Research shows that Muslims are often reproduced within the context that reinforces stereotyping of Muslims, see for example Otterbeck and Schielke. They are often regarded as a collective group with no distinct individuals and thereby the Islamic religiosity is portrayed as different and deviant from the more secular and private practiced Protestantism that is a common belief in Sweden. The purpose of this work is to study the already existing representation of Muslim women in a Western context, i.e. Muslim women in Sweden. This is done through an analysis of two ethnographic interviews and observational studies, written by researchers in Sweden (Karlsson Minganti and Sultan Sjöqvist) to investigate the existence of an "us and them" mindset. The two ethnographic studies which are analyzed in this work, deal with different types of Muslims: women who have been Muslims since birth and converted Muslim women. Furthermore, each researcher's results are put in relation to postcolonial theories to interpret and understand the conclusions of the researchers. My conclusion is that there are clear tendencies of an "us and them" mindset, where researchers place their research object as "them". The women are portrayed as different, with different values in relation to the "Swedish society" or the "Western world". Many of the women show awareness of being assigned the position of "the others" by the society. The women, both the converted and the ones who have been Muslim since birth, think that they do not fall into the norm of whiteness, they do not identify themselves as the "normal western woman" and they position themselves as a minority, forming the notion that they are "them" and confirming the exclusion of themselves. Other clear trends are the researchers ways to interpret and understand women's lives on the basis of the white 'middle-class women's experiences and thereby excluding the Muslim women’s own perception of their conditions of life.

Enlargement of the European Union (EU) coupled with immigration and rising transnational flows of people has led to increased contact between different cultures, religions, ethnic groups and diverse languages. Historically, the reproduction of ethnic and racial bigotry from generation to generation has marred the European landscape. Cognisant of this, the EU is committed to the development of intercultural competences and the promotion of intercultural dialogue, involving not only public authorities but also civil society. As part of a strategy to build a cohesive integrated ‘social Europe’, the EU launched the 2008 European Year of Intercultural Dialogue (EYID) at Ljubijana in Slovenia on January 8. Beneath the carapace of ‘Unity in Diversity’, the aim of EYID is to promote a better understanding of Europe’s complex cultural environment in an effort to move beyond ‘mere tolerance’. In recent years, however, increasing tensions involving Europe’s Muslim population have been exacerbated by their visible difference, youth riots, terrorism and the current global discourse of “clash”. Considering that Europe’s largest ethnic minority is Muslim, any attempt to foster tolerance through intercultural dialogue could be severely limited by Europe’s ability to sustain a meaningful dialogue with Islam. Thus, this thesis focuses specifically on dialogue with Islam in contemporary Europe. Its aim is to contribute to the present discussion concerning the perceived need for policy makers and citizens to redefine the space/identity allocated to Europe’s Muslim population. Beginning with a brief history of Muslim immigration to Europe this dissertation then analyses the marginalisation of these immigrants by the development of institutionalised inequalities. Pursuant to this is an examination of the scholarly debate surrounding the phenomenon of a nascent ‘European identity’ and its compatibility, to an equally embryonic ‘Euro-Muslim identity’. Using EYID as a tool, this treatise then examines the themes reflected in academic discourse, which emerged from the EU level debates in relation to the acceptance of Europe’s minorities. As Europe attempts to rethink a broader identity by accepting that immigrants are no longer sojourners but a necessary part of Europe’s future, this thesis asks, how meaningful was the EYID to the discourse between Europe’s Muslims and European leaders, policy makers, and civil society?

Undersökningens syfte är att utifrån jungiansk teori bilda en förståelse för hur assimilation påverkar muslimsk identitet och självförverkligande i en sekulär kontext. Detta genom en fenomenografisk analys av det empiriska materialet, vilket består av kvalitativa intervjuer med troende muslimer. Utöver detta problematiseras Jungs analytiska psykologi i och med hur väl applicerbara dessa teorier är på muslimskt identitetsskapande idag. Undersökningen visar att det svenska sekulära samhället skapar ett assimilationstryck som upplevs av respondenterna i olika grader. Dessa påtryckningar innebär dock inga märkbara negativa tendenser i religionsutövandet bland de medverkande i den utsträckningen att den muslimska identiteten drabbas. Däremot tvingas respondenterna hantera utsatthet baserat på okunskap, rädsla och hat som på intet sätt bör försummas. Slutligen visar sig jungiansk psykologi fungera relativt oproblematiskt i en analys av den här typen. Jungs teorier är dock i behov av viss modernisering för att bättre passa samtida religionsvetenskap.

This thesis argues that women are increasingly recruited by terrorist organizations because they are perceived as high benefit and low cost perpetrators. Female terrorism is an increasing trend, as it is particularly effective and becoming more effective over time. Its effectiveness results from cross-cultural, deeply imbedded stereotypes of female behavior. Women are seen as nonviolent in the cultures from which female terrorists emerge and in which they perpetrate their attacks, and are therefore given more lenient security measures at security barriers. In addition, security policies reflect these stereotypes, as some only apply to men. The literature on the topic of gender and terrorism often addresses individual motivations for terrorism and misses the practical element of group strategy that is vital to understand in order to effectively defend against the trends of female terrorism. I found that terrorist groups are rational actors and thus choose to deploy women because they are low cost and high benefit. Terrorist groups learn through interactive exchanges with the target population or government and act accordingly. While the goal of gender equality may be used in secular terrorist organizations’ rhetoric, women’s involvement in terrorism does not necessarily equate to western-style feminism or gender equality. I illustrate the racial implications that are upheld and replicated through stereotypes about terrorism. Muslims are portrayed as terrorists to bolster the government’s interest in securing votes for its foreign policy agenda. I argue that stereotypes persist because of the media’s drive for profit as well as the perceived need for narrative fidelity, although this type of reporting benefits terrorist groups and impairs the target state’s security. If understood and addressed properly, this trend of female terrorist lethality can be undermined through policy recommendations. International organizations that adopt these policy recommendations together may effectively reduce female terrorist lethality, terrorism in general, and increase global security.

