they're thrown out of television. And I've talked about when somebody doesn't throw the line, they sort of get your backlash and it's so bad that they can't, they become too controversial and they sort of thrown out of television. So that wouldn't really work for them. Right, yeah, no. I mean, organizations like that and just religious organizations in Pakistan in general, really have got quite an astonishing variety of mediation strategies that don't require electronic mediation. Yeah, yeah, yeah. No, that's a really good point. And actually, yeah, I had initially been thinking similarly and your presentation here actually changed some of the directions of my thinking. So I really appreciate that. Thank you. Which is to say I will definitely, yes, definitely be ordering this book sometime very soon. Right, do we have, right. Okay, we have a thank you from Osama. I think that I'll just ask one more question and then we can call it an afternoon. And that is essentially what future do you see for religious television in Pakistan if any such thing is predictable? I see it moving more to social media now because I think that there are these niche audiences and then religious scholars can sort of have more say in it. So I think religious television will always be there. I think that it has a certain market in Ramazan especially because people use it as a form of entertainment. I think it'll keep running in the background and there will be a market for it and there will be people who'll be watching it. But I don't, I see a social media sort of taking over from here and I sort of see this going into social media. And just because everybody is on it for one and to the religious scholars have a lot more autonomy in terms of the content they want to produce and broadcast, so just for that. But I think a lot of them will still use television to get their popularity and fame from, because it's a lot easier if you transition from television on to then social media rather than just start. But there are so many new preachers and all kinds of preachers who come up in Pakistan which are basically just on social media because that means anybody can come and talk about religion essentially. So it'll be interesting, it'll be interesting to see but yeah, it's difficult really. Well, I mean your next project perhaps. Maybe it looks interesting, yeah, definitely. Well, thank you very much Dr. Tahalkazi for spending nearly two hours with us now. Thank you, thank you very much for hosting this talk. It was really interesting, I really enjoyed being here. Certainly our pleasure at the South Asia Institute. And thank you all for joining us as well.