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Navigating the Cultural Divide: Islam, Gender, and the Integration of Somali Immigrants

Navigating the Cultural Divide: Islam, Gender, and the Integration of Somali Immigrants This article explores gender notions and practices among American-Somalis in Columbus, Ohio. Theorists have disputed whether original or new culture should influence immigrants’ evolving identities. Interviews with thirty-eight immigrants revealed a more decisive third mode of discourse that seems to transcend the two cultural ends—namely, Islam. Participants invoke Islam to justify adopting new gender arrangements demanded by new circumstances. In other cases they cite Islam to legitimize severing ties with customs perceived as unsavory in the original culture.This middle way between homogenizing assimilation and compartmentalizing pluralism is based on economic pressures and on rediscovering/rereading Islamic texts, emancipated from older interpretations. Doing so, participants distance themselves from aspects of the original culture while reframing cherished elements of the new culture as “Islamic”. For them, Islam facilitates transcultural integration, enabling hybrid identities and behavioral patterns to coexist, and creating dynamic, novel, and genuinely cross-civilizational representations of “modern” community and agency. http://www.deepdyve.com/assets/images/DeepDyve-Logo-lg.png Sociology of Islam Brill

Navigating the Cultural Divide: Islam, Gender, and the Integration of Somali Immigrants

al-Huraibi, Nahla
Sociology of Islam , Volume 5 (1): 38 – Apr 17, 2017
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Publisher
Brill
Copyright
Copyright © Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, The Netherlands
ISSN
2213-140X
eISSN
2213-1418
DOI
10.1163/22131418-00501002
Publisher site
See Article on Publisher Site

Abstract

This article explores gender notions and practices among American-Somalis in Columbus, Ohio. Theorists have disputed whether original or new culture should influence immigrants’ evolving identities. Interviews with thirty-eight immigrants revealed a more decisive third mode of discourse that seems to transcend the two cultural ends—namely, Islam. Participants invoke Islam to justify adopting new gender arrangements demanded by new circumstances. In other cases they cite Islam to legitimize severing ties with customs perceived as unsavory in the original culture.This middle way between homogenizing assimilation and compartmentalizing pluralism is based on economic pressures and on rediscovering/rereading Islamic texts, emancipated from older interpretations. Doing so, participants distance themselves from aspects of the original culture while reframing cherished elements of the new culture as “Islamic”. For them, Islam facilitates transcultural integration, enabling hybrid identities and behavioral patterns to coexist, and creating dynamic, novel, and genuinely cross-civilizational representations of “modern” community and agency.

Journal

Sociology of Islam – Brill

Published: Apr 17, 2017

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