{"id":9897,"date":"2026-09-01T12:42:00","date_gmt":"2026-09-01T11:42:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/virtuallyislamic.com\/vi2023\/?p=9897"},"modified":"2026-10-09T18:42:13","modified_gmt":"2026-10-09T17:42:13","slug":"situation-update","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/virtuallyislamic.com\/vi2023\/2026\/09\/01\/situation-update\/","title":{"rendered":"Situation Update"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"has-vivid-red-color has-text-color has-link-color has-large-font-size wp-elements-1 wp-block-paragraph\">Some personal news:<\/p>\n\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\">\n<figure class=\"aligncenter size-medium\"><img fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"246\" height=\"300\" src=\"https:\/\/virtuallyislamic.com\/vi2023\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/A-grb1995lah-4-246x300.jpg\" alt=\"Gary R. Bunt, Lahore, 1995\" class=\"wp-image-9902\" srcset=\"https:\/\/virtuallyislamic.com\/vi2023\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/A-grb1995lah-4-246x300.jpg 246w, https:\/\/virtuallyislamic.com\/vi2023\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/A-grb1995lah-4.jpg 595w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 246px) 100vw, 246px\" \/><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n<div class=\"wp-block-image\">\n<figure class=\"aligncenter size-full\"><img decoding=\"async\" width=\"418\" height=\"279\" src=\"https:\/\/virtuallyislamic.com\/vi2023\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/B-GRB-2024-_-1-1-1-2.jpeg\" alt=\"Gary R. Bunt, Indonesia, 2024\" class=\"wp-image-9903\" srcset=\"https:\/\/virtuallyislamic.com\/vi2023\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/B-GRB-2024-_-1-1-1-2.jpeg 418w, https:\/\/virtuallyislamic.com\/vi2023\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/B-GRB-2024-_-1-1-1-2-300x200.jpeg 300w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 418px) 100vw, 418px\" \/><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Today marks 30 years since I joined the staff of (what was then) the University of Wales, Lampeter, as an Islamic Studies lecturer.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">I\u2019ve witnessed many changes through the university\u2019s various incarnations (it\u2019s now UWTSD). During this time, I worked with some great students and colleagues (including through external collaborations) and developed my research on Islam, Muslims, and the internet.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">In other news \u2026 I will be departing the university at the end of the month. I will continue to supervise some PhDs. The research will continue, with a book on AI\/Islam in the pipeline (++).<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Spot the difference in the \u2018before and after\u2019 photos (above)!<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Watch this space for updates.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Some personal news: Today marks 30 years since I joined the staff of (what was then) the University of Wales, Lampeter, as an Islamic Studies lecturer. I\u2019ve witnessed many changes through the university\u2019s various incarnations (it\u2019s now UWTSD). During this time, I worked with some great students and colleagues (including through external collaborations) and developed&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6,5],"tags":[381,382],"class_list":["post-9897","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-gary-r-bunt","category-research","tag-academia","tag-gary-r-bunt"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/virtuallyislamic.com\/vi2023\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9897","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/virtuallyislamic.com\/vi2023\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/virtuallyislamic.com\/vi2023\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/virtuallyislamic.com\/vi2023\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/virtuallyislamic.com\/vi2023\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9897"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/virtuallyislamic.com\/vi2023\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9897\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":9917,"href":"https:\/\/virtuallyislamic.com\/vi2023\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9897\/revisions\/9917"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/virtuallyislamic.com\/vi2023\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9897"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/virtuallyislamic.com\/vi2023\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9897"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/virtuallyislamic.com\/vi2023\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9897"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}