Betreuung:
- Borayin Larios
The proposed research topic addresses how young South Asian Muslim migrants construct their religious identities against the backdrop of rising Islamophobia in Austrian politics. The focus of the proposed research project is to undertake a comparative analysis of various groups of young South Asian, Urdu-, Hindi-, English-, and Punjabi- speaking, Muslim migrants in Vienna, Austria in order to understand their identity development in relation to their religious beliefs particularly through participation in religious rituals and consumption of specific foods. The intended goal of this project is to highlight how religious practices and foodways develop and change between countries of origin and migrant/diaspora communities. In addition, this project aims to highlight that young South Asian Muslim migrants in Austria are not a monolith – rather, different groups create their own unique strategies for coping with “disintegration stress” (Dinç, 2014, p. 40) especially reflected through their participation in induvial and communal religious ritual practices and through the foods they consume.
The research project will concern itself with three case study groups: young post-migrants (people whose parents or grandparents immigrated to Austria but who grew up in Austria), international students, and asylum applicants. These three groups share many similarities but their legal statuses, lived experiences, and relationship with religion and Austria are different. The focus on religious rituals and food practices, is intended to serve as a tangible entry point to understand how religious practice is embodied by these groups in quotidian life. Through one-on-one interviews, participant observation in ritual practices, as well as surveys, this project aims to understand both broadly and deeply, the dynamic evolution of religious rituals and food practices that exist within young South Asian Muslim migrants in Austria.
This study pushes forward the state of research by proposing an analysis of three distinct groups in the form of case studies that will highlight both broadly and deeply the diversity of religious ritual practices and foodways of youth South Asian Muslims migrants in Austria.