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JØRGEN S. NIELSEN, Towards a European Islam (London: Macmillan Press, 1999). Pp. 163. $59.95 cloth.

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  30 June 2001

J. Christopher Soper
Affiliation:
Department of Political Science, Pepperdine University, Malibu, Calif.

Abstract

Jørgen Nielsen's Towards a European Islam provides a very good introduction to the role that Islam plays in the experience of most non-European immigrants to Western Europe. As Nielsen correctly notes, there is an overwhelmingly Muslim character to immigration in the region, but few of the recent studies on immigration have looked systematically at the issue of the role religion plays in the lives of these newly arrived migrants. This relative silence is surprising given that there are an estimated 9 million Muslims in Western Europe, which makes them the largest religious minority in the region. Nielsen's book, therefore, is a healthy corrective for a literature that too often ignores this important question. The book's greatest strength is its description of the complex process by which Muslims seek to integrate their religious values and practices into social and political cultures that are not well suited to accommodating those views.

Type
BOOK REVIEW
Copyright
© 2000 Cambridge University Press

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