ABSTRACT
This chapter presents some concluding remarks on the concepts discussed in the book. If the ‘exotic’ studies of Muslim communities suffered from essentialist views which interpreted the social structure and political organization of Muslim societies as a direct result of theological aspects, more recent studies of Muslims in the west suffer from essentialist views which interpret Muslim identity as a by-product of Islam, as religion. The genesis of the book rests not in the attempt to assert what the anthropology of Islam should be, but rather in an effort aimed at starting a reflexive debate among scholars and students. The author provides evidence of the level of abstraction, generalization and essentialization existing even in recent studies concerning Islam and Muslims, and argues that human identity is related to the self and environment, through emotions and feelings. Yet, the discussion about emotions and feelings has had no real debate within the anthropological study of Muslims.
