Ilkka Lindstedt

Ilkka Lindstedt holds a PhD and title of docent in Arabic and Islamic Studies at the University of Helsinki. He has published studies on early Islam, Arabic historiography, and Arabic epigraphy. He is currently a Fellow at the Helsinki Collegium for Advanced Studies.

His current (2016–2019) research project at the Helsinki Collegium for Advanced Studies, “Early Islamic rock inscriptions as historical sources,” looks at Arabic epigraphical material through theories of identity formation and group behavior. He utilizes in particular the social identity approach, a framework developed in social psychology. Epigraphy is complemented with the Quran and other Arabic texts.

The argument put forward is that the Quran and Arabic epigraphy of the seventh century CE do not yet evince a distinctively Islamic identity or rites but, rather, the “Believers” (the name of the ingroup in the early sources) included some Jews and Christians. The Quran and epigraphy feature instances of intercommunal and intracommunal discourse and polemics that help to trace aspects and developments of the nascent identity.