Muslim immigrants are simultaneously included in and excluded from the ideological construction of Europe

Evidence

The problem of understanding Islam in Europe is primarily, so I claim, a matter of understanding how “Europe” is conceptualized by Europeans. Europe (and the nation-states of which it is constituted) is ideologically constructed in such a way that Muslim immigrants cannot be satisfactorily represented in it. I argue that they are included within and excluded from Europe at one and the same time in a special way, and that this has less to do with the “absolutist Faith” of Muslims living in a secular environment and more with European notions of “culture” and “civilization” and “the secular state,” “majority,” and “minority.” — Talal Asad, Formations of the Secular, 768 (#expands, via linked claim)

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: Muslims cannot assimilate into a polity defined against Islam itself — Cyra Akila Choudhury, Racecraft and Identity in the Emergence…, 311; Islam functions as an internal exteriority within Europe’s self-definition; Muslim inclusion-exclusion in Europe stems from European concepts of culture and secular state (+9 more)

Broader Connections

• Muslims are simultaneously included in and excluded from secular Europe #expands (0.95) — Talal Asad, Formations of the Secular, 768