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This introductory chapter begins by describing the core of the book, which is about the emergence of an Islamic diasporic legality among British and American Muslim communities. In a general sense, this book seeks to explain how the diaspora becomes the social problematic through which we see the interaction of people and the law. The chapter then addresses three main theoretical issues. The first, about an emerging legality, highlights the connection between law and identity, as it analyzes the social relations at the heart of the political and legal debates in and around Muslim communities in the United States and Britain. The second issue is that of the dialogic process of appropriating certain discourses, and it entails the examination of significant moments in the construction of normative claims through law. The third topic is about a growing repertoire of tools used to resist assimilation into a secular-liberal discourse of rights. An overview of the subsequent chapters is presented.

In March 2008, Britain's Christian Research organization disseminated a study that made the following projection: By 2020, the number of Catholics attending Sunday mass will have been surpassed by the number of Muslims worshiping in mosques in Britain. This study came out in the middle of growing tensions about the place of Muslims in British society and fanned some alarmist flames about the changing face of Britain. This backlash was not far off the heels of a lecture given at the Royal Courts of Justice, in February 2008, by Dr. Rowan Williams, the archbishop of Canterbury and the head of the worldwide Anglican Communion, which also ruffled British feathers. He suggested that British Muslims be allowed to live freely under the shari'a law, signaling that there is something more than just the official British legal system alone. This speech not only highlights the significance of legal pluralism; it also raises the question of what it means to be a Muslim by conviction and free choice. This chapter discusses how some Muslim intellectuals have dealt with the question of the religious neutrality of the liberal state. It examines the question raised by official recognition of a shari'a council in Britain: To what extent should religious identity and practice be accommodated under a liberal legal framework? The chapter explores the related questions of power and representation at this significant site, where the diaspora intersects with the national spaces that it continually negotiates.

The last few decades of the nineteenth century heralded a period of intense anti-British Muslim politics in the subcontinent, and Mecca was at the centre of real or perceived insurgent activities. Subjects such as the pilgrimage to Mecca were discussed extensively and debated intensely, but the veneer of inactivity (in terms of the status quo maintained with regard to actual policies) camouflaged the many seething apprehensions. A close watch was kept on the pilgrimage arrangements, and the situation within ‘Arabia’ in general, but this did not appear to lead to any concrete interventionist measures. As the politics of pan-Islamism intensified, the colonial state appeared almost to be in a state of semi-paralysis as far as deeply religious subjects were concerned. This chapter explores the dynamics of this inactivity and reveals the frenzy that caused this paralysis.

This chapter addresses the questions about the formation of identities, contemporary experiences of Islamophobia and emancipatory politics in the lives of Muslims in Britain. It specifically presents an overview of current discussions among British Muslims about Islamophobia and its relationship to their complex identities to shed further light upon this debate around ‘identity politics’. Islamophobia provokes the constitution of assertive Muslim identities in the hegemonic public sphere. Britishness is only partly constitutive of modern Muslim identities. There was a sharp bifurcation of British Muslims into loyal moderates and disloyal radicals after 9/11, but it could not be sustained to the same degree after the emergence of a large, third space for democratic dissent that British Muslims helped to shape in the run up to the Iraq war. It is noted that Islamopobia merely creates anti-Islamophobia, and that it cannot permanently define the British Muslim experience.

This chapter reports a descriptive overview of the historical trajectories and demographic characteristics of the British Muslim population, drawing on 2001 Census data and the findings of sample surveys. It also provides a critical review of the literature on Islam and space. It then addresses the pathways that geographical and other spatially-oriented research on Muslims in Britain and beyond might pursue in future. It is noted that the economic disadvantages experienced by British Muslims manifest themselves spatially. The links between beliefs, texts and associated rituals lend an inherent spatiality to Islamic practice. Scholarship on Muslims in Britain draws upon a broad range of disciplinary perspectives, theoretical standpoints and methodological approaches. Muslims are much more disadvantaged than other minority groups, a pattern which is expressed and recreated in the spatial order of the specific cities in which the large majority of Muslims are concentrated.

This chapter examines Muslim geographies. Muslim geographies have principally been geographies of contestation and conflict. The 1960s was considered as the start of the secularisation of the world in terms of the fact that religious thinking, institutions and practices were observed to have lost their social significance. The 1990s and even more so the 2000s have become a growth period for the geographies of religion, including Muslim geographies. The conflicts surrounding places are a barometer of state-religion relationships, inter-religious relationships and intra-religious relationships. Muslim geographies have been influential in shaping an important part of geographical enquiry. Some of the Muslim geographies have made vital innovative contributions and brought to bear original geographical perspectives in understanding religion. It can be stated that even while British Muslim geographies have contributed significantly to an understanding of contemporary British social dynamics, there remain many absent religions and absent geographies.

