Abstract
This chapter takes up a prominent feature of converts’ narratives that has significant implications for thinking about identity and belonging, the discursive divide between religion and culture. It identifies and critically discusses two approaches to un the relationship between religion and culture in convert narratives, one which sees converts assimilating into born Muslim communities and one which sees converts as excluding born Muslims from a Westernised form of Islam. It goes on to discuss the work of three prominent scholars whose approaches emphasise religious concerns to thinking about the religion–culture divide. This allows this discursive feature to be seen as inevitably grappled with rather than settled in the favour of one side or another. The chapter subsequently proposes an alternative analytical frame based on Simmel’s conception of the stranger and offers a more dynamic and complex understanding of the patterns of belonging that emerge in converts’ narratives.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Notes
- 1.
It should be stressed again that this process is not exclusive to converts, many born Muslims, particularly young Muslims are similarly negotiating this dynamic, although the focus of this book is converts.
- 2.
- 3.
see also An-na’im (2008) on the necessity of a secular state for Islam in Muslim majority countries.
- 4.
See also interview at http://www.signandsight.com/features/1258.html.
- 5.
although Tibi has since despaired at the prospect of a Euro-Islam becoming a reality.
- 6.
To indicate that when I am using the term ‘stranger’ meant in reference to Simmel’s conception, it is italicised throughout from this point forward.
- 7.
We can note here following these points that the concept of the stranger in the Islamic tradition encompasses both a positive as well as negative side (Rosenthal, 1997). This is somewhat differently conceived, being focussed on the traveller, but an appreciation of both of these aspects is itself of importance for how the concept is to be applied here.
References
Ahmed, S. (2000). Strange encounters: Embodied others in post-coloniality. Routledge.
Alexander, J. C. (2013). The dark side of modernity. Polity Press.
Amin, A. (2012). Land of strangers. Polity Press.
An-na’im, A. A. (2008). Islam and the secular state: Negotiating the future of Shari’a. Harvard University Press.
Bauman, Z. (1988). Strangers: The social construction of universality and particularity. Telos, 78, 7–42.
Bauman, Z. (1991). Modernity and ambivalence. Polity Press.
Bauman, Z. (1993). Postmodern ethics. Blackwell.
Bauman, Z. (1995). Life in fragments. Blackwell.
Bauman, Z. (1997). Postmodernity and its discontents. Polity Press.
Bennett, L., & Crawley Jackson, A. (2016). Making common ground with strangers at Furnace Park. Social & Cultural Geography, 18(1), 92–108.
Diken, B. (1998). Strangers. Ashgate.
Harman, L. D. (1987). The modern stranger: On language and membership. Mouton de Gruyter.
Hashas, M. (2019). The idea of European Islam: Religion. Routledge.
Hervieu-Léger, D. (1999). Le Pélerin et le Converti: La Religion en Mouvement. Flammarion.
Horgan, M. (2012). Strangers and strangership. Journal of Intercultural Studies, 33(6), 607–622.
Hylland Eriksen, T. (2015). The meaning of “we”. In P. A. Kraus & P. Kivisto (Eds.), The challenge of minority integration (pp. 2–21). De Gruyter Open.
Iveson, K. (2006). Strangers in the cosmopolis. In J. Binnie & J. Holloway, S. Millington & C. Young (Eds.), Cosmopolitan urbanism (pp. 70–86). Routledge.
Jackson, L., Harris, C., & Valentine, G. (2016). Rethinking concepts of the strange and the stranger. Social & Cultural Geography, 18(1), 1–15.
Koefoed, L., & Simonsen, K. (2011). “The stranger”, the city and the nation: On the possibilities of identification and belonging. European Urban and Regional Studies, 18(4), 343–357.
Kristeva, J. (1991). Strangers to ourselves. Columbia University Press.
Krotofil, J. (2011). “If I am to be a Muslim, I have to be a good one”: Polish migrant women embracing Islam and reconstructing identity in dialogue with self and others. In K. Górak-Sosnowska (Ed.), Muslims in Poland and Eastern Europe (pp. 154–168). University of Warsaw.
Kuru, A. T. (2020). Islam, authoritarianism, and underdevelopment: A global and historical comparison. Cambridge University Press.
