The mosque in the suburbs

Negotiating religion and ethnicity in South London

Bibliographic Data

ID3977600
AuthorsSimon Naylor (0000-0001-7747-1714), James R Ryan (0000-0003-1959-4964), James Ryan (0000-0003-0339-4028)
Year2002
Volume3
Issue1
Pages39-59
Publication date2002-01-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenueSocial & Cultural Geography (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 1464-9365 • E-ISSN: 1470-1197
PublisherInforma UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/14649360120114134
OpenAlexW2131999900
LanguageEN
Citations received90
References cited12

The geography of religi on for UK residents of South Asian origin is inexorably linked to the politics of the built environment. In particular, the siting, or expansion, of places of worship for minority-religious groups has often been bound up with the negotiation and contestation of the politics of identity. In this paper we explore the historical unfolding of a complex politics of identity and difference across one particular site of religious worship. The building in question is the London Fazl Mosque, London's first mosque. The paper focuses on two periods in the architectural, social and religious life of the site: its initial planning, opening and use in the London suburbs of the 1920s; and the community's more recent--and ultimately unsuccessful--attempts to extend the mosque in the 1990s. Across these two periods we draw out the ways in which notions of similarity and difference were employed by mosque-users, other local residents, the press and local and central government bodies in their discourse relating to the mosque. In particular we are concerned with how the mosque has meant different things to different religious, ethnic and social groups across the period under study, and how the mosque's relative ability to conform to associative aesthetic valuations throughout its history effectively sanctioned as well as condemned building works

Aesthetics · Art · Ethnic group · Ethnology · Identity (music · Negotiation · Political science · Politics · Social science · Sociology · Worship · Anthropology · Gender Studies · Law · Philosophy · Public Spaces through Art · Religious studies · Religious Tourism and Spaces · Urban Planning and Governance

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