This concluding chapter explains that, amidst the din generated by Islamophobia, it is not easy to recognise that there is an alternative narrative about the evolution of the three million-strong British Muslim community and its role in society today. The alternative account does not make many headlines for two main reasons. First, it does not fit the agenda of most of the newspapers and other media outlets, which flourish on the dramatic story of violence and subversion. And second, it comprises a rather disparate concatenation of underlying social, political, and commercial changes that are not easily represented as a neat, single process. But it involves one significant trend, namely a gradual convergence between the Muslim and the non-Muslim communities in Britain. For the historian, there is no great surprise here, for history is punctuated by quiet social revolutions that have often occurred in spite of politicians, the press, and the opinion leaders who command massive attention, especially in a world driven by instant, 24-hour news. Yet the influence of politicians is far more limited than one might suppose from the relentless prominence they enjoy day by day.

It is generally believed that Muslims share all aspects of Islamic culture and that they are different from the mainstream British population. However, Muslims in Britain are ethnically diverse and heterogeneous in skin colour, language and culture. The only element they have in common is their religion. However, most Muslims feel a strong connection and association with the broader Islamic community (ummah) and have a constant desire for greater Islamic political unity within the ‘Abode of Islam’ (dar-al-Islam. The core of unity among Muslims is the Quran, the word of Allah. While the interpretation of the word of Allah differs across various Muslim groups, the Quran nevertheless provides the same message for all Muslims. This chapter examines identity theory and applies this theory towards an understanding of Muslim identity. It considers whether ‘Britishness’ has any impact on or conflict with the Muslim identity. It also examines the Scottish identity question as well as the debate on ‘Muslim identity’ raised by Channel 4. Before concluding with an overview of the research methodology used in this chapter, it investigates the geopolitical factors that could have an implication on British Muslim's identity.

This chapter describes the experiences of young British Pakistani Muslim women. Pakistani Muslim populations in Slough are primarily located in the wards with the highest deprivation indices and unemployment rates. The educational experiences of four young women reported stress the challenges for young British Pakistani Muslims in accessing good education and the value attached to education by these young women. All of them saw education as a means by which they could have good employment prospects. There is evidence that families may invest more in their daughters than in their sons as girls begin to outperform boys at school and the labour market is more receptive to female workers with ‘soft skills’. It is also noted that the persistence of faith is an important source of identity.

This chapter discusses the experiences of Muslim boys by focusing upon issues such as masculinity, neighbourhood spaces, schooling and territoriality in the lives of Muslim youth. The significance of space/place to the boys' experiences and identity constructions is considered. This account underscores the difficulties inherent in attempts to challenge racisms within society. Public concerns about the rise of radicalism among young British Muslims are reported here. Muslims are increasingly subject to a forced telling of the self in UK public life. It is also shown that while there are considerable differences between the contemporary post-9/11, post-7/7 world and the post-Rushdie era of the study, there is a pertinent parallel, in that both are times in which young Muslims, but particularly young Muslim men, are being forced to situate (and explain) themselves in relation to wider, negative (demonising) discourses around ‘fundamentalist’, ‘dangerous’ Muslim masculinity.

With every crisis that has involved the Muslim Ummah in recent years, some British Muslims have exerted their exclusive identity by expressing their opinions over the issue. With the emergence of a crisis that resulted in the marginalisation of Muslims, British Muslims have become more assertive in identifying themselves as Muslims and in announcing their identity publicly. This chapter focuses on the social identity of British Muslims. It begins by discussing the initiation of the niqab (face veil) debate. Second, it discusses the intervention of British politicians in the niqab debate. Then, the chapter examines the Muslim's and the wider community's reaction to the situation. Finally, the chapter considers the views of 71 participants of this study with regard to whether the niqab forms an integral part of the identity of Muslim women.

This chapter investigates how British Muslim women's understandings of home, and the driving forces underlying the creation of home spaces, are rooted in personal and family circumstances, lived experiences of community and neighbourhood, and understandings of ‘self’ and ‘other’. Women living in family homes adopted a range of different strategies in order to negotiate the role constructed for them and to preserve a sense of self. While young married couples may spend some time living with in-laws in the early years of marriage, growing numbers will acquire a home of their own. The continuing importance of family alongside the trend toward independent home-making emerged in a narrative of home spaces. More young British Muslims are moving into new spaces, although there are perceived risks attached. Women's experiences and expectations of home as a ‘way of being’ were underpinned by a number of different discursive frameworks of belonging and non-belonging.

Since the seventh century, Britain has had a contact with the Muslim world through trade contacts with Muslim-controlled Egypt, Palestine and Andalusia. From the sixteenth century to the end of the eighteenth century, British relations with the Muslims were cordial. In the late sixteenth century, following on from the steps taken by her father King Henry VIII, Queen Elizabeth I arranged a defence treaty with the Ottomans in 1587, and later Britain formed political links with Muslim territories as far away as India and Persia. A few centuries later, Muslims began to migrate to Britain. This chapter examines the migration of Muslims to Britain. It examines their settlement patterns and transition to becoming citizens of Britain. To begin, the chapter discusses the short migration history of British Muslims, including the narratives of resistance and support from the wider society in the course of their settlement and of the contribution Muslims have made to their new home. The chapter then focuses on the Muslim settlement in the five cities of Britain. These are: London, Leicester, Bradford, Leeds and Cardiff. The chapter concludes by considering the socioeconomic status of the respondents of this study.

