ABSTRACT
As is evident from the number of publications in recent years, research on Muslim diasporic mystical movements has gradually increased, reflecting the rising popularity of Sufism among diverse groups, including immigrant Muslims, Western-born children of migrant parents and converts. There are many examples of the popularity and prominence of Sufism in Europe and the USA, such as the conversion to and initiation into diasporic Sufi organizations, the poetry of the famous medieval Sufi poet Jalal al-Din Rumi, performances of the Whirling Dervishes, and a number of conferences on Sufism. The latter certainly indicates a growing degree of interest among Western scholars in analysing the broader implications of these developments. In contrast, argued from the mainstream perspective, we may hardly find this intellectual curiosity regarding contemporary mystical movements in the diaspora among non-Muslims, as well as among Muslims in contemporary Muslim-majority countries, where Sufi ideas and institutions are tendentiously marginalized and often portrayed as being virtually non-existent. In fact, organized Sufism may take different forms, at times witnessing a revival in some Muslim majority areas for quite different reasons (see below).1
