Mon intime conviction – Auteur

Tariq Ramadan est un intellectuel, islamologue, professeur et universitaire à Oxford, Suisse d'origine égyptienne.

Son œuvre s'articule sur une réflexion théologique, philosophique et politique en lien avec la religion musulmane, les spiritualités et les différentes philosophies. Il est engagé depuis plusieurs années dans le débat concernant l’islam en Occident et dans le monde.

Famille

En 1949, Hassan El-Banna, le grand-père de Tariq, fondateur des Frères musulmans, pourchassé sur ordre du roi égyptien Farouk, est assassiné pour ses activités politiques. En 1958, Wafa el-Banna, la mère de Tariq, part se réfugier en Suisse avec son mari Saïd Ramadan. Ils trouvent refuge à Genève, où naissent leurs enfants Tariq et Hani. Tariq est né le 26 août 1962.

 

Etudes

• Tariq Ramadan a étudié la philosophie et la littérature française à l'Université de Genève.
• Après sa thèse de doctorat sur Nietzsche, il a obtenu une maîtrise de lettres en philosophie et littérature française.
• Ensuite, il a obtenu un doctorat en Islamologie - Arabe.
• Entre 1988 et 1992, il a occupé le poste de doyen au Collège de Saussure, à Genève.
• Il a étudié ensuite les sciences islamiques à l’université al-Azhar au Caire entre 1992-1993 puis 1994-1995.

 

Carrière

 

Année	Evénement/Activité
A partir de 1992	Donner des conférences en France.
En 1993 et 1994	Participer au congrès de l’Union des organisations islamiques de France (UOIF).
De 1996 à 2003	Donner des cours d'islamologie à l'université de Fribourg.
Au début de l’année 2004	L’université catholique de Notre-Dame à South Bend dans l'Indiana lui offre une double chaire permanente de sciences islamiques.
	Enseigner sur « les relations entre les religions, les conflits et la promotion de la paix » dans le Joan B. Kroc Institute.
En août 2004	Il a été empêché d’entrer aux USA par le gouvernement Américain.
En janvier 2010	Le Département d'État des États-Unis prend la décision, dans un document signé par la Secrétaire d'État Hillary Clinton, de ne plus considérer comme recevables les raisons qui empêchaient M. Ramadan d’entrer aux Etats-Unis.
Pendant l'été 2005	Invité par visiting scholar à l'université d'Oxford pour participer à un groupe de réflexion, fondé par Tony Blair sur le problème de l'extrémisme islamique au Royaume-Uni, suite aux attentats survenus à Londres le 7 juillet 2005.
À partir du 1er septembre 2009	Nommé à une chaire d'études islamiques contemporaines à l'Oriental Faculty de l'Université d'Oxford et est également attaché au St Antony’s College, de la même université.
Depuis 2009	Professeur des sciences islamiques contemporaines au département des Sciences islamiques de la faculté du Qatar (attaché à la Qatar Foundation)
	Chercheur (Senior Fellow) à l'université de Doshisha (Kyoto, Japon).

 

Distinctions

• Nommé en 2000 comme l'un des sept innovateurs religieux du XXI^e siècle par Time Magazine (États-Unis).
• Élu comme l'une des 100 personnes les plus influentes du monde en 2004 par Time Magazine (États-Unis).
• Élu européen de l'an 2006 par EuropeanVoice.
• Nommé parmi les 100 intellectuels les plus influents du monde en 2006, 2008, 2009 et 2010 (Prospect Magazine UK et Foreign Policy USA).
• Récompensé d'une étoile de distinction dans le Publishers Weekly pour « What I believe » (traduction anglaise de Mon intime conviction). 
• Il reçoit en 2007 le prix d'excellence décerné par le journal britannique Muslim News.

 

Bibliographie

 

Livre	Edition	Année
L'Islam et le réveil arabe	Presses du Châtelet	Novembre 2011
Mon intime conviction	Presses du Châtelet	Octobre 2009
Islam, la réforme radicale, éthique et libération	Presses du Châtelet	Octobre 2008
Muhammad, Vie du Prophète	Presses du Châtelet	Octobre 2008
Les musulmans d'occident et l'avenir de l'islam	Sindbad	Janvier 2003
Musulmans d'Occident : Construire et Contribuer	Tawhid	Septembre 2002
Islam : Le face à face des civilisations - Quel projet pour quelle modernité ?	Tawhid	Septembre 2001
Musulman européen : Étude des sources islamiques à la lumière du contexte européen	Tawhid	Septembre 1999
Les Musulmans dans la laïcité : Responsabilités et droits des Musulmans dans les sociétés occidentales	Tawhid	1994 (2e éd. Sept. 1998)

Source:

Wikipedia

Steve Jobs – Extraits

Je suis actuellement en train de lire la biographie du co-fondateur et ex-PDG d’Apple « Steve Jobs ». Le livre est vraiment très intéressant et mérite d’être lu, je vais donc partager avec vous quelques extraits pour vous donner une idée sur le livre et vous inciter à le lire.

