Introduction Rethinking an ‘Islamic Utopia’

This article argues for a non-normative and pluralistic approach to the study of Utopia among Muslim people. The authors employ the contributions to this special section as a starting point to redress a number of ethnocentric biases clouding the relationship between Utopia and Islam. They criticize...

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Bibliographic Details
Published inReligion and society (New York, N.Y.) Vol. 13; no. 1; pp. 185 - 199
Main Authors Priori, Andrea, Gerharz, Eva
Format Journal Article
LanguageEnglish
Published Berghahn Books, Inc 01.01.2022
Subjects
Muslims
Religious aspects
Secularism
United Kingdom
Tunisia
Bangladesh
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Summary:This article argues for a non-normative and pluralistic approach to the study of Utopia among Muslim people. The authors employ the contributions to this special section as a starting point to redress a number of ethnocentric biases clouding the relationship between Utopia and Islam. They criticize arguments that deny Muslims the ability to produce genuine' Utopias, highlighting commonalities between a religious culture and the secular culture in the West that has endorsed the notion of Utopia. At the same time, the contributors show how in scholarly research a normative and prejudicial concept of 'Islamic Utopia' has obscured the variety of forms that utopianism assumes among Muslim people, particularly the youth. This article envisages an inductive approach that takes into account both the different positionalities from which the concepts of Islam and Utopia are appropriated and the diverse political outcomes that are produced.
ISSN:2150-9298
2150-9301
DOI:10.3167/arrs.2022.130113