This course will introduce students to the discourses on Islamic law and human rights. There has been an essential and lively debate on Islamic law and culture and their implications for human rights. Our goal is to study this debate and rigorously engage it. In this context, we will examine the debates in favor of universal human rights and cultural and religious relativism. We will focus on Islamic rights schemes and the arguments of their proponents and critics. We will also study human rights discourses of Muslim countries and the social and political contexts of these discourses. Furthermore, we will examine the human rights practices and arguments of certain groups, such as the Muslim Brotherhood, and Islamic countries such as Pakistan, Iran, Sudan and Saudi Arabia. Some of the topics covered will be the human rights implications of Islamic criminal law, family law, religious minorities and the position of women. We will conclude the course by examining the Islamic human rights discourse from a comparative perspective. No prior knowledge of Islam or Islamic history is necessary for this course. Some knowledge of International human rights law would be useful but not necessary. There are no required course prerequisites.