My paternal grandfather, Robert Campbell, was born in Toberhead, a farming community near the town of Magherafelt, Londonderry County, Northern Ireland, on January 29, 1864. He arrived in Canada on May 22, 1881 with his parents and siblings, aboard the SS Moravian. He married Sarah McTavish on December 23, 1891, and they had two sons, Robert (born February 19, 1893) and Peter (born April 16, 1898). Sarah had been born and raised near Arthur, Ontario, northwest of Toronto, and both sons were born in Claremont, Ontario, northeast of Toronto, where my grandfather was working as a carpenter and farmhand. Sarah died sometime before 1909, by which time Robert and his sons were living in the Parkdale area of Toronto.
My paternal grandmother, Mary Jane 'Minnie' Bailie, was born in Ballynahinch, County Down, Northern Ireland, in May 1885. She arrived in Canada on April 25, 1909, aboard the SS Lake Erie, and was employed as my grandfather's housekeeper. They would marry on July 25, 1912. Robert and Minnie had two children, my father William (born August 17, 1913) and Jess (born c. 1915). Robert would be killed in a railway accident at the Parkdale Station on January 31, 1917.
Minnie would go on to marry Thomas Hamilton Cannon on February 28, 1922, and they would have two children, Mary and Jack.
Saturday, April 9, 2011
Saturday, March 19, 2011
Can I Read Arabic?
As I discussed in an earlier post, when people learn that I have written books about the Qur'an, their first question is usually to ask me if I am Muslim. Once that issue has been dealt with, they are curious about whether I can read Arabic. I assume that the motivation for asking is to determine by what authority I presume to write about Islam's sacred book - one that is deemed to be a sacred book only in the original Arabic. As with the previous question, however, the answer does not come down to a simple yes or no.
I first point out that I do not speak or read modern Arabic, emphasizing that knowing how to ask directions to the subway, or being able to order eggs and coffee for breakfast, are not really matters that get discussed in the Qur'an. I then go on to point out that while those who are proficient in modern Arabic will be able to read the literal text of the Qur'an, that is not the same as saying that they will then understand what they are reading. The Arabic of the Qur'an represents a stage of linguistic and cultural development in the Arabian peninsula 1400 years ago, and much has changed linguistically, culturally, politically and religiously since then. Even for those modern readers whose first language is Arabic, reading the Qur'an in Arabic means reading the Qur'an in translation.
I then indicate that while I have some ability to read the Arabic of the Qur'an, I do not claim any special expertise as a linguist, nor do I think I will ever reach a point where I consider myself to have mastered the subject. Rather, I see myself as a perpetual student of Classical Arabic, of the Qur'an, and of Islam more generally. I have to read translations of the Qur'an in order to think and write about it, and so does everyone else.
I first point out that I do not speak or read modern Arabic, emphasizing that knowing how to ask directions to the subway, or being able to order eggs and coffee for breakfast, are not really matters that get discussed in the Qur'an. I then go on to point out that while those who are proficient in modern Arabic will be able to read the literal text of the Qur'an, that is not the same as saying that they will then understand what they are reading. The Arabic of the Qur'an represents a stage of linguistic and cultural development in the Arabian peninsula 1400 years ago, and much has changed linguistically, culturally, politically and religiously since then. Even for those modern readers whose first language is Arabic, reading the Qur'an in Arabic means reading the Qur'an in translation.
I then indicate that while I have some ability to read the Arabic of the Qur'an, I do not claim any special expertise as a linguist, nor do I think I will ever reach a point where I consider myself to have mastered the subject. Rather, I see myself as a perpetual student of Classical Arabic, of the Qur'an, and of Islam more generally. I have to read translations of the Qur'an in order to think and write about it, and so does everyone else.
Saturday, March 12, 2011
Discovering Distant Relatives
My maternal grandmother Marie Des Neiges Proulx was born on October 8, 1897, in Perce, Quebec. Her great grandfather Joseph Proulx had moved to the Gaspe region from the Quebec City area in about 1802. Joseph was a descendant of Jean Prou, who had come to Canada in about 1666, settling in Montmagny on the south shore of the St. Lawrence River. I have not been able to determine at what point and for what reason the spelling of the family name picked up the "lx" ending, but I have discovered that Jean's surname had been changed from Proust to Prou, upon his arrival in Quebec.
