1.

Record Nr.

UNINA9910781099903321

Autore

Bowen John Richard <1951->

Titolo

Can Islam be French? [[electronic resource] ] : pluralism and pragmatism in a secularist state / / John R. Bowen

Pubbl/distr/stampa

Princeton, NJ, : Princeton University Press, 2009

ISBN

1-282-30383-X

9786612303838

1-4008-3111-3

Edizione

[Course Book]

Descrizione fisica

1 online resource (243 p.)

Collana

Princeton studies in Muslim politics

Disciplina

305.6/970944

Soggetti

Muslims - France

Islam - France

Islam and politics - France

Lingua di pubblicazione

Inglese

Formato

Materiale a stampa

Livello bibliografico

Monografia

Note generali

Description based upon print version of record.

Nota di bibliografia

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Nota di contenuto

Frontmatter -- Contents -- Acknowledgments -- Part One: Trajectories -- Chapter One. Islam and the Republic -- Chapter Two. Fashioning the French Islamic Landscape -- Part Two: Spaces -- Chapter Three. Mosques Facing Outward -- Chapter Four. Shaping Knowledge to France -- Chapter Five. Differentiating Schools -- Chapter Six. Can an Islamic School Be Republican? -- Part Three: Debates -- Chapter Seven. Should There Be an Islam for Europe? -- Chapter Eight. Negotiating across Realms of Justification -- Chapter Nine. Islamic Spheres in Republican Space -- Notes -- Bibliography -- Index

Sommario/riassunto

Can Islam Be French? is an anthropological examination of how Muslims are responding to the conditions of life in France. Following up on his book Why the French Don't Like Headscarves, John Bowen turns his attention away from the perspectives of French non-Muslims to focus on those of the country's Muslims themselves. Bowen asks not the usual question--how well are Muslims integrating in France?--but, rather, how do French Muslims think about Islam? In particular, Bowen examines how French Muslims are fashioning new Islamic institutions and developing new ways of reasoning and teaching. He looks at some of the quite distinct ways in which mosques have connected with



broader social and political forces, how Islamic educational entrepreneurs have fashioned niches for new forms of schooling, and how major Islamic public actors have set out a specifically French approach to religious norms. All of these efforts have provoked sharp responses in France and from overseas centers of Islamic scholarship, so Bowen also looks closely at debates over how--and how far--Muslims should adapt their religious traditions to these new social conditions. He argues that the particular ways in which Muslims have settled in France, and in which France governs religions, have created incentives for Muslims to develop new, pragmatic ways of thinking about religious issues in French society.