Negotiating the ‘Genuine’ Religion: Muslim Diaspora Communities in the Context of the Western Understanding of Religion

Abstract

Abstract The article contextualizes the current West European debates on Islam within the framework of the specific modern Protestant understanding of religion. Using the case study of Muslim minority groups from the Balkan (Albanians and Bosniaks) in Switzerland, it illustrates how this essentialistic understanding of religion characterizes the public perceptions of religious minorities in West European societies, especially in the post 9/11 period. The main argument of this contribution lays stress on the fact, that, depending on their cultural background as well as on their perception by the non-Muslim majority, different Muslim actors internalize the essentialistic understanding of religion dictated by majority society and likewise reply with different essentializing discursive constructions of Islam.