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Hire Dr. Walter Y.

Canada

USD 200 /hr

Senior Researcher and Lecturer: Islamic Argumentation Theory, Legal Theory, Substantive Law, and Intellectual History

Profile Summary

I am a senior researcher and lecturer in Islamic argumentation & debate theory, Islamic law & legal theory, and Islamicate Intellectual History more broadly; currently I hold the position of Senior Researcher (Islamic Argumentation Theory) in “RevLog Redux”, the 2024 European Research Council (ERC) Synergy Grant project “Logic in Reverse Redux. Illegitimate Argumentative Moves in the Arabic, Byzantine, Hebrew and Latin Medieval Traditions”. A core member of a larger movement to research, revive, and practice the Islamic sciences of critical thinking—especially dialectical debate methods (jadal / munāẓara / ādāb al-baḥth)—I am backed by a broad, international network of like-minded scholars, with ongoing and planned collaborations for decades of critical research and teaching in the argumentative sciences of Islam. I am the author of The Dialectical Forge (Springer, 2017) and some two dozen published and forthcoming articles and book chapters, and to date I have enjoyed well over a decade of international post-doctoral research and teaching appointments, conference invitations, and collaborations, all thanks to a number of funding bodies and benefactors.

Few would disagree our world is desperately in need of rational, ethical, “truth-seeking” models for argumentation and debate; and it has already proven valuable for modern theorists to mine the rich vein of argumentation and debate methods produced by over 1,000 years of refined Islamicate scholarship. My driving objective remains to bring these methods to light, to analyze them, to make them accessible, and—above all—to train a new cadre of critical thinkers in their practice.

Subject Matter Expertise

Services

Writing
Research
Consulting

Writing Technical Writing, General Proofreading & Editing, Translation

Research Fact Checking, Scientific and Technical Research, Systematic Literature Review

Consulting Scientific and Technical Consulting

Work Experience

Senior Researcher (Islamic Argumentation Theory): ERC SYNERGY GRANT RevLog Redux

McGill University, Institute of Islamic Studies

May 2025 - Present

Senior Researcher (Islamic Argumentation Theory): ERC SYNERGY GRANT « RevLog Redux »

McGill University

May 2025 - Present

Professor: Central Questions in Islamic Law

McGill University

2024 - 2024

Researcher & Consultant

Université de Lille

2020 - 2024

Research Associate:

McGill University

2017 - 2024

Professor: Islamic Law and Society

Concordia University

2023 - 2023

Professor: Central Questions in Islamic Law

McGill University

2020 - 2020

Postdoctoral Research Fellow

Rheinische Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität Bonn

2016 - 2017

Visiting Research Fellow

Ruhr-Universität Bochum

2015 - 2016

Research Officer

University of Oxford

2014 - 2015

Research Associate

McGill University

2012 - 2014

Visiting Fellow

Harvard University

2013 - 2013

Education

Ph.D., Islamic Studies (Institute of Islamic Studies)

McGill University

2006 - 2012

M.A., Islamic Studies (Institute of Islamic Studies )

McGill University

2002 - 2006

B.A., Studio and Visual Arts, Minor: Religious Studies

Hamilton College

1990 - 1994

Certifications

TEFL

ITC International

June 1999 - Present

Publications

BOOK CHAPTER

Walter Edward Young (2025). Four Moves to Rule Them All: Qiyās-Dialectic Metatheories and the Ascendancy of Master-Category Objections in Post-Classical Islamic Dialectics . Logic, Soul, and World.

Walter Edward Young (2024). The Insufficiency of Concomitance Alone . Islamic Law in Context.

Shahid Rahman, Walter Edward Young (2023). Outside the Logic of Necessity: Deontic Puzzles and ‘Breaking’ Compound Causal Properties in Islamic Legal Theory and Dialectic . Fallacies in the Arabic, Byzantine, Hebrew and Latin Traditions.

Walter Edward Young (2022). Foreword . Arsyad al-Banjari’s Insights on Parallel Reasoning and Dialectic in Law: The Development of Islamic Argumentation Theory in 18th Century Southeast Asia, by Muhammad Iqbal.

