Is There a Secular Hierarchy in the Norwegian Public Sphere?

Abstract

The point of departure for this article is to understand how various utterances from Muslims on themes such as secularity, freedom and feminism can be recognized in the Norwegian public sphere. Following the French anthropologist Louis Dumont, I want to show how values and ideals like freedom and feminism lay the foundation for what we could call a “secular hierarchy” within the Norwegian context. This hierarchy remains concealed for both participants and for researchers as long as it is not confronted but has become more visible as various “new” voices want to have a say in the public sphere. My claim in the article is that the variation in Muslim points of view can be understood as different approaches to the same hierarchical obstacle. However, due to our modern ideology we are not theoretically equipped to understand what hierarchy is. A second point in the article is thus to draw on the tradition from Dumont to reflect on the theoretical aspects of hierarchy.