Jean Proust had been born in the village of Distre, a few kilometers from Saumur, and about 40 kilometers from Angers, in the district of Maine-et-Loire (formerly Anjou), France, on December 2, 1646. Local records exist for his father and grandfather, both of whom had been named Jean. Not being able to trace the family line back further than the late 1500s, I started to wonder if I could establish a link between myself and the acclaimed French author Marcel Proust, who had been born near Paris, and who had died there in 1922.
Marcel Proust is perhaps best known for his seemingly endless, and actually never completed, epic novel, most commonly referred to in English as Remembrance of Things Past, the title given to it by its first translator Moncrieff, but perhaps more appropriately called, as it is in some more recent translations, In Search of Lost Time. The novel, which runs for more than 4000 pages over several volumes, contains over 2000 characters, and so it only seems appropriate that my relationship to the author is one of Proustian proportions, in that I was able to determine, thanks to the efforts of many distant relatives for whom genealogy research has become an addiction, that I am his fifty-eighth cousin, nineteen times removed.
Jean Proust had been born in the village of Distre, a few kilometers from Saumur, and about 40 kilometers from Angers, in the district of Maine-et-Loire (formerly Anjou), France, on December 2, 1646. Local records exist for his father and grandfather, both of whom had been named Jean. Not being able to trace the family line back further than the late 1500s, I started to wonder if I could establish a link between myself and the acclaimed French author Marcel Proust, who had been born near Paris, and who had died there in 1922.
Marcel Proust is perhaps best known for his seemingly endless, and actually never completed, epic novel, most commonly referred to in English as Remembrance of Things Past, the title given to it by its first translator Moncrieff, but perhaps more appropriately called, as it is in some more recent translations, In Search of Lost Time. The novel, which runs for more than 4000 pages over several volumes, contains over 2000 characters, and so it only seems appropriate that my relationship to the author is one of Proustian proportions, in that I was able to determine, thanks to the efforts of many distant relatives for whom genealogy research has become an addiction, that I am his fifty-eighth cousin, nineteen times removed.
Saturday, February 26, 2011
Are You A Muslim?
A co-worker passed me in the hall this week and said, "I see you have a new Qur'an book out. Are you a Muslim?" I hesitated, smiled and said, "You wouldn't believe how many times I get asked that question." Not wishing to pursue the matter any further at that point, I quickly moved on.
Looking back over the past several years, the question usually arises when I am teaching courses on Islam or the Qur'an, when I am giving public lectures on these topics, and when I am being interviewed about my books. Both Muslims and non-Muslims have asked. My answer is always the same: "I don't answer that question, because I do not want to introduce any sort of bias into the reception of me or my ideas." I do however wonder at the motivation for asking.
While I'm sure that some people are merely curious, as if to say, "Robert Campbell doesn't sound like a Muslim name," I also suspect that others are looking to determine by what authority I speak about the Qur'an, thereby establishing how much credence they should place in what I have to say and to some extent allowing them to slot me into one of the convenient categories of apologist, detractor, heretic or zealot. After all, if I can be pigeonholed, the individual avoids the work of having to listen/read and think about the views that I am expressing.
One young Muslim woman told me that she and her husband had read through my first book (Reading the Qur'an in English) twice, and had spent a good amount of time discussing its content, all the while looking for clues that would help them determine my religious identity. They concluded that, while I certainly had an impressive understanding of the Qur'an, because I left some questions unanswered and appeared to advocate the questioning of some generally accepted precepts, I was not a Muslim. From my perspective, I was ecstatic. I had managed to get two people to carefully read through what I had to say, discuss it at length and draw some conclusions about their understanding of what it meant to be a Muslim. What more could I want?
Looking back over the past several years, the question usually arises when I am teaching courses on Islam or the Qur'an, when I am giving public lectures on these topics, and when I am being interviewed about my books. Both Muslims and non-Muslims have asked. My answer is always the same: "I don't answer that question, because I do not want to introduce any sort of bias into the reception of me or my ideas." I do however wonder at the motivation for asking.
While I'm sure that some people are merely curious, as if to say, "Robert Campbell doesn't sound like a Muslim name," I also suspect that others are looking to determine by what authority I speak about the Qur'an, thereby establishing how much credence they should place in what I have to say and to some extent allowing them to slot me into one of the convenient categories of apologist, detractor, heretic or zealot. After all, if I can be pigeonholed, the individual avoids the work of having to listen/read and think about the views that I am expressing.
