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1 I trace the beginnings of this book to an informal conversation I remember having in the late 1990s. This was during a trip to Bangladesh, the country of my birth. I was at my parents’ house in a middle-class neighborhood of Dhanmondi in Dhaka, the capital city, having tea with friends, a group that included academics, lawyers, and NGO leaders. Eager for their feedback, I expressed an interest in studying the rising prominence in the social and political life of Bangladesh of Islam, in particular an Islam that emphasizes a return to basic principles and the significance of Islamic thought for all aspects of life. I sought their advice on how I should go about conducting this study. In the vigorous discussions that ensued, all agreed that the topic was an important one. But why focus simply on those in Bangladesh? Why not look at those abroad—at Bangladeshis in Abu Dhabi, Kuala Lumpur, London, and New York? My friends spoke of noticing how Bangladeshis who went abroad often became highly religious, indeed “fundamentalist” in their orientation. They found it puzzling and counterintuitive. It was, moreover, a trend that held true across class lines, among not only the rural impoverished Bangladeshis who traveled to Saudi Arabia and Kuwait on labor contracts but also the urban, middle-class Bangladeshis who were going to Australia, Canada, and the United States. For all these reasons, as one friend put it, “Why not look abroad for what is happening at home?” Among the notable global trends of the late twentieth and early twenty-first centuries is an Islamic revival. Across the Muslim world, there has been a surge of religiosity coupled with the expansion of Islamic movements that advocate a greater and renewed focus on religion in the lives of Muslims. This book is about the relationship of global migrations to these religious developments. My particular window into this topic is a study of movements from the Muslim-majority country of Bangladesh to different parts of the world—to Britain, the United States, the Arab Gulf states, and Malaysia. I look at how, Muslim Migrants, Bangladeshis Abroad chapter 1  in relation to these quite different settings, Bangladeshi Muslim migrants and their families come to organize their community life and make sense of their place in the world. In my investigations, I pay particular attention to the dynamics of Muslim identity among Bangladeshis abroad, and their implications for the religious landscape of Bangladesh today. Politics and the Study of Muslim Migrants The opening of the twenty-first century has seen an explosion of interest in Western societies about the Muslim world. Global political events, most notably the September 11, 2001, terrorist attacks by extremist Islamists on New York and the subsequent U.S.-led military invasion of Iraq, have fueled this interest, infusing it with a sense of urgency and anxiety. As interest in Muslims has surged around the world, the growing Muslim presence within North America and Europe has also attracted attention. This is particularly so in light of such catastrophic events as the July 7, 2005, London bombings (also known as “7/7”), which were carried out by four British Muslim men, three of Pakistani and one of Jamaican descent. Such incidents have raised fears about Muslim communities in the West as breeding grounds for violent extremism. Reflecting these political currents, this has been a time of vigorous expansion in research and writing in North America and Europe about Islam and Muslims. Many conferences have been convened, research reports commissioned , surveys administered, and monographs written about Muslims. Among other things, these efforts have brought attention to the widespread hostility faced by Muslims in the West. Many post-9/11 analysts have further identified these conditions of stigmatization to be an important reason for the apparent growth of religious identification and practice among Muslims. That is, faced with intensive and largely negative scrutiny, Muslims have come together in a dynamic of reactive solidarity. They have responded to stigmatization by developing a stronger and more self-conscious collective identity coupled with high levels of involvement in pan-national Muslim groups and organizations (Cainkar 2004; Peek 2005; Roy 2004). These trends are reported to be operating in an especially powerful way among Muslim youth—the children and grandchildren of Muslim migrants to North America and Europe. In this religious resurgence among Muslims, an ethos of what may be described as “revivalist Islam” has been prominent. Revivalist Islam refers broadly to...

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