Being German, becoming Muslim

Dikici, Erdem

Abstract

There is no doubt that Islam is a central as well as a contentious theme in European politics and public discussions. Muslims do not only make up a significant part of the cultural diversity of European societies, but they are also perceived as a significant political threat to the future of white Christian Europe. There is much evidence that immigrants in general, and Muslims in particular, have not been treated equally in many European countries. Prohibition of Muslim religious symbols such as the headscarf in the European public sphere is one of the contemporary visible patterns of exclusion. Numerous studies have focused on experiences of racialization, stigmatization, discrimination, exclusion, etc. of Muslim immigrants and their subsequent generations. However, it is rare to find studies that address European converts to Islam and deal with their somewhat distinctive experiences of marginalization, stigmatization, and exclusion, as well as identity formation processes and their struggles to create a space for Islam in their native land. Being German, Becoming Muslim is thus a groundbreaking book that sheds much light on the lives of German converts to Islam, their ways of becoming Muslims and being German in the aftermath of conversion, their ambivalent relationships with immigrant Muslims, their strategies and struggles with respect to broadening a space for Islam, and even making it a German religion, and finally their curious relationship with the Salafis in Germany.

• Journal Article Type: Book Review
• Acceptance Date: Jun 8, 2015
• Online Publication Date: Jun 22, 2015
• Publication Date: Jun 22, 2015
• Deposit Date: Oct 10, 2022
• Journal: Islam and Christian-Muslim Relations
• Print ISSN: 0959-6410
• Electronic ISSN: 1469-9311
• Publisher: Taylor & Francis (Routledge)
• Peer Reviewed: Peer Reviewed
• Volume: 26
• Issue: 4
• Pages: 531-533
• Item Discussed: Being German, Becoming Muslim by Esra Özyürek, Princeton, NJ, Princeton University Press, 2015, 171 pp., $24.95/£14.86 (paperback), ISBN 9780691162799; $55.00/£37.95 (hardback), ISBN 9780691162782
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/09596410.2015.1059013
• Public URL: https://uwe-repository.worktribe.com/output/10020951
• Publisher URL: https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/09596410.2015.1059013