Religiosity as an Identity: Young Arab Muslim Women in the United States and France

Abstract

Young Arab Muslim women who are religious are particularly challenged by hostility toward Muslims in the United States’ and France’s secular societies. They feel Muslim first but are not recognized as religious citizens and their personal quest for religious identity faces both stereotypical assumptions from non-