exploring muslim identities in europe & north america

Michael Gove, Secretary of State for Education, has reignited a row over plans for a mosque in his constituency, remarking cryptically that there were “other reasons” it should not be built to replace an existing facility with no washing facilities or toilet. “It would mean the replacement of a handsome Victorian building with a building which would not fit in with the street scene in Camberley and, because of the way it would overlook the Royal Military Academy, would not be appropriate for all sorts of other reasons.” (http://politicalscrapbook.net/2011/04/michael-goves-other-reasons-for-opposing-a-mosque/) Gove's "all sorts of other reasons" is effectively a misnomer for questioning the place of Islam in British urban space and, ultimately, British society. The underlying discourse is deeply hierarchical and, for lack of a better word, ethnocentric.  It prioritizes the "handsomeness" of Victorian architecture and the "Britishness...

originally published as  'Muslimska föreningar i Malmö och Lund – en ögonblicksbild' in islamologi.se on December 2nd, 2010 and translated from the Swedish original by Spyros A. Sofos   By Erica Li Lundqvist & Leif Stenberg History The first large groups of Muslims arrived in Sweden during the 1960s and 1970s.[19] They mainly consisted of guest migrants from Turkey and former Yugoslavia, and were then followed by a wave of family reunification –widespread during the late 1970s and early 1980s. During the mid-1980s, asylum seekers from Iran, Iraq, Lebanon, Syria and Turkey started arriving in Sweden and at the end of the decade they were joined by asylum seekers from Somalia and Kosovo. [20] The subsequent Yugoslav disintegration meant that a large number of Muslim Bosnian refugees came to Sweden, the majority of whom have settled in Malmö. [21] To all these different Muslim migrants one should add a number of Swedes who have converted to Islam. Despite their s...

originally published as  'Muslimska föreningar i Malmö och Lund – en ögonblicksbild' in islamologi.se on December 2nd, 2010 and translated from the Swedish original by Spyros A. Sofos By Erica Li Lundqvist & Leif Stenberg If we compare with the Lund municipal statistics from 2006, 136 different countries of origin are represented, with the largest group coming from Nordic countries (21%) followed by Germany (7.1%), the US (4.9%), Poland (4.8 %) and Iraq (4.7%). A total of 1635 people originate in Asia, with Iraq being the single largest country. The district of North Fäladen has the largest proportion of foreign nationals (1468), representing 13% of its population. [13] According to Imam Ali Ibrahim, of Lund's Islamic Center, there are approximately between 4 and 5,000 Muslims in the town, however, not all of them practicing. [14] During a typical Friday visit, for example, to the mosque, there are around 90 people while the larger festivals can attract u...

translated from 'Muslimska föreningar i Malmö och Lund – en ögonblicksbild'  originally published in islamologi.se on December 2nd, 2010 and translated by Spyros A. Sofos By Erica Li Lundqvist & Leif Stenberg During a visit to the urban district of Rosengård in Malmö in order to photograph the "cellar mosques", we suddenly got lost in the suburban jungle. A group of children and young people noticed us wondering and asked us what we were doing. "We are looking for a mosque", we said, after which they replied in chorus: "There are many!" And they pointed in all directions. The development of Muslim neighbourhoods in Malmö and Lund has been gaining momentum since the first Muslim community was established in Malmö in the late 1960s and early 1970s. Today, Islam is a natural, albeit controversial, part of Swedish society. Nevertheless, very little commentary on Islam in Sweden is premised on comprehensive empirical investigation. [1] A prob...

This is Rasheed Wallace. He is Muslim, and he is wearing an ensemble from the Middle Ages Hats off to this amazing and imaginative attempt to deconstruct our stereotypical views of Muslims. For a humorous yet sober treatment of the subject visit http://muslimswearingthings.tumblr.com/ Former NPR analyst Juan Williams, among other ignorant people, has an irrational fear of Muslims, and thinks you can identify them based on what they look like. Here I will post pictures of Muslims wearing all sorts of things in an attempt to refute that there is such a thing as "Muslim garb" or a Muslim look.

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.