. His explanations for the divergence are rooted in the idea of a 'great Western Transmutation.' This is not to be confused with the Industrial Revolution, as it includes variables more diverse than just industry. Hodgson posited that all the societal elements (industry, banking, health care, police, etc.) of Western European nations became so advanced (or 'technicalized') and co-dependent that those societies were able to determine their own rate of progress. The two most important influences on Hodgson's thought were the French orientalist and priest Louis Massignon and the eighteenth-century American Quaker, John Woolman. From the former he learned empathy and respect for Islam, while the latter represented a critical view of Eurocentrism and an embodiment of Hodgson's own Quaker conscience. Islamicate Hodgson introduced the term Islamicate to refer to characteristics of regions where Muslims, while culturally dominant, were not, properly speaking, “religious”: "'Islamicate' would refer not directly to the religion, Islam, itself, but to the social complex historically associated with Islam and the Muslims, both among Muslims themselves and even when found among non-Muslims". For example, wine poetry was Islamicate, but not Islamic according to Hodgson. This terminological distinction has not been widely adopted. Life Marshall Hodgson was born in Richmond, Indiana in April 11, 1922. He was a practicing Quaker, a strict vegetarian. He worked in the Civilian Public Service as a conscientious objector from 1943 to 1946. In 1951, he received his PhD from the University of Chicago, where he later became professor, receiving tenure in 1961, becoming chairman of the Committee in Social Thought in 1964 and the newly established Committee on Near Eastern Studies in the same year. He was married and had three daughters. Hodgson died in 1968 while jogging on the University of Chicago campus. Bibliography The Secret Order of Assassins: The Struggle of the Early Nizârî Ismâʻîlîs against the Islamic World. 's-Gravenhage, Mouton, 1955. The Venture of Islam: Conscience and History in a World Civilization, Vols 1-3. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1974. Rethinking World History: Essays on Europe, Islam and World History. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1993. See also World history Islamic studies References Notes External links Guide to the Marshall G. S. Hodgson Papers 1940-1971 at the University of Chicago Special Collections Research Center Genius Denied and Reclaimed: A 40-Year Retrospect on Marshall G.S. Hodgson’s The Venture of Islam Bruce B. Lawrence at Marginalia November 11, 2014 ISLAMICATE SOCIETY