Nordic Mosques Research Network

We are launching a new Nordic Mosques Research Network to run initially through three workshops in 2019 and 2020.

We set out to investigate mosques, Muslims and Islam in the Nordic countries as Muslims seek responsive institutions but remain challenged by economic, legal and political contexts. Mosques are at the heart of this. Much of the future of mosques depends on whether they can give and refine responsive and meaningful answers and make them coherent with the economic, legal and politics questions that Muslims seek the answers to. As such, this may result in the secularisation of mosques as they negotiate and find their place in society.

The three workshops follow the themes identified in the institutional embeddedness of Islam, namely, the Islamic economic, legal and political aspects.

The first will be on “Mosques, families and Islamic law,” in Göteborg, Sweden, 21.-23. August 2019. The second is on ”Mosques, power and politics,” in Copenhagen, Denmark, 22.-24. January 2020 and the third is on ”Mosques, communities and finance,” in Oslo, Norway, 12.-14. August 2020.

Calls for Papers and invitations to participate will be distributed in early 2019, but if you are interested, please email Niels Valdemar Vinding

During the workshops, Nordic and international expertise will gather in a returning network context to establish the state of research, to challenge the questions, assumptions and misunderstandings about mosques and Muslim institutions, and to build new research projects and ventures. The result will be a research network, a new collective grant application and three significant publications, including a special issue, an edited volume and a textbook for university level and teacher education.

The workshops and the project are jointly run by Niels Valdemar Vinding and Brian Arly Jacobsen from University of Copenhagen and prof. Göran Larsson from Göteborg Universitet and prof. Torkel Brekke from Oslo Universitet.

We are funded by a NOS-HS Workshop Grant as "Nordic Mosques in Context – On the institutional embeddedness of Islam in the Nordic countries" (Grant No. 2018-00085).