 

Les deux Steve : Jobs et Wozniak

La Blue Box posa entre eux les bases du partenariat à venir : Wozniak serait le gentil magicien, qui viendrait avec ses inventions de génie et Jobs imaginerait comment les présenter, les rendre conviviales, et les lancerait sur le marché pour gagner de l’argent.

Ironie du sort

Plus tard dans la vie, quand il eut précisément l’âge auquel son père biologique l’avait abandonné (vingt-trois ans), Steve Jobs fit de même avec son propre enfant – même si, après quelques années, il en assumera la paternité.

Quête de soi

Régime végétarien et bouddhisme zen, méditation et spiritualité, acide et rock and roll – Steve Jobs menait tout de front, à mille pour cent, comme le voulaient l’époque et la quête de l’illumination qui animait les campus.

Apple : Origines du nom

« J’étais dans la phase « pommes » de mon régime, expliqua-t-il. Je revenais de la plantation de pommiers. Je trouvais ce nom drôle et sympathique, et pas intimidant. Apple mangea finalement le mot « computer ». En plus, cela nous plaçait avant Atari dans l’annuaire ! » Il posa un ultimatum : si Wozniak n’avait pas une meilleure idée d’ici le lendemain après-midi, ce serait Apple. Et Apple ce fut.

Steve Jobs Manager

Certains développeurs de l’équipe jugeaient Jobs impossible à vivre dans le travail : « Steve crée de la tension, des dissensions, et harcèle tout le monde plutôt que de faire tampon, écrivait un collaborateur dans une note pour Raskin en Décembre 1980. J’aime discuter avec lui, vraiment, j’admire ses idées, sa vision à long terme, son énergie. Mais il génère une atmosphère pourrie qui ne me convient pas. Moi, j’ai besoin de soutien et de sérénité. »

Champ de Distorsion de la Réalité

« Le CDR était un mélange troublant de charisme et de force mentale ; c’est la volonté de plier les faits pour qu’ils entrent dans le moule. Si un argument ne faisait pas mouche, Steve passait aussitôt au suivant. Au besoin, il vous prenait de court et adoptait soudain votre point de vue, comme si cela avait toujours été le sien, et sans jamais reconnaître qu’il était d’un avis contraire la seconde précédente ».

L’ambiance dans Apple

La rivalité entre les différentes équipes était réelle, mais non dénuée d’humour, comme ce drapeau de pirates qui flottait sur le toit du Bandley 3, le bâtiment du département Macintosh. Quand Jobs s’était vanté que ses développeurs travaillaient quatre-vingt-dix heures par semaine, Debi Coleman avait fait imprimer les fameux tee-shirts : « Quatre-vingt-dix heures par semaine et on aime ça ! » Le groupe Lisa, pour ne pas être en reste, sortit des tee-shirts : « On travaille soixante-dix heures par semaine, mais nous on sort notre produit ! » L’équipe Apple II, qui, tout indolente qu’elle fût, était la seule à rapporter de l’argent à la Pomme, répliqua : « Nous, on travaille soixante heures et on finance le Lisa et le Mac ! ».

Jobs vs Gates

Jobs croyait à l’intégration pyramidale matériel/logiciel, qui imposait de construire des machines incompatibles avec les autres. Gates, au contraire (et c’était la voie la plus rentable), croyait en un monde horizontal où les ordinateurs des différents fabricants seraient tous compatibles – tous tournant sur le même système d’exploitation (le Windows de Microsoft) – et pourraient utiliser n’importe quelle application (telle Excel ou Word, de Microsoft encore).

Enfin, il est à noter que le livre contient plus de 600 pages, donc il me faudra un peu de temps pour terminer sa lecture et faire son analyse. Entre temps, je vais publier très prochainement, l’analyse d’un autre livre que j’ai récemment terminé, il s’agit de « Mon intime conviction » de Tariq Ramadan.

Amal.

Detective stories, are they a waste of time?

As you can see in “My favourite books” section of this blog, the first book in the list is “And then there were none”, it’s a detective story and one of the best sellers of Agatha Christie. I thought first to write a review for this novel, but I decided not to do because what matters in this kind of novels is suspense, so a review wouldn’t be interesting for you, because if you decide to read the novel, it will be like watching a movie for the second time! Maybe a short summary later will be enough just to give you an idea about the book.

