Access Islam, an educational tool produced by WNET Channel Thirteen in New York City, is a tremendous resource for educators looking for ways to convey the rich history and practices of Islam to students in the fourth through eighth grades. While RealPlayer is required to watch the video segments, which originally aired on the PBS series, Religion & Ethics NewsWeekly, including documentary footage...

Created and maintained by the Ahlul Bayt Digital Islamic Library Project (DILP), this nice website is designed to facilitate access to high-quality resources related to Islamic history, law, practice, and the societies of various Muslim peoples. The homepage is well designed, as it provides a general search engine, and an option to browse the site and its materials in four different languages. For...

Since the events of September 11, 2001, Americans have done a great deal of soul-searching about what the future role the United States will play in international affairs. In many ways, any response to such an inquiry will contain many different layers and ideas. In April 2007, PBS began their investigations into this complex area by showing the first episode of "America at a Crossroads". Through...

This website from the Asia Society is actually two exhibitions in one: Traces of the Calligrapher and Writing the Word of God: Calligraphy and the Qur'an. The former focuses on the men and women who have practiced calligraphy, or beautiful writing, the most esteemed of the Islamic visual arts, while the latter provides a few samples of their craft. In the opening section, "Tools and Materials",...

Commentary on religion can be a touchy subject, and it's nice to find a place online where the commentary is both thoughtful and well-informed. The "Comment is Free" site created by the Guardian newspaper blends informed remarks on religion with the thoughts and viewpoints of visitors to the site. Front and center, visitors will come across "The Question". This area contains a weekly question that...

First appearing in 1893 at the Columbian Exposition in Chicago, the Council for a Parliament of the World's Religions (CPWR), is "recognized as the birth of formal interreligious dialogue worldwide." Since then, CPWR has had Parliaments in South Africa, Spain, and Chicago. This December the Parliament takes place in Melbourne, Australia, and includes speakers such as His Holiness the Dalai Lama...

Human Rights Watch, "the world's leading independent organizations dedicated to defending and protecting human rights", has a revealing report available on their website about the discrimination that has occurred against the Shia religious community in Saudi Arabia. The Report, found in the "Publications" tab of the website, can be read online in English or Arabic (click the yellow "L" near the...

A number of interesting digital projects have recently been sponsored by the National Science Foundation, and the Electronic Tools and Ancient Near Eastern Archives (ETANA) is one such project. With the support and primary documents of a number of important institutions, such as the Society of Biblical Literature and Case Western Reserve University, the mission of ETANA is to "develop and maintain...

In its 84-year history, the Council on Foreign Relations has published a number of important papers and publications dealing with a host of public policy issues, and this latest effort that addresses democracy in the Arab world should be of significant interest to many different groups. This particular report came from a Council-supported Task Force, co-chaired by former Secretary of State...

Under the banner of "Challenging Misconceptions, Illuminating Diversity", the University of Wisconsin-Madison's National Resource Centers and Wisconsin Public Radio's Here on Earth: Radio Without Borders have created this very thoughtful and probing website. The site contains links to the various broadcasts of Inside Islam from Wisconsin Public Radio, a weblog, a set of helpful external links, and...