How Not to Get Duped by Sloppy Western Academic ‘Scholarship’ in Islamic Studies
1) Do not get impressed by diacritical marks and extensive footnotes. (You may laugh, but the subconscious effect is there if you are not wary enough).
2) If it is essential to the case the academic is building, make sure to verify the source. You would be amazed at how many (and the kinds of) errors and misquotations you would discover. If the source does check out, then research the author’s overall stance by seeing everything else he said on the topic to ensure that the academic is not cherry-picking his statements.
3) Have access to a very senior student of knowledge/traditional junior scholar of the discipline you are reading in that is not influenced by the epistemological standards of the western academy. By “access,” I mean someone who will give you the time of day and has the patience and interest to help you out with your queries.
4) Pay meticulous attention to faulty deductions and non-sequiturs that can easily evade your radar. There are western academics that do not make any careless factual errors. Their research is mainly factually accurate, but their contentious deductions that form the crux of their case are relayed in a few sentences that can easily elude your radar (much of the time, they are made in the concluding remarks). They know they are making an unprecedented argumentative leap at specific points. However, to bypass additional critical scrutiny, they briefly relay that critical faulty argument in a few lines as if it is indisputable and not worthy of critique, rather than seeking to give it the spotlight it deserves due to its importance to their case by justifying it. Catching these non-sequiturs is not easy unless you are really paying attention, have strong logical skills, and have a good understanding of the subject matter.
If you cannot do number 1, then you are an easily impressionable person. God help you.
If you cannot fulfill numbers 2 and 3 above, you honestly have no business reading about your faith from western academics authoring material that satisfies epistemological criteria alien to your Islamic tradition. You are clearly unqualified to step into a deep end of confusion you cannot stay afloat in.
Number 4 is the trickiest and requires the most attentiveness and experience. It is where many will inadvertently fail, and this is reason enough to discourage, if not prohibit, the bulk of Muslims who have no legitimate reason to read such material from doing so.
Traditional Muslim authors make mistakes too, absolutely. But the difference is that they operate within legitimate boundaries (unless pointed out otherwise by those qualified) and tend to not argue for something radically unacceptable due to their abidance by commonly shared methods of research and inquiry.