Young British Muslims

The discursive field of what may tentatively be termed ‘British Muslim Studies’ has seen considerable evolution in recent decades. Emerging out of various race and ethnicity departments in the 1970s and 1980s, the Rushdie affair was the catalyst that foregrounded an explicitly Muslim identity as a subject of academic scrutiny. Another change has gained prominence in recent years relating to the identity of those conducting the research. Allied with the maturation of a university-educated second-generation in the 1990s and 2000s, increasing numbers of British Muslims are now reflexively studying the sociocultural contours of their own communities. The editor of this volume, Sadek Hamid, exemplifies both these trends. His own biography encompasses activism and academia, a confluence that to date has most notably produced his 2016 book Sufis, Salafis and Islamists: The Contested Ground of British Islamic Activism.