This chapter describes the quantitative evidence concerning British Muslims' employment and the types of explanation that are advanced for the differential success of distinct ethnic minority groups. The quantitative studies indicate that there is some form of ‘Islamic penalty’. From the research with Pakistanis, three interlinked sets of disadvantages are determined which might develop an ‘Islamic penalty’ in the UK labour market. Even after allowing for the effect of living in a ward with high unemployment, Muslims appeared to suffer an employment penalty. The politics of race and ethnicity were significant impacts on the labour market, particularly in Slough. In Reading, ignorance could result in insensitivity and failure to try to recruit among ethnic minorities. Paid work is usually secondary to the obligations of women. Current ‘racial discrimination’ against Muslims may be connected to a fear of terrorism that makes employers more hostile to overt expressions of ‘Muslimness’.

This chapter demonstrates how, despite their experience of prejudice, Muslims became involved in a gradual process of integration into mainstream society; in this period they largely thought of themselves as ‘black’ or as Asians, rather than as Muslims. First-generation British Muslims had been fairly relaxed about social behaviour and religious observation. Meanwhile, the second generation of Muslims were not in Britain as temporary economic migrants, and consequently were less passive than their predecessors, more confident and aware of their opportunities and rights in Britain. For them, integration into mainstream society went hand in hand with an increasing assertiveness in the face of prejudice and an awareness of their identity as Anglo-Asians. By the 1980s and 1990s, the younger generation were becoming alienated from their parents due to familiarity with a secular society; many regarded the world of the mosque as boring. Muslims also began to reflect mainstream practice in other ways: more women in their twenties remained unmarried and, with their better language skills and qualifications, they were more likely to be in paid employment.

Investigations of the identity of young British Muslims have concluded that most of the participants valued their British connections because they were either born in Britain or had lived there for quite a time. At the same time, they were also attached to their ethnic heritage and their cultural celebrations. They spoke of their religious identity, which was reflected in their Muslim names, Islamic practices and celebrations, and sometimes through their dress. However, many respondents were distressed by the media practice of ‘othering’ Muslims. Some felt they were the ‘other’ as a result of the 7/7 London bombings, and/or because of their Islamic attire or appearance, which was not acceptable to some members of the wider society. Some Muslim women felt left out at the rise of the niqab debate and Muslim men felt alienated when they were ‘stopped and searched’. While it is understood that bicultural identity when embraced by the first-generation immigrants and the host society can lead to the easier settlement of the younger-generation immigrants, sometimes the notion and practice where the wider society refers to them as the ‘other’ makes these generations shun bicultural identity for a single identity. This chapter discusses how the media affects social cohesion. It discusses the areas that need attention within the Muslim community, such as education, integration, political participation, women, mosques, and youth. It also examines some of the positive steps taken by the Muslim community and advocates the endorsement of biculturalism.

Identity is always ‘in process’ and always ‘being formed’. It is argued that identity is always influenced by the surroundings in which the people live. This chapter focuses on how the identity of young British Muslims is shaped up by internal factors such as family, ethnic and religious community. It examines the placement of young British Muslims within the framework of their religion and culture. First, it discusses the broader context of Islam. Then, it discusses two issues of Muslim women: mosque restrictions and how they impact on Muslim women; and the marriage dilemma. Lastly, the chapter discusses youth issues such as literacy and numeracy problems; music in Islam; and cultural issues and drugs.

In the summer of 2001, young British Asians took to the streets of Oldham and Burnley in the North of England to protest against perceived racial inequality in their neighbourhoods. In the popular British press, these events were reported as illustrative of the disconnection of young British Asians from wider British society, driven by outside ‘foreign’ influences. For Ash Amin, however, the protests by young British Muslims mark the emergence of a subcultural force refusing to remain hidden. Importantly, they do not mark distance from Britishness, alienation or confusion, but are, rather, evidence of the very secure sense of citizenship held by this British-born/raised generation. Monica Ali's first novel, Brick Lane, is imbued with this spirit of defiance. Like Nadeem Aslam, Ali seems to straddle worlds of postcolonial fiction and contemporary British Asian literature. Her second novel, Alentejo Blue (2004), can be read as a conscious attempt to refuse to allow simplistic associations between ethnic authors and particular subject matter. For Ali, the possible politics behind such a departure needs to be contextualised within the reception of Brick Lane.

This chapter reviews the spatial negotiations that have often had to be entered into by British Muslims as means to establishing mosques and centres of religious education (madrasas). It uses Henri Lefebvre's concepts of ‘representation of space’. There are various points of comparison that can be made between the Birmingham Central Mosque and the Jame Masjid in Handsworth. The mosque is considered as a meaningful or ‘representational space’ for the respective Muslim group. Both the Central Mosque and the Jame Masjid were developed some time ago, while the Dar ul-Uloom Islamia in Small Heath was planned and completed in the late 1990s. In the statements of the President of the Birmingham Central Mosque and the representative of the Dar ul-Uloom Islamia, it is noted that the local discourse of multiculturalism is not only promoted by the City Council, but is also shared by the members of Muslim organisations.