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Since perhaps as early as the Iranian hostage crisis of the 1970’s (with the advent of 24-hour news), and certainly since 2001 (with wider computer ownership and access to the internet), the most modern popular media treatments of Islam and Muslims have been  synonymous with images and narratives of violence and intolerance.  Recent events in Syria, Iraq and Nigeria, among others, have reinforced this widening perception.  Some scholars and researchers have sought to explain what is asserted to be the non-rational and violence-prone nature of religion generally, and Islam in particular.   William Cavanaugh in, The Myth of Religious Violence: Secular Ideology and the Roots of Modern Conflict challenges this premise and explores how the categories of ‘religion’ and ‘the secular’ were constructed to legitimize the modern nation-state monopoly on violence.  Arjun Appadurai in a collection of essays, Fear of Small Numbers takes a decidedly different approach and asserts that large-scale violence is a result of globalization and its handmaidens, fear and social uncertainties.The Journal of Islamic Law and Culture invites papers exploring these divergent points of view on the  historical, social, and political conceptions and roles of violence and religion, including examinations of religion as demarcating social and political boundaries, while globalization may deconstruct such boundaries, construction of religion and secular as social and political concepts, appropriation of the concepts of violence and religion by ideological and political actors, and how these examination may assist in understanding large-scale violence we see in Muslim lands today. Could either of these approaches deepen our knowledge or perhaps extend it? Is the current situation best explained as a fight between the secular state and religion or as one artifact of the era of globalization? Perhaps both of these approaches miss the mark and there is valuable information not taken into consideration. These are just suggestions and contributors may take any approach they wish.Manuscript submissions will be peer-reviewed, must be submitted in English, and be no more than 10,000 words and no less than 5,000 words, in 12 pt Times New Roman font, in MSWord format (no pdf documents, please), include an abstract of not more than 200 words (with key words, as applicable), use footnotes, not endnotes (Chicago Manual of Style, APA or Blue Book citation format), and include any tables or graphic exhibits.Manuscripts should be submitted to: jilc@depaul.edu or to:The Journal of Islamic Law &#38; CultureIslamic World Studies ProgramDePaul University2327 N. Racine AvenueChicago, Illinois 60614on or before March 31, 2015.  Please include the full name, affiliation, address, phone and email of all contributing authors.Please note:  The Journal is also accepting Book Review submissions in accordance with its focus on scholarly works in the areas of law, humanities, political and social sciences, as well as arts and culture, examining the Muslim experience in the global context.