kenan

about

I am a writer, lecturer and broadcaster. I am Senior Visting Fellow at the Department of Political, International and Policy Studies at the University of Surrey. I am a presenter of Analysis, BBC Radio 4's flagship current affairs programme and a panelist on the Moral Maze. I used to present Nightwaves on BBC Radio 3. I have also written and presented a number of radio and TV documentaries. My books include From Fatwa to Jihad (2009), Strange Fruit (2008), Man, Beast and Zombie (2000), and The Meaning of Race (1996).

I was born in India, brought up in Manchester and now live in London. I studied neurobiology (at the University of Sussex) and history and philosophy of science (at Imperial College, London). I was for a number of years a research psychologist at the Centre for Research into Perception and Cognition (CRPC) at the University of Sussex, working on problems of the mental representation of spatial relations. For the past decade, I have been an independent writer, lecturer, researcher and broadcaster.

Academically, my main areas of interest are the history of ideas; the history and philosophy of science; the philosophy of mind; theories of human nature; science policy; bioethics; political philosophy; religion; and race, immigration and multiculturalism.

Politically, I have long campaigned for equal rights, freedom of expression, and a secular society, and in defence of rationalism and humanism in the face of a growing culture of irrationalism, mysticism and mysanthropy. In the 1980s I was involved with various far left organsiations and antiracist campaigns including the Newham 7 campaign, the Colin Roach campaign and East London Workers Against Racism. I have written of how the Salman Rushdie affair helped transform my relationship with the left; the Rushdie affair gave early notice of the abandonment by many sections of the left of their traditional attachment to ideas of Enlightenment rationalism and secular universalism and their growing espousal of multiculturalism, identity politics and notions of cultural authenticity. As a result, much of my political campaigning over the past decade has been in defence of free speech, secularism and scientific rationalism.

I have written four books: The Meaning of Race: Race, History and Culture in Western Society (Palgrave / New York University Press, 1996); Man, Beast and Zombie: What Science Can and Cannot Tell Us About Human Nature (Weidenfeld & Nicolson [2000] / Rutgers University Press, [2002]) and Strange Fruit: Why Both Sides are Wrong in the Race Debate (Oneworld, 2008) and From Fatwa to Jihad: The Rushdie Affair and its Legacy (Atlantic, 2009).

The Meaning of Race, which AC Grayling hailed as 'important, cogent and illuminating', examines the historical development of the idea of race, and its philosophical and political roots. It also unpicks the relationship between racial thinking and contemporary multicultural and postmodern ideas.

Man, Beast and Zombie, described by the late Roy Porter as the 'most insightful and thoughtful account of the contemporary claims of science', looks at how the idea of the human has developed over time and explores the problems and limits of scientific explanations of human nature. It takes a particularly close look at the claims of evolutionary psychology and cognitive science.

Strange Fruit explores the relationship between the science of race and the politics of identity. Race, the book concludes, 'is not a rational, scientific category. Antiracism has become an irrational, anti-scientific philosophy. The challenge we face is to confront racial thinking while defending scientific rationality and promoting Enlightenment universality.' Andrew Anthony said of it in the Observer that 'few targets escape Malik's forensic intelligence'.

My latest book From Fatwa to Jihad: The Rushdie Affair and its Legacy (Atlantic, 2009) tells the story both of the Rushdie affair and of its transformative impact on cultural and political landscape of the West. The book explores the issues that the Rushide affair raised. in particular the questions of muliculturalism, radical Islam and free speech, and shows how in responding to these issues Western liberals have betrayed the fundamental beliefs of liberalism.

I have lectured at a number of universities in Britain, Europe and the USA. In 2003 I was a visiting fellow in the department of History and Philosophy of Science at the University of Melbourne, Australia. I am currently Senior Visting Fellow in the Department of Political, International and Policy Studies at the University of Surrey.

As well as writing and presenting Nightwaves on BBC Radio 3 and Analysis on BBC Radio 4, I have written and presented a number of TV documentaries, including Disunited Kingdom, Are Muslims Hated? (which was shortlisted for the Index on Censorship Freedom of Expression award), Let 'Em All In and Britain's Tribal Tensions. Other radio programmes I have made include 'Skullduggery' (BBC Radio 4, June 2006) and 'Man, Beast and Politics' (BBC Radio 4, November / December 2001).

I write a column for the Norwegian newspaper Bergens Tidende. I have also written for the Times, Guardian, Financial Times, Independent, Independent on Sunday, Sunday Times, Sunday Telegraph, Handelsblatt, Aftenposten, New Statesman, Prospect, TLS, THES, Nature and The Philosophers' Magazine.

I am a Fellow of the Royal Society of Arts.