Self, Islam and Secular Public Spaces

Islamic voices appear to violate secular principles of Western democracy, or so goes the dominant consensus in Europe and increasingly in the US. We have seen this strong consensus emerge during the controversies surrounding the hijab, the niqab, the minaret and Danish cartoons. As tempting as it can be for pundits and politicians to put “Islam” in opposition to secularism, it is crucial to differentiate what among Islamic practices and activities is at odds with the Western understandings of secularity. Islam is disturbing because Muslims claim or show by their embodied practices that modern and religious individualism are not synonymous. By covering, distinguishing and separating, they inconveniently remind us that the individual and especially his or her body are not absolutely powerful. The cognitive realm is manifested in popular obsessions with diet, health and medical discourses that were already central to the Protestant Reformation.