The aim of the study is to examine how religion legitimates outrages and it what ways we can regard religion as politics. The study uses the theory that Eickelman and Piscatori present in their book Muslim politics. They use the term ‘Muslim politics’ to describe the relation between Islam and politics. Eickelman and Piscatori divide Muslim politics in five elements that the essay uses to structure the analysis. By studying IS´s own published documents, two issues of the newspaper Dabiq Magazine, from a discourse analytical approach, this essay aims to consolidate the discourse behind the texts and find how the Muslim politics of IS is constructed. IS is an organization that has proclaimed a caliphate that includes Iraq and Syria. IS claims that the core of Islam has been lost and it needs to be rediscovered to avoid the punishment from Allah. IS claim to be the trustees of the will of Allah on earth and call on people to rally behind their interpretation of “true Islam”. The vision of IS is to re-establish a caliphate which is part of the ongoing objectification process.

This thesis explores the thought of a prominent Indian Muslim thinker, Asghar Ali Engineer, on liberation theology and the status of women in Islam. In his elaboration of liberation theology, Engineer demonstrates that from its inception, Islam has sided with the oppressed and the weak. If it is interpreted from its theological as well as sociological context, he argues, Islam makes it clear that it promotes justice and equality. The juxtaposition of theological and sociological perspectives is crucial to any understanding of Engineer's thought on liberation theology. Such perspectives also inform Engineer's view of the status of women in Islam. Our discussion is limited to two of the topics addressed by Engineer: polygamy and the veil. The key to understand these issues, Engineer maintains, is by distinguishing between the 'normative' and 'contextual' statements of the Qur'anic text. The point of this distinction is to differentiate between those principles of the Qur'an which are universal in nature, i.e. values, which transcend beyond time and space, and the contextual ones which are only valid in particular situations and circumstances. / In conclusion, Engineer's thought on liberation theology and women's issues are found to be liberal, critical and emancipative, successfully demonstrating that Islam sides with the weak and promotes justice and equality.

Based on a field study carried out in Kirikkale, this study investigates the transformation of religious tradesmen of small cities in Turkey with emphases on : (a) the role of religious values within the free market economy / (b) the &amp / #65533 / work ethics&amp / #65533 / of religious tradesmen and (c) the transformation process of religious values within the present economic system. In the study, semistructured in-depth interviews and official documents were used to collect the research data. The thesis of Weber on the relationships between religious values and the rational capitalism was examined to better understand the work ethics and the religious values of religious tradesmen. The opinions of Weber, Rodinson and &Uuml / lgener about the causes of the nonexistence of a rational capitalism in the Islamic world were evaluated throughout the study. In this respect, the emergence and the development of the Muslim guilds and petty bourgeoisie within the traditional Islamic societies were also studied. The research results suggest that the incorporation into the free market economy brings about the transformation the religious economic convictions or values. Therefore, the chance of survival and the applicability of such religious values within this economic system seem to be impossible. In summary, this particular research indicates that the religious tradesmen do not face with serious contradictions in their economic activities. They rather seem to be involved in a transformation and adaptation process in the free market economy.

This thesis investigates the continued hostilities and increasing backlash against the American Muslim community in the United States from a critical perspective that centralizes the racialization of Muslims and Muslim looking-people. The increasing anti-Muslim backlash against American Muslims warrants the need for a critical examination and analysis of the roots of this backlash and why, almost 11 years after September 11th, 2001, conditions for Muslims and Muslim looking-people are worsening. The term Islamophobia has been conceptualized and defined differently by various scholars, contributing to an analytical dilemma of how Muslims rationalize and resist anti-Muslim backlash. Therefore, the concept of racialization provides a fuller perspective and understanding as to why Muslim and non-Muslim Arabs, South Asians, and African Americans have been subjected to rising suspicion, surveillance, imprisonment, and violence in a post 9/11/2001 era. This thesis posits the notion of the white Christian Normative, an inherent Christian bias embedded deep within the racialized social system of the United States. This Christian Normative has its roots in the colonial confrontation between European colonizers and Indigenous populations in what is now considered the United States and has maintained its significance in impacting the life chances of non-white non-Christian minorities ever since. This thesis argues that it is the Christian normative that drives and sustains the anti-Muslim backlash in the United States. The anti-Muslim backlash that is growing stronger in the United States is also theoretically conceptualized within this thesis. This thesis utilizes qualitative data collected from 23 in-depth interviews with Arab and South Asian American Muslim college students between the ages of 18 to 35 years from the Midwest as its empirical basis.

The Islamic dress code has been forcibly imposed on the women in Sudan, since 1983, and many feminists researchers have criticized the practices of the veil as a tool to oppress women. This study aimed to explore a group of Sudanese women, currently living in South Africa, experiences and perceptions of the veil, whether the veil is a religious dress code or a tool that has been used to exercise inequality.

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