One young Muslim woman told me that she and her husband had read through my first book (Reading the Qur'an in English) twice, and had spent a good amount of time discussing its content, all the while looking for clues that would help them determine my religious identity. They concluded that, while I certainly had an impressive understanding of the Qur'an, because I left some questions unanswered and appeared to advocate the questioning of some generally accepted precepts, I was not a Muslim. From my perspective, I was ecstatic. I had managed to get two people to carefully read through what I had to say, discuss it at length and draw some conclusions about their understanding of what it meant to be a Muslim. What more could I want?
Sunday, February 20, 2011
A Day Late
Well, here I am, only six weeks into this blog, and already I am a day late in posting. I could make all kinds of excuses, such as the fact that I have a new computer and I have spent an inordinate amount of time trying to transfer files and get everything set up the way I want it - which is all true - but it is certainly no excuse. I could also say that I wasn't in the mood for writing, but I am almost never in the mood for writing, and that doesn't prevent me from doing it on a regular basis. I could say that I used up all of my energy yesterday shoveling snow - again quite true and very frustrating - but still not really an excuse. I did some reading and I even watched some TV, but I had plenty of time to write a blog entry. I just got lazy and decided it could wait.
Saturday, February 12, 2011
Tragedy of the Commons
Happy to say that my video is receiving a good number of views, primarily from within Canada, but increasingly from Europe, Asia and the Middle East.
The print copies of "Women, War & Hypocrites" should be arriving this coming week, so that means distributing copies to potential reviewers and local media, as well as getting ready for an official launch event.
However, today's task is teaching my MBA students about the tragedy of the commons. Among the issues to be discussed are: how can we allow unchecked population growth when we live in a finite world where many essential resources are nearly exhausted, and can conscience and rationality trump the basic human tendency toward unbridled self-interest.
In my view, we are on the brink of a population crisis that will see up to one-third of the world's people vanish in the next three to five years. Some of this will be from disease, but I think that most of it will be the consequence of natural disasters such as earthquakes and massive flooding. Of course, a good deal of the extreme weather patterns experienced around the globe are a direct result of the human exploitation of natural resources and the pollution related to the processing and use of these resources.
I am not a pessimist or a doomsayer, I'm a pragmatic realist.
The print copies of "Women, War & Hypocrites" should be arriving this coming week, so that means distributing copies to potential reviewers and local media, as well as getting ready for an official launch event.
However, today's task is teaching my MBA students about the tragedy of the commons. Among the issues to be discussed are: how can we allow unchecked population growth when we live in a finite world where many essential resources are nearly exhausted, and can conscience and rationality trump the basic human tendency toward unbridled self-interest.
In my view, we are on the brink of a population crisis that will see up to one-third of the world's people vanish in the next three to five years. Some of this will be from disease, but I think that most of it will be the consequence of natural disasters such as earthquakes and massive flooding. Of course, a good deal of the extreme weather patterns experienced around the globe are a direct result of the human exploitation of natural resources and the pollution related to the processing and use of these resources.
I am not a pessimist or a doomsayer, I'm a pragmatic realist.
Saturday, February 5, 2011
Call to Prayer
Check out this video that I posted a few days ago on YouTube. The audio portion is a recording of me reciting the Islamic call to prayer (adhan), and the video is a slide show of recent and historic photos of Cape Breton Island, where I live. At the end of the video, I provide a shot of the covers of my two books on the Qur'an, as well as the url for my home page, so that you can get more information about me and my work.
My new book Women, War & Hypocrites is now available from Amazon.com (USA), .ca (Canada), .co.uk (United Kingdom) and .de (Germany). Basically, the book describes how to approach reading the English text of the Qur'an to gain insight into the way in which matters pertaining to women (e.g., marriage, inheritance, hijab and wife beating), war (e.g., killing, battle, jihad and terrorism) and hypocrites (e.g., People of the Book, intoxication and the crucifixion of Jesus) are covered, especially in the fourth surah (chapter) of the Qur'an, known as The Women. Rather than attempt to tell you what the Qur'an says about these matters, I try to help you to develop your own understanding of the text.
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