ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses the study of Muslim communities and Islam within Western contexts. From the 1970s until the mid-1980s anthropologists and sociologists focused on the national and ethnic identities of Muslim migrants, suggesting complex processes of integration and assimilation. The concept of identity became central to the understanding of how the Muslim communities would reconcile their religion with Western values. Some influential studies have suggested that Muslim migrants were living ‘between two cultures’, so that their children could be seen as a product of this ‘in-betweenness’ possessing fluid, hybrid, multiple identities controlled and shaped by cultural processes. The author compares these studies with some of his fieldwork and research experiences. The chapter finally discusses the use of the Internet, and the new anthropological studies of the virtual ummah that have developed in recent years.
