Symposium: Islamic ethics & living in ethnic and cultural diversity

Description

n the last decades, anthropological scholarship on Islam has given considerable attention to ethics and Muslim self-fashioning. In the context of Muslims in Europe the ethical turn was most productive in relation to limitations of secular/liberal national regimes (e.g. Fadil, 2011; Jouili, 2015), various forms of governmentality by state and non-state actors (e.g. Ahmad & El-Yousfi, 2021), and in relation to gender and sexual practices (e.g. Amir-Moazami, Jacobsen, & Malik, 2011; Lechkar, 2022). Recently, proposals were made for an anthropology of Islam that takes faith, divinity and God more seriously, for instance, by critically interrogating anthropologists’ methodological atheism (Willerslev & Suhr, 2018). Or by suggesting to devote more attention to the ‘power of God’ by examining understandings of human-divine relations, and the ways theology shapes human interactions through God’s presence and mediation (Schielke, 2019). The question has been raised as to how we can discern and discuss the shapes of an ‘autonomous Islamic tradition’ in Europe, while moving beyond foundational concerns with Muslims’ sameness/Otherness (Fadil, 2019).

The goal of this day is to reflect further on current approaches in the anthropology of Islam, particularly by foregrounding Islamic faith, spirituality and ethics, and the conditions of life in superdiverse contexts. How can anthropologists study everyday life but also the role of Islamic ethics in environments marked by multiple forms of cultural and religious difference? More generally, how can both disciplines – Islamic theology/ethics and anthropology – be brought into a productive dialogue and conversation? We welcome presentations that discuss empirical research or theoretical reflections. Presentations of findings, work in progress and think pieces are all welcome.

Periode	21 jun 2023
Evenementstype	Conference
Locatie	Gent , Belgium
Mate van erkenning	International