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Narratives of Conversion to Islam in Britain centre of islamic studies, cambridge The Centre of Islamic studies seeks to develop a constructive and critical understanding of Islam in the modern world. Its priority is to develop high-quality research and outreach programmes about Islam in the United Kingdom and Europe. Through its roster of scholarship, symposia, reports and interactive educational events, the Centre is committed to engaging with academics, policy-makers and wider society. This report is exclusively about female converts to Islam in Britain. Conversion implies continuity and change, association and, at times, involuntary dissociation. It looks back, and it looks forward in a journey with meanings which vary with time and from person to person. Female conversion to Islam in particular challenges the binaries of tradition versus modernity and faith versus secularism, by combining in the person of the convert – and her body – both the insider and the outsider, and doing so in a way that has the capacity to dilute the rough and ready distinction between ‘us’ and ‘them’. In the person and body of the female convert to Islam, the ‘twain shall and do meet’. This in-betweenness of female converts poses challenges to our mental and social tax- onomies, being insiders/outsiders and intimate strangers at one and the same time, to both the non-Muslim majority and the Muslim minority in Britain.’ PROFESSOR YASIR SULEIMAN , PREFACE Narratives of Conversion to Islam in Britain , , , Female Perspectives : + () • : + () • : @... PROFESSOR YASIR SULEIMAN , PROJECT LEADER FOUNDING DIRECTOR , PRINCE ALWALEED BIN TALAL www.cis.cam.ac.uk CENTRE OF ISLAMIC STUDIES , CAMBRIDGE UNIVERSITY OF CAMBRIDGE 978-0-9573166-0-7 in association with THE NEW MUSLIMS PROJECT , MARKFIELD MARCH 2013 NARRATIVES of CO NVERSION TO ISLAM Female Perspectives Professor Yasir Suleiman Project Leader and Founding Director Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal Centre of Islamic Studies, University of Cambridge in Association with The New Muslims Project, Markfield Contents Participants iv Preface 1 Executive Summary 9 1. Outline of the project 17 2. Limitations of the report 18 3. Objectives of the report 19 4. A note on terminology 21 5. The participants 22 6. The findings: general comments 23 7. Non-Muslim Perceptions of Islam 24 8. Family responses 25 9. Appearing as a Muslim 31 10. Marriage 38 11. Sexuality 48 12. Domestic violence 53 13. Polygyny 55 14. Divorced women 59 15. Converts’ children 60 16. Homosexuality 64 17. Trans-sexualism 67 18. Gender 69 19. Becoming part of wider Muslim communities 73 20. Identity 80 21. Media 84 22. Citizenship, political identity and engagement 90 23. Women’s rights 95 24. Guidance and spirituality 96 25. Sufism 99 26. Imams and scholars 100 27. Struggles within the faith 101 28. Concluding Remarks 110 29. Recommendations 113 Appendices 116 Endnotes 124 PARtICIPAnts Professor Yasir Suleiman Candace Hoffman-Hussain Chair and Project Leader Sarah Joseph Batool Al-Toma Rose Kelly Co-Chair Laura Zahra McDonald Shahla Suleiman Joanne McEwan Project Manager Fatima Martin Ruqaiyah Hibell Debbie Miller Secretariat Anita Nayyar Catherine Aganoglu Mariam Ramzy Kristiane Backer Francesca Reeder Alicia Blatiak Kathleen Roche-Nagy Salima Blundell Imelda Ryan Jameela Boardman Natasha Sadra Karima Brooke Adeela Shabazz Jameelah Campbell Julie Siddiqi Myriam Francoise-Cerrah Aisha Siddiqua Andrea Chishti Zahra Sobeiroj Marion Cobban Ioni Sullivan Ann Coxon Yasmin Sullivan Merryl Wyn Davies Anisa Temel Sumayah Ebsworth Rianne C Ten Veen Megh Falter Doris Teutsch Valerie Gihani Erica Timoney Olga Gora Mohini Verma An Van Ho Suaad Walker Catherine Heseltine Fatima Zohra iv PReFACe As this report will set out, conversion is a complex phenomenon: it implies continuity and change, association and, at times, involuntary dissociation. It looks back, and it looks forward in a journey with meanings which vary with time and from person to person. Female conversion to Islam in particular challenges the binaries of tradition versus modernity and faith versus secularism, by combining in the person of the convert – and her body – both the insider and the outsider, and doing so in a way that has the capacity to dilute the rough and ready distinction between ‘us’ and ‘them’. In the person and body of the female convert to Islam, the ‘twain shall and do meet’. For this reason, conversion to Islam presents one of the best empirical domains through which we can explore some of the most entrenched dichotomies involving Islam and Western modernity. Conversion may in fact be as much about Islam itself, as it is about some interpretations of Western modernity to which conversion often poses many questions. The in-betweenness of female converts poses challenges to our mental and social taxonomies, being insiders/outsiders and intimate strangers at one and the same time, to both the non-Muslim majority and the Muslim minority in Britain. In-betweenness may be a liberating place for the female convert, but it certainly is a hugely challenging one. The question female converts often face is this: ‘why would a liberated/free Western woman embrace a backward faith that oppresses her?’ This question carries the implication that there must be something ‘wrong’ with, or ‘perverse’ about, the female convert to want to do this ‘wrong/perverse’ thing. The fact that conversion to Islam may be a rational choice made to deal with some real philosophical and existential problems facing female converts in the modern world appears to be an embargoed idea, whether by routine habits of thought, through social acculturation or out of Islamophobic prejudice. Conversion is often full of joy and pain for the convert and her family and friends, regardless of the faith to which she converts, but no more so than when the faith concerned is a maligned Islam and its followers. For this reason, the Narratives of Conversion to Islam symposia that I had the honour of chairing for this report (as the only male member of the project) were unequalled as an exercise in baring the soul, displaying human vulnerabilities, 1 voicing doubt, expressing unwavering certainty, affirming and re-affirming commitment, revelling in diversity, and lovingly celebrating and braiding the common bonds of humanity that, in their diverse inflections, seem to divide us. For many, if not all, of the participants the narratives underlying this report were conceived as journeys of discovery that went backward and forward, with many unscheduled stops to take stock, affirm the direction, refuel and move on. The notion of the journey was in fact so strong in these narratives that some participants suggested inscribing it in the title. In the end, the decision was made to stick to a more mundane title which, I hope, still retains the notion of process in what this report talks about: conversion is always in a mode of becoming through which a state of being subsists as a core. This report is exclusively about female converts to Islam in Britain, although the converts who took part in the project came from different ethnic, national, faith and no-faith backgrounds that characterise the plurality of British society. Converting to Islam brings challenges to the female convert on many levels. The report deals with these openly and, I hope, sensitively. The challenge of separating faith from culture impacts the convert from the very beginning of her conversion and may last for a considerable time. Converts often turn to members of the heritage Muslim community for information on Islam, moral support and friendship, but they cannot always tell the difference between what is faith-bound and what is culture-bound in the information that they receive, especially at the start of their conversion. This may present the convert with a confusing picture at a time when she is unsure of her faith. It is not that heritage Muslims knowingly set out to confuse the convert, but they may not always be aware of the fine distinctions between faith and culture in their own belief systems. In this context, the attempt to integrate the convert into a heritage Muslim community (there are many such communities) becomes a matter of absorption where she is expected to dilute her pre-conversion cultural practices into the culture of the recipient community; in some cases she is urged to get rid of these practices altogether in order to become a full Muslim. Either way, conversion has a double trajectory in sociological terms: conversion to a new faith and accommo- dation/‘conversion’ to a new culture; although the first kind of conversion is the main subject of this report, the interplay between the two processes of conversion is also explored. Because of this double trajectory, it is not surprising that conversion to Islam is associated, for some converts at least, with culture shock and culture stress, which may or may not colour their views of the conversion experience. 2 One of the first challenges facing a female convert to Islam is that of dress etiquette. The report deals with this at some length from different angles. The participants expressed a great variety of views on this issue, which has been complicated by the emblematising of the hijab, both by Muslims and non- Muslims, as a sign of Islamic identity in a world that is dominated by all kinds of anti-Islamic/Muslim feelings. Some converts see the hijab in this way, as a badge of identity, but others do not. Some wear the hijab from day one of their conversion, while others do not. Some in this latter group may not wear the hijab except when it is required to discharge their religious duties and on other occasions. Others may wear it on and off as they see fit, reflecting their mood, locality1 or the ebbing and flowing of their religiosity. Some may wear it sparingly, showing strands of hair, but others would use it to cover their hair completely.
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