Islam in in global context Benjamin Soares and Benedikt Pontzen

Since the fall of 2018, Benjamin papers and discussions therefore aimed experiences. The workshop was concluded Soares has been directing a at exploring the complexity of Muslim with a lecture by Benjamin Soares three-year multi-disciplinary project, youths’ ways of being Muslim in a variety ( of Florida). He argued that “ in Africa in Global Context,” of settings. lived Islam in cannot be studied funded through a grant from the In the workshop keynote, Filippo without taking religious plurality and the Henry Luce Foundation’s Initiative Osella (University of Sussex) showed how mutual influences between and on Religion in International Affairs lived Islam cannot be adequately studied non-Muslims into account. to the University of Florida. The in isolation. As he argued, Islam in Kerala As all of these studies with the diversity project is carried out by the Center for in South India cannot be considered apart of their topics and approaches helped to Global Islamic Studies in conjunction from its complex history and internal show, the ways in which Muslim youths with the Center for . The differences, local, translocal, and global live their religion are complex and cannot main objectives are to deepen knowledge networks, as well as the actual encounters be premised on und erstandings of Islam of Islam in Africa, challenge scholars of with non-Muslim Others. Accordingly, as unchanging. There was a consensus that Islam working on other geographic areas Islam is lived at the interstices of the one needs more such rich empirical studies to engage more fully with scholarship everyday and people’s various experiences. as well as comparative reflection in order on Africa, and strengthen the study The subsequent paper presentations to develop better analytical language to do and understanding of Islam in the continued with this line of thinking justice to the complexity of lived Islam US, as well as in non-US institutions through case studies of lived Islam among among Muslim youths. Such discussions of higher education especially in sub- Muslim youths in Africa. Kae Amo (Ecole will continue in future project activities in Saharan Africa. In addition to helping des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales, this and the coming two years. to consolidate UF’s standing as a leading Paris) described how since the 1980s hub for the study of Islam in Africa, the Muslim students have gained wide visibility Benjamin Soares is director of the Center for project will also support non-US-based on university campuses in due to Global Islamic Studies and professor in the scholars, institutions, and higher education, shifting corporeal and spatial practices Department of Religion. Benedikt Pontzen is a particularly in Africa, through the training through which their presence on campus Luce Foundation postdoctoral fellow in the Center and mentoring of scholars. It will also is enacted. Mamadou Bodian (West for Global Islamic Studies and the Center for facilitate long term international exchanges African Research Center, Dakar), using a African Studies. and networks. During the first year, the comparative approach, argued that over thematic focus will be lived Islam in Africa the last few decades Muslim students in a comparative context in a series of have reclaimed public space on campuses events, including a workshop in October, a across the francophone . Frédérick symposium, and summer institute. Madore (University of Florida) presented Benjamin Soares and Benedikt on Islamic organizations in Burkina Faso Pontzen, the project’s first post-doctoral that have re-fashioned themselves and the associate, convened “Muslim Youths and public sphere by devising new forms of Lived Islam in Africa and Beyond” as civic engagement and entrepreneurship the first workshop of the project. On over the last few years. Musa Ibrahim October 18-19, 2018, workshop partici- (Bayero University, Kano) explained how pants explored and discussed approaches the emergence of popular movie culture to the study of Muslim youths in Africa has not only propelled but partaken in and beyond. One of the key questions ongoing debates on “correct” Islamic was how Muslim youths understand and norms and practices. Focusing on Islamic practice their religion in different contexts. schools in and their Omani Given the great diversity of ways in textbooks, Kimberly Wortmann (Wake which Muslim youths live their region, Forest University) showed how the the participants agreed one cannot reduce textbooks familiarize Zanzibari youths lived Islam to a single reading, nor, for that with Omani culture and norms while matter, can one consider either “youth” the youths in turn translate and mediate or understandings of Islam as fixed. The these according to their own language and

10 Center for African Studies Research Report 2018–2019