Performing Islam - Volume 1, Issue 2, 2013

This article considers the work of Rachid Taha from a postcolonial perspective. Taha is the most well-known French Algerian musician working in popular music in France and now has a considerable following in the anglophone world. The article is most concerned with the ways Taha’s music expresses the experience of being identified as neither French nor Algerian while also feeling that both heritages are central to his identity as a Beur. The article focuses specifically on an understanding of Taha’s work in terms of métissage, hybridity. Taha’s first group was Carte de Séjour. Starting from a track on their first album, Rhorhomanie, which uses phrases from Arabic, French and English, the article goes on to examine examples of recordings where Taha has offered a revisioning of already well-known songs: Carte de Séjour’s version of Charles Trenet’s ‘Douce France’/‘Sweet France’, Taha’s version of Dahmane el Harrachi’s ‘Ya Rayah’ and, finally, Taha’s version of the Clash’s ‘Rock the Casbah’.

This article argues that by successfully performing their belief and ostensibly embodying its effects, western converts to Islam (especially prominent white converts in Reviving the Islamic Spirit conventions held annually in United States and Canada) believe for the rest of the Muslims. In effect they functions as a ‘fetish’. Just as the sexual arousal of a fetishist is dependent upon the presence of a psychosexual fetish, for (some) Muslims the deepest indications of faith is invoked by the prominent converts’ typical hyper-performativity of their ‘muslimness’. As it relates to the presence and rise to prominence of western male white converts, the emergence of converts as the signifiers of Muslims’ belief are becoming apparent. The content of Muslim’s belief remains objectively insufficient until it is fetishistically invoked by the western convert as its signifier.

This article is based on the field study of ritual practice known as Kutheeratheeb prevalent among Kerala Muslims. Through the Kutheeratheeb performance, a Mappila seeks the help of God through the mediatory power of saints and it also results in the origin of a new layer of religious leadership known as Ustadh. Islam in Kerala for various historical reasons accommodates native culture for its dispersal and survival. Keeping a separate identity from the other Muslims in India, the Mappilas of Kerala follow their cultural traits drawn from the neighbourhood within the umbrella of Islam. The existing scholarly debate on Islam perceives two streams of practices within the religion, that is, ‘Textual’ and ‘Lived Islam’. More often than not, scholars have expressed their views on these two streams as if they are binary opposites. The present study looks at ‘textual’ and ‘lived Islam’ as integral parts of Muslim culture and both ‘complement’ each other. This is due to icotypification of Islamic practices in Kerala.

A prominent theme in studies of Islamic religio-philosophical systems has been the supposed uptake of key Greek traditions on health and the body. Even those concerned with mysticism have reflected certain ideological interests: most studies of Sufi tradition focus upon either the distinctive mystical doctrines of the group or the trance produced in their rites or the interaction of text and musical formations. This article approaches the tradition from a different perspective. It focuses its attention on key elements in Sufism, but not on either the ideological or textual dimensions. It looks to the performative aspects of dhikr and the chanters who are integrated into it, and especially to note the way in which baraka provides an underlying rationale for health/well-being for all participants (including onlookers). Further, since the dhikr goals are clearly central for all Sufis (i.e. spiritual encounters), the role of the body, body postures and ritual movements all argue for approaching and critically analysing both them and baraka for their larger delivery of meaning. All this suggests a much different mind–body relationship than encountered in the Greek tradition. Examples will be drawn from fieldwork among Morocco’s Sufi chanters.

This article discusses the cultural politics of the Taliban and Hizbullah. While Hizbullah embraces ‘resistance art’ and encourages purposeful music and artistic expressions as pious entertainment, the Taliban censor music and restrict artistic activities, considering them innovations (bida‘) that distract from the practice of ‘authentic Islam’ and ‘true worship’. To discuss the interplay between the ‘power of music’ and ‘music in power’, this article uses samples of anashid (songs, hymns and anthems) of the Taliban and Hizbullah, both of which practice jihad through music. Most notably, both employ the same Qur’anic concept of ‘action of excellence under God’s guidance’, either to legitimize and justify certain artistic expressions and practices (Hizbullah) or to ban and prohibit them all together (the Taliban). Hizbullah’s contextual argument leads to a music theory, whilst the Taliban’s prohibition in the absolute curtails cultural politics all together.

Music is present online and offline alike, only amplified in volume and diffusion by the increase in audio and visual technology. However, music is controversial as well, when we consider current and long-term debates over acceptance and rejection of music in Islam. Looking at music as both social practice and artistic product, this article investigates its presence on websites created by Dutch Moroccans in the Netherlands and explores the way in which Internet-mediated music contributes to characterizing such sites. Five websites are investigated: El Tawheed, which is presented by other sites as the site of a ‘Moroccan mosque’, Ontdekt Islam/Discover Islam, Maroc.nl, which is a popular website, and two Berber websites, Amazigh.nl and Tawiza.nl. The analysis ties in with results and insights of a rich amount of works that have addressed websites variously indicated as ‘Muslim’, ‘allochthonous’, ‘ethnic’, ‘minority’ and ‘migrant’.1 Studies by J. W. Anderson, A. Appadurai and D. Miller and D. Slater have been source of inspiration. Finally, this article discusses the adequacy of the religion/secularism opposition in understanding ideas and prac¬tices of music as expressed by Dutch Moroccan websites.