Lucian Stone is Assistant Professor in the Department of Philosophy and Religion at the University of North Dakota, USA.

Since cosmopolitanism has often been conceived as a tenet of 'Western civilization' that emanates from its Enlightenment-based origins in a humanist age of modernity, Iranian Identity and Cosmopolitanism: Spheres of Belonging advances a highly innovative gesture by contemplating the implications and relevance of the idea in a so-called non-Western cultural territory.

The particularities of the Iranian and Islamic context shed new light on advancements and obstacles to cosmopolitan praxis. The volume provides four principle disciplinary assessments of cosmopolitanism: philosophy, political science, sociology, and cultural studies,including literary criticism. The authors in this collection critically examine topics including the historical encounter between Iranian and Western thinkers and its impact on Iranian political ideals; the tension between maintaining apolitical-theology rooted in metaphysical assumptions and the prerequisite of secularism in cosmopolitan and democratic philosophies.

This highly innovative volume will be of interest to scholars and students of Middle Eastern and Iranian Studies, Islamic Studies, Globalization, Political Science and Philosophy.

Editor's Introduction: Farsi Shekar Ast: Heterogeneity, Disorientation, Cosmopolitanism, Lucian Stone (University of North Dakota, USA)
1. Iranian Intellectuals and Cosmopolitan Citizenship, Ramin Jahanbegloo (University of Toronto, Canada)
2. Metaphysics, Secularism, and Cosmopolitan Democracy, Alireza Shomali (Wheaton College, USA) and Ebrahim K.Soltani (Eastern Michigan University, USA)
3. On the Assumed Dichotomy in the Structure of the Islamic Republic of Iran and the Unbearable Burden of Being an Intellectual in Iran, Reza Afshari (Pace University, USA)
4. Cosmopolitan Resistance and Territorial Suppression: A Story of Dissidence and the Islamic Republic of Iran, Shahla Talebi (Arizona State University, USA)
5. Cosmopolitan Violence as Cosmological Reckoning: The Poetics of the Night-Raid, the Martyred Body, and the Execution-Spectacle, Jason Bahbak Mohaghegh (Babson College, USA)
6. Armenians in Iran, or the Limits of Cosmopolitanism, Nasrin Rahimieh (University of California Irvine,USA)
7. Cosmopolitanism: Neither For, Nor Against, To the Contrary, Farhang Erfani (American University, USA)
Appendix: On Cosmopolitanism, Bryan Lueck (Southern Illinois University Edwardsville, USA)
Bibliography
Index