It’s true that many people believe that reading this kind of books isn’t really useful, and more than that, they consider it as a waste of time, but personally, I think it has many positive sides:

1. Developing our imagination

While reading a detective story, instead of waiting for the truth to be revealed at the end, the reader can take the place of the detective, start thinking like him and try to find out the guilty. It’s very funny and very useful because it makes our little grey cells work!!!

* Little grey cells: the famous sentence of Hercule Poirot, a fictional Belgian detective created by Agatha Christie.

2. Changing the mood

When we are used to reading serious books such as politics, history, NLP and Economy books, we can feel at one point that we need to relax, so why not to read something light and enjoyable? It’s better than stopping reading, because at least it will help us keep up our pace.

In my opinion, a detective story is the best choice we can make, because it’s very easy to read and doesn’t require a big effort. Even when we try to play the detective role, it remains very amusing!

3. Picking up new information

Sir Conan Doyle, the writer of the famous “Sherlock Holmes” was a Physician. Agatha Christie worked as a nurse during the First World War, and married an archaeologist. Those writers used their life experience and their knowledge in their stories, so the details they gave in their cases are real, and we can learn a lot from them.

For example, those novels can contain medical information such us poisons effects and symptoms of different illnesses, or information about archaeology, such as customs and traditions of ancient cultures or some events related to historical monuments or artefacts.

Furthermore, in some of their stories, crime writers provide an overview of the political, economical and historical environment where their characters live, this information is also inspired from reality, so I think it's very interesting to know.

4. Discovering Human nature

The writers of detective stories give a big importance to the psychology of their characters. As we know all, the human nature is very complicated, and it’s very normal to find a villain and an innocent side inside each of us, but it’s the way we deal with them that determine our actions.

In those novels, we learn not to trust appearances and not to judge people until we live with them and know them more closely.

Another little detail I’ve learned from Hercule Poirot is that people tend to talk about their problems, their thoughts and their pasts with strangers because they have no interests in common, so they won’t judge them or criticize them or use this information against them one day. This is how Hercule Poirot solves his cases; he knows how to talk to people and make them trust him.

5. Learning Languages

Most of detective stories look like pieces of theatre, since they contain especially dialogue, and this dialogue is often written in familiar language. 

So, for people who want to learn more practical English or French and acquire new expressions, it’s a good idea to read this kind of books.

In the end, I hope that I've succeded in changing your vision about detective stories, and I look forward to reading your interventions.

Have a good week end all!

Amal.

Vanished - Review

Number of pages, Edition house

375 pages, CORGI BOOKS.

Narrator
The author herself.

Characters

Principal characters:

• Marielle: The principal character.
• Charles Delaunay: The first husband of Marielle.
• Malcolm Petterson: The second husband of Marielle.
• Teddy: Marielle and Malcolm’s son, he vanished from the house without a trace.
• Bea Ritter: A journalist who believed in Charles innocence and tried to reveal the truth.
• John Taylor: The FBI inspector, when he started investigating about Teddy’s kidnapping, he fell in love with Marielle.
• Bill Palmer: The U.S. Attorney, he wanted to condemn Charles of Teddy’s kidnapping.
• Tom Armour: Charles’s attorney, he started have feelings for Marielle after knowing her.
• Brigitte Sanders: The secretary and the mistress of Malcolm.

Secondary characters:

• André: Marielle and Charles‘s son, he died when he was 2 years old.
• Marielle’s parents
• Charles’s father
• Malcolm Servants
• The witness Louie the Lover
• The Sergeant O'Connor
• The judge Morrison
• The jury members

Summary

The novel is about a young woman called Marielle, at the age of 18, she was living in Paris with her parents. She falls in love with a certain Charles Delaunay, an independent person who leads a free life and participates in wars to defend human principles, without her parent’s permission, they elope and get married.

One year later, she gives birth to a baby, “André”. During the family holidays, this latter dies by drowning. Charles can’t bear this situation and bits her wife until she loses her fetus. Instead of supporting her, he starts blaming her for the death of both children that she becomes mentally ill.

When she leaves the mental hospital, she goes back to New York and works as a secretary for her father’s friend. Malcolm Patterson was a rich man and much older than she was, he was also very kind and gentle with her that she accepts his proposal of marriage, but without telling him about her past. After their marriage, she discovers that the only wish of her husband is to have children, which his ex-wives couldn’t do. Two years later, she becomes pregnant, and gives birth to “Teddy”.

