Publication of the Berlin Graduate School Muslim Cultures and Societies

Edited by Omar Kasmani and Stefan Maneval

Publisher: Revolver Publishing (January 2, 2017)

This book is a cooperation between doctoral fellows, alumni and alumnae, post-doctoral fellows and professors of the Berlin Graduate School Muslim Cultures and Societies (BGSMCS). It brings together photographs, objects, and essays as a way to present the overlooked and sometimes under-represented aspects of everyday life across various Muslim communities and societies. In doing so, it recognizes and reflects upon the importance of material and visual cultures.

Our selection comprises of material gathered at the BGSMCS: photographs that researchers have recorded during fieldwork, objects and artefacts that they have brought back from the field and accompanying essays that feature multi-disciplinary perspectives on the subject.

Muslim Matter underscores the complexity and heterogeneity of Muslim lifeworlds: places where prayer goes hand in hand with ideas of amusement and simple pleasures offset the harshness of conflict-ridden environments; also communities which are in conversation with non-Muslim majorities; and occasions where the human-ness of the subject takes precedence over its Muslim-ness.

Contributors

Olly Akkerman; Schirin Amir-Moazami; Feray Coşkun; Kristina Dohrn; Markus Fiebig; Bettina Gräf; Kerstin Hünefeld; Omar Kasmani; Alina Kokoschka; Gudrun Krämer; Jasmin Mahazi; Stefan Maneval; Anton Nikolotov; Benedikt Pontzen; Jasmijn Rana; Rune Steenberg Reyhé; Mahabat Sadyrbek; Wendy Shaw; Claudia Seise; Usman Zahirzai

About the Authors

• Omar Kasmani is a post-doctoral research associate at the Collaborative Research Center Affective Societies, Freie Universität Berlin. He holds a PhD in Social and Cultural Anthropology also from Freie Universität Berlin.

• Stefan Maneval is a post-doctoral research associate at Europa-Universität Flensburg. He holds a PhD in Islamic Studies from Freie Universität Berlin.

Table of Contents

• Foreword, Bettina Gräf
• Framing Muslims or Reframing the Questions: Notes on the “Muslim Question” in Europe, Schirin Amir-Moazami
• Matter that Matters: An Orientation, Omar Kasmani
• The Thing with Islam: Material Culture beyond the Museum Display Case and the Cabinet of Curiosities, Alina Kokoschka
• Lost and Found: A Matter of Orientation, Stefan Maneval
  Objectification, Wendy Shaw

Source: Berlin Graduate School Muslim Cultures and Societies (BGSMCS)