A National Sufi Order with Transnational Dimensions: The Maktab Tarighat Oveyssi Shahmaghsoudi Sufi Order in London

Abstract

Figuring out how one should live as an Iranian Muslim in London proves not an easy undertaking when feeling estranged from both the versions of Islam being promoted by the Islamic regime in Iran, and the national debates surrounding Muslim integration in British society. This article looks at how the tradition of Sufism has been reworked in the light of these circumstances, and reveals an aspect of the constructional process in which individuals engage when confronting the tensions between different definitions of belonging and differentiation. It shows how the transnational organisation called the Maktab Tarighat Oveyssi Shahmaghsoudi (School of Islamic Sufism) has been created and informed within a broader context of social dialogue through various means of communication and information technology and articulated by Iranians who have multiple affiliations and associations with London, Iran and the Iranian diaspora.