Le Quesne, N. (2000, December 3). Trying to bridge a great divide. Time. Available at: http://content.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,90623,00.html. Last Accessed 9 June 2020.
Levine, D. N. (1991). Simmel at a distance: On the history and systematics of the sociology of the stranger. In L. Ray (Ed.), Formal sociology: The sociology of Georg Simmel (pp. 272–286). Edward Elgar.
Lofland, L. H. (1973). A world of strangers: Order and action in urban public space. Basic Books.
Marotta, V. (2010). The cosmopolitan stranger. In S. van Hooft & W. Vandekerckhove (Eds.), Questioning cosmopolitanism (pp. 105–120). Springer.
Marotta, V. (2012). Georg Simmel, the stranger and the sociology of knowledge. Journal of Intercultural Studies, 33(6), 675–689.
McLemore, S. D. (1991 [1970]). Simmel’s “stranger”: A critique of the concept. In L. Ray (Ed.), Formal sociology: The sociology of Georg Simmel (pp. 263–271). Edward Elgar.
Moosavi, L. (2012). British Muslim converts performing “authentic Muslimness.” Performing Islam, 1(1), 103–128.
Murad, A. H. (2020). Travelling home: Essays on Islam in Europe. The Quilliam Press.
Nielsen, J. S. (1999). Towards a European Islam. Palgrave Macmillan.
Nielsen, J. S. (2007). The question of Euro-Islam: restriction or opportunity? In A. al-Azmeh & E. Fokas (Eds.), Islam in Europe diversity, identity and influence (pp. 34–48). Cambridge University Press.
Özyürek, E. (2015). Being German, becoming Muslim: Race, religion, and conversion in the New Europe. Princeton University Press.
Park, R. E. (1928). Human migration and the marginal man. American Journal of Sociology, 33(6), 881–893.
Ramadan, T. (2002). To be a European Muslim. The Islamic Foundation.
Ramadan, T. (2004). Western Muslims and the future of Islam. Oxford University Press.
Ramadan, T. (2008). Radical reform: Islamic ETHICS and liberation. Oxford.
Ramadan, T. (2009). Islam, the West and the challenges of modernity (Trans. S. Amghar). The Islamic Foundation.
Ricoeur, P. (2006). On translation. Routledge.
Rosenthal, F. (1997). The stranger in medieval Islam. Arabica, 44(1), 35–75.
Roy, O. (2006). Globalized Islam: The search for a new Ummah. Columbia University Press.
Roy, O. (2010). Holy ignorance: When religion and culture part ways. Columbia University Press.
Schuetz, A. (1944). The stranger: An essay in social psychology. American Journal of Sociology, 49(6), 499–507.
Simmel, G. (1950). The stranger. In K. H. Wolff (Ed. and Trans.), The sociology of Georg Simmel (pp. 402–408). The Free Press.
Siu, P. C. P. (1952). The sojourner. American Journal of Sociology, 58(1), 34–44.
Siddiqui, M. (2015). Hospitality and Islam: Welcoming in god’s name. Yale University Press.
Stonequist, E. V. (1935). The problem of the marginal man. American Journal of Sociology, 41(1), 1–12.
Tibi, B. (2001). Islam between culture and politics. Palgrave.
Tibi, B. (2008). Political Islam, world politics and Europe: Democratic peace and Euro-Islam versus global Jihad. Routledge.
Tibi, B. (2009). Islam’s predicament with modernity: Religious reform and cultural change. Routledge.
Tibi, B. (2012). Islamism and Islam. Yale University Press.
Tiryakian, E. (1973). Sociological perspectives on the stranger. Soundings, 56(1), 45–58.
Vernon, J. (2014). Distant strangers: How Britain became modern. University of California Press.
Wood, M. M. (1934). The stranger: A study in social relationships. Columbia University Press.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Corresponding author
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2021 The Author(s), under exclusive license to Springer Nature Switzerland AG
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Sealy, T. (2021). Religion, Culture and the Stranger. In: Religiosity and Recognition. Palgrave Politics of Identity and Citizenship Series. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-75127-2_5
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-75127-2_5
Published:
Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, Cham
Print ISBN: 978-3-030-75126-5
Online ISBN: 978-3-030-75127-2
eBook Packages: Social SciencesSocial Sciences (R0)