exploring muslim identities in europe & north america

This entry was prompted by an article by Andrew Brown that appeared in Saturday's Guardian. Asking whether Sunday's Swedish election could give power to the country's far right, Brown identifies the potency and divisive character of the issue of immigration in Swedish politics. But immigration is not a new phenomenon in Sweden as it has traditionally been a haven for various refugees/asylum seekers and economic migrants. It is clear that the issue the far right Swedish Democrats have been exploiting is Muslim immigration in Sweden and the impact this has on Swedish society at local and national level. But, I think more importantly, Brown's article focuses on the Rosengård district of Malmö and identifies the conflicting perceptions about access and usage of this urban space as one of the key elements in shaping perceptions about Islam, immigration and attitudes towards foreigners in the Swedish election. This is by no means something new. Back in 2004, Fox N...

The French Senate voted almost unanimously to ban face-covering Islamic veils in public, opening the way for the enactment of the colloquially called anti-burqa law. Interestingly, 246 senators overwhelmingly outnumbered the one and only opponent of the law who voted against it. Similarly, in July, the bill sailed through the Assemblée nationale by a vote of 335 to 1. Despite the intense public debate, within the serene confines of France's legislature the law united government and opposition and was met with virtually no resistance.  It is telling that not only the rights of the estimated 2,000 French Muslim women who wear variants of the full cover, but also the broader right of self determination of hundreds of thousands of French Muslim women which the bill symbolically challenges have not been deemed worth defending by the French legislators.