Shahzad Bashir specializes in Islamic Studies with an interest in the intellectual and social histories of the societies of Iran and Central and South Asia circa fourteenth century CE to the present. His published work is concerned with the study of Sufism and Shi'ism, messianic movements originating in Islamic contexts, representation of corporeality in hagiographic texts and Persian miniature paintings, religious developments during the Timurid and Safavid periods, and modern transformations of Islamic societies.
Professor Bashir is currently finishing a book entitled Islamic Pasts and Futures: Conceptual Explorations. This is a wide-ranging treatment that critiques the way Islamic history has been conceptualized in modern scholarship and suggests alternatives, with emphasis on the multiplicity of temporal configurations found in Islamic materials. This project engages contemporary academic debates regarding language, historiography, and history on the basis of materials of Islamic provenance.