One day, Marielle and Charles meet accidentally in the Saint Patrick’s church at the anniversary of their children's death. The next day, when she is with her child in the zoo, she meets Charles again, and he becomes very angry at her when he knows that she has a child of another man, and then he starts threatening her.

In the next evening, the child is kidnapped from his own room without any trace. He just vanishes!

The investigations last more than 3 months without any result, the only suspected was Charles, especially after finding the child bear and pajamas in his house.

In the trial, the case takes another direction, instead of searching the child, Malcolm and the U.S. attorney start revealing Marielle’s past to convince the jury that she wasn’t a good Mom and that she was the mean reason of the child disappearance. But a journalist called Bea Ritter who believes in Charles innocence, the FBI inspector John Taylor who starts loving Marielle, and Tom Armour, the Charles’s Attorney achieve their investigations until they find the child in a boat sailing to Europe, they discover, later, that it’s his father Malcolm who arranged the whole story, in order to run away with his secretary and his son to Europe.

Marielle feels happy to have her son back, becomes free of her husband and decides to start a new life with her child and maybe another man, Tom Armour.

Principal ideas

1. Marielle has been married twice, and both experiences were unsuccessful :

• The first marriage was based only in love, which is not always enough. The couple was so young to assume the responsibility of a family, they were still independent, crazy, and without experience.
• The second marriage was based on bad intentions, Marielle had no family, so she considered her husband as a father, a protector since he was rich, old and he had a good life experience. In the other side, Malcolm married her only to have children and because she is a week person and easy to control.

2. Because of Marielle’s weakness and depression, she gives to her husbands the opportunity to manipulate her and to control her life and her feelings as they like.

Writing style

In the beginning, the author focuses on narration and description in order to draw a clear picture of her characters, and to make us live the story, and I think she succeeded in this.

Later, she started introducing dialogue, especially during the investigations and the trial; which helps the reader follow closely the story events. The novel becomes then like a piece of theatre, which I find enjoyable.

Points of agreement

1. The decision of marriage is not as simple as it seems, there are many conditions a couple should meet before making such a decision:

• To be mature and able to shoulder the responsibility of a family.
• To have good intentions and reasons to marry (help each other to improve, achieve dreams together…)
• To have interests in common and similar social backgrounds.
• In a relationship, Love alone is not enough, and money and safety alone are either not enough. Both are important.
• Each one should respect the other and be able to forgive his mistakes.

2. The experience that doesn’t kill us makes us stronger: Every experience in our lives should be considered as an opportunity to learn, to know the world more and to be stronger. Our weakness and depression let others take control of us, and use us to achieve their intentions at the expense of ours. 

3. The description of characters was fantastic, the author painted their physical and emotional features with such a professionalism and ingenuity.

Points of disagreement

1. Marielle started having feelings for Taylor, the FBI inspector, when she was still married to Malcolm, and she expressed her feelings too. I think that nothing could justify that a woman betrays her husband even if he is bad, she’d better ask for divorce before thinking of another man, and as if that were not enough, this man was already married!

2.There is no real suspense in the novel because the reader can easily expect the end of the story; it’s disappointing especially if we know that the novel is considered as a thriller!

Evaluation

It’s true that the novel treats important social issues, but as a thriller, it contains no suspense, so I rate the book 2/5.

                                                                                                    

Vanished - Author

Danielle Steel

Danielle Fernandes Dominique Schuelein-Steel (born August 14, 1947), better known as Danielle Steel, is an American romantic novelist and author of mainstream dramas.

Steel has sold more than 800 million copies of her books (as of 2005) worldwide and is the fourth best selling writer of all time, and is currently the best-selling author alive. Her novels have been on the New York Times bestseller list for over 390 consecutive weeks and 22 have been adapted for television.

Early life

Steel was born in New York City, the only child of Norma da Câmara Stone dos Reis and John Schulein-Steel. Her father was a German Jewish immigrant, and her mother, born in Portugal, was the daughter of a diplomat.

Steel was raised Catholic and had wanted to be a nun during her early years. Her parents divorced when she was eight, and she was raised primarily in New York City and Europe by her father, rarely seeing her mother.

Steel started writing stories as a child, and by her late teens had begun writing poetry. A graduate of the “Lycée Française de New York”, class of 1963, she studied literature design and fashion design, first at “Parsons School of Design” in 1963 and then at “New York University” from 1963 to 1967. 

Personal life

Steel has been married 5 times, and she had 7 children from his first, second and fourth marriages, Beatrix (1966), Nicholas (born in 1678 and committed suicide in 1997 as a result of bipolar disorder), Samantha (April 14, 1982), Victoria (September 5, 1983), Vanessa (December 18, 1984), Max (February 10, 1986) and Zara (September 26, 1987).

