Faith intersections and Muslim women in the European microcosm

Notes towards the study of non-organized Islam

Bibliographic Data

ID7767211
AuthorsSara Silvestri (corresponding author)
Year2011
Volume34
Issue7
Pages1230-1247
Publication date2011-07-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenueEthnic and Racial Studies (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0141-9870 • E-ISSN: 1466-4356
PublisherInforma UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1080/01419870.2011.565779
OpenAlexW2088732093
LanguageEN
Citations received8
References cited50

Faith and religiosity remain elusive objects of analysis for the social sciences, as individualization and non-hierarchical religions grow. This methodological article demonstrates the possibility of researching in depth these subjects while abandoning traditional categories such as institutions, prescriptions, organizations, and authorities, foregrounding instead a more subjective focus, incorporating a comparative, cross-national dimension. Theoretical and methodological considerations arise from the genesis and select findings of a qualitative interdisciplinary study exploring Muslim women in contemporary Europe. Involving 132 participants in five countries, the project explores intersections between everyday concerns, lived experiences and conceptualizations of faith, beyond the traditional 'performance' of religion. Attention is drawn to the fluidity of religious adherence, the effect of national cultural-political imaginaries, and the spiritual and intellectual efforts involved in 'living religion', and in making it a resource for individual agency. Keywords: Islam in Europelived religionintersectionalityfaith and spiritualitygenderreligiosity Acknowledgements I would like to thank Jørgen Nielsen, Nadia Jeldtoft, Martin Bulmer, Amanda Eastell-Bleakley, and four anonymous referees for their comments and support. I am particularly grateful to the King Baudouin Foundation and City University London, for funding different stages of this research, as well as to my research assistants: Sara Anwar, Jamila Boughelaf, Marianna Cento, Emanuela Dalmasso, Silvia Lauzzana, Oihana Marco Mendez and Fatima Zibou. The paper also benefited from feedback received at various invited seminars around the world. I remain the only person responsible for its content. Notes 1. This expression denotes the concentrated unplanned co-presence of very diverse and distant human and cultural worlds, in the European space. 2. This broadly sketched picture is in reality more nuanced, varying from country to country and according to Islamic traditions. But a discussion of this would go beyond the scope of this article. Whereas the presence of Muslim women in leadership positions in traditional Islamic institutions is rare and contested (female religious scholars and judges can be found in East Asia but not often in other regions of the so-called 'Muslim world'), they are very active in civil society organizations. 3. E.g. Minai 1981 Minai, N. 1981. Women in Islam, New York: Seaview Books. [Google Scholar]; Kandiyoti 1991 Kandiyoti , D. 1991 Women, Islam and the State , Basingstoke : Macmillan [Crossref] , [Google Scholar]; Afshar 1993 Afshar , H. 1993 Women in the Middle East , Basingstoke : Macmillan [Crossref] , [Google Scholar]; Moghadam 1993 Moghadam, V. 1993. 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Women and Muslim Family Laws In Arab States, Amsterdam: Amsterdam University Press. [Google Scholar]. 4. E.g. Mernissi 1991 Mernissi, F. 1991. Women and Islam, Oxford: Blackwell. [Google Scholar]; Ahmed 1992 Ahmed, L. 1992. Women and Gender in Islam, New Haven: Yale University Press. [Google Scholar]; Wadud 1999 Wadud, A. 1999. Quran and Woman, New York: Oxford University Press. [Google Scholar]. 5. For the findings of the initial research conducted in 2007–8 see Silvestri (2008 Silvestri S. \ forthcoming Europe's Muslim Women: Beyond the Burqa Controversy , London : Hurst [Google Scholar]). 6. With various experience levels, they helped with parts of the research. The two Muslims in the group were not selected on the basis of their personal creed, but for their competence and enthusiasm. 7. Since 9/11, Muslims in the UK especially have expressed a 'fatigue' about being researched, and suspicion about research potentially funded or used by counter-terrorism entities. 8. In April 2010 Belgium's lower house of parliament passed a law banning the wearing of the Islamic face veil in public (but the law-making process was not completed due to a crisis of government). In September, the French parliament voted in favour of a similar law banning the 'integral veil' in public buildings. Also in 2010, in Italy, two Piedmont local authorities fined two Muslim women wearing the niqab, applying an old counter-terrorism law forbidding entering public buildings with the face hidden. The same year also saw the rise of far-right anti-immigration parties across Europe. 9. No comments on the headscarf were solicited in the research apart from two closed questions. See Silvestri (forthcoming). 10. No room is available here to discuss these and other issues that emerged, such as critical but ambivalent positions vis-à-vis religious leaders, tradition, and ethnic communities of origin, but they are covered in Silvestri (forthcoming

Agency (philosophy · Epistemology · Faith · Foregrounding · Islam · Political science · Politics · Qualitative research · Religiosity · Social science · Sociology · Gender Studies · Law · Migration, Refugees, and Integration · Psychology · Religion and Society Interactions · Religion, Society, and Development · Social Psychology

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