Representing Muslimness

This article analyses how Muslims in Metro Manila faced a land dispute and mobilized themselves for nonviolent struggle in a place other than their homeland in the Philippine south. The land dispute was retold in the idiom of religious struggle, but the narrative differed from that used in the armed conflict in the 1970s in the south. In the national capital region Muslims fought with lawsuits and rallies, and used the mass media to their advantage. Lawyers appealed to the concept of waqf (endowment land) based on Shariah, while students who organized rallies relied on different strategies to appeal to elders and youth. Participation in the rallies was marked by gender and generational differences, but the claim of unity needs to be reconsidered. The creative representation of Muslimness sustained a final court battle that lasted eight years, which culminated in a legal victory in 1997. The case highlights the practice of strategic essentialism by a minority group

Battle · Endowment · Essentialism · Media studies · Narrative · Political science · Sociology · Victory · Asian Geopolitics and Ethnography · Asian Studies and History · Gender Studies · History · Law · Philippine History and Culture

• Cross and Crescent

  Open Access•Leslie Anne Liwanag, Romeo Jumao-as Toring et al.•International Journal on Culture…•2025

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