Steel's longtime residence was in San Francisco, but she now spends most of her time at a second home in Paris.

Career

• While Steel was still attending New York University, she began writing, completing her first manuscript the following year, when she was nineteen.

• In 1966, Steel worked for a public relations agency in New York called Supergirls for several years. A magazine client was highly impressed with her freelance articles and encouraged her to focus on writing and suggested she write a book, which she did.
  

• Most of her books were born from her serial marriages, such as Going home (1972), Passion’s Promises (1977), The promises (1978), The Klone and I (1998).

• In 1984, Steel contributed to her first non-fiction work Having a Baby and featured a chapter about suffering through miscarriage.Steel also ventured into children's fiction by writing "Max and Martha" series (1989-1991) and "Freddie" series (1992).

• To honor the memory of her son Nicholas, Steel wrote the non-fiction book His Bright Light about Nick's life and death.

• Steel's novels have been translated into 28 languages and can be found in 47 countries across the globe, and 22 of her books have been adapted for television, including two that have received Golden Globe nominations.

• Her novels sometimes explore the world of the "rich and famous" and frequently deal with serious life issues, like illness, death, loss, family crises, war and relationships.
  

• In recent years, Steel has also been willing to take more risks with her plots. Ransom focuses more on suspense than romance, and follows three sets of seemingly unconnected characters as their lives begin to intersect.

• In 1998, Steel sold the rights of her novel The Ghost to Columbia Pictures, and in 2005, she reached an agreement with New Line Home Entertainment to sell the film rights to 30 of her novels for DVDs.

• Steel is a prolific author, often releasing several books per year. Each book takes 2½ years to complete, so Steel has developed an ability to juggle up to five projects at once, researching one book while outlining another, then writing and editing additional books.

Honors & Awards 

• In 1981, Steel has been a near-permanent fixture on the New York Times hardcover and paperback bestsellers lists.

• In 1989, she was listed in the Guinness Book of World Records for having a book on the New York Times Bestseller List for the most consecutive weeks of any author - 381 consecutive weeks at that time.

• In 2002, Steel was decorated by the French government as an Officier of the Ordre des Arts et des Lettres, for her contributions to world culture.

• She has additionally received:

1. Induction into the California Hall of Fame, December 2009.
2. "Distinguished Service in Mental Health Award" (first time awarded to a non-physician) from New York Presbyterian Hospital, Department of Psychiatry and Columbia University Medical School and Cornell Medical College, May 2009.
3. "Outstanding Achievement Award" for work with adolescents from Larkin Street Youth Services in San Francisco, May 2003.
4. "Service to Youth Award" for improving the lives of mentally ill adolescents and children from the University of San Francisco Catholic Youth Organization and St. Mary's Medical Center, November 1999.
5. "Outstanding Achievement Award" in Mental Health from the California Psychiatric Association 
6. "Distinguished Service Award" from the American Psychiatric Association

Bibliograpy

• Golden Moments –1979
• The Ring – 1980
• Remembrance – 1981
• Secrets – 1985
• Jewels – 1992
• Vanished – 1993
• Malice – 1996
• Mirror Image – 1998
• Lone Eagle – 2001
• Second Chance – 2004
• Sisters – 2007
• A good women – 2008
• Legacy – 2010
• Betrayal – 2012

Source : Wikipedia

How to apply the KAIZEN approach to Reading?

Kaizen (改善) in Japanese is the fusion of two words, “Kai” and “Zen” which mean respectively “Change” and “Good”, the whole word means then "improvement" or "change for the better".

This approach focuses on little continuous improvements to reach a big goal, and it has been used in different fields such us manufacturing, engineering, management, healthcare, etc.

Kaizen is not a methodology, it’s a state of mind based on the following principles:

-         Do it better, make it best, improve it

-         Better than yesterday, less good than tomorrow

Thus, if you have a goal, you’d better break it down into small daily steps, this will help you be always in touch with your goal and not give it up.

So, how can we use this approach in reading?

Let’s suppose that you want to acquire the habit of reading, in this case, you can use the Kaizen approach by starting reading for 10 minutes a day, which is very easy I guess, and then increase the reading time progressively.

Now, if you have already the habit of reading, but you think that you don’t read enough or you want to increase your reading speed, in this case, you can set an annual challenge by defining the number of books you want to read, and then divide this goal into monthly and daily goals. For example, to finish 12 books within a year, one book is required every month, and the number of pages per day can be defined depending on the book size.

I hope that you’ll find this tip useful and I look forward to reading your comments.

Amal.