Shahid Rahman, Farid Zidani, Walter Edward Young (2022). Ibn Ḥazm on Heteronomous Imperatives. A Landmark in the History of the Logical Analysis of Norms . Synthese Library.

Walter Edward Young (2022). The Formal Evolution of Islamic Juridical Dialectic: A Brief Glimpse . Logic, Argumentation & Reasoning.

Walter Edward Young (2022). “Molla Fenârî and Pre-Imperial Ottoman Argumentation Theory.”. Osmanlı’da İlm-i Mantık ve Münazara.

(2021). Dialectic in the religious sciences . Encyclopaedia of Islam, THREE.

Walter Edward Young, Shahid Rahman , Farid Zidani (2021). “It Ought to be Forbidden! Islamic Heteronomous Imperatives and the Dialectical Forge.”. Lógica, Conocimiento y Abducción. Homenaje a Ángel Nepomuceno.

Walter Edward Young (2020). Foreword . Islamic Disputation Theory: The Uses & Rules of Argument in Medieval Islam, by Larry Miller.

Walter Edward Young (2019). Concomitance to Causation: Arguing Dawarān in the Proto-Ādāb al-Baḥth . Philosophy and Jurisprudence in the Islamic World.

Walter Edward Young (2014). “Karakī, ʿAlī al-.” .

Walter Edward Young (2013). “Origins of Islamic Law.” . Oxford Encyclopedias of the Islamic World: Digital Collection.

Walter Edward Young (2013). “Uṣūl al-Fiqh.” . Oxford Encyclopedias of the Islamic World: Digital Collection.

JOURNAL ARTICLE

Shahid Rahman, Walter Edward Young (2022). Argumentation and Arabic Philosophy of Language : Introduction . Méthodos.

Shahid Rahman, Walter Edward Young (2022). In Existence and in Nonexistence: Types, Tokens, and the Analysis of Dawarān as a Test for Causation . Méthodos.

Walter Edward Young (2022). On the Logical Machinery of Post-Classical Dialectic: The Kitāb ʿAyn al-Naẓar of Shams al-Dīn al-Samarqandī (d. 722/1322) . Méthodos.

Walter Edward Young (2018). Al-Samarqandī’s Third Masʾala . Oriens.

Walter Edward Young (2016). Mulāzama in Action in the Early Ādāb al-Baḥth . Oriens.

BOOK REVIEW

Walter E. Young (2021). Logic of Law Making in Islam: Women and Prayer in the Legal Tradition. By Behnam Sadeghi . Journal of the American Oriental Society.

OTHER

Walter Edward Young (2019). Kitāb ʿAyn al-Naẓar fī ʿIlm al-Jadal by Shams al-Dīn al-Samarqandī (d. 722/1322) Edition and Translation: Walter Edward Young TEI infrastructure and interface design: Frederik Elwert TEI encoding: Frederik Elwert and Walter Edward Young .

BOOK

Walter Edward Young (2017). The Dialectical Forge . Springer International Publishing.

level-one heading

Senior Researcher and Lecturer: Islamic Argumentation Theory, Legal Theory, Substantive Law, and Intellectual History

Senior Researcher (Islamic Argumentation Theory): ERC SYNERGY GRANT RevLog Redux

McGill University, Institute of Islamic Studies

Senior Researcher (Islamic Argumentation Theory): ERC SYNERGY GRANT « RevLog Redux »

McGill University

Professor: Central Questions in Islamic Law

McGill University

Researcher & Consultant

Université de Lille

Research Associate:

McGill University

Professor: Islamic Law and Society

Concordia University

Professor: Central Questions in Islamic Law

McGill University

Postdoctoral Research Fellow

Rheinische Friedrich-Wilhelms-Universität Bonn

Visiting Research Fellow

Ruhr-Universität Bochum

Research Officer

University of Oxford

Research Associate

McGill University

Visiting Fellow

Harvard University

Ph.D., Islamic Studies (Institute of Islamic Studies)

McGill University

M.A., Islamic Studies (Institute of Islamic Studies )

McGill University

B.A., Studio and Visual Arts, Minor: Religious Studies

Hamilton College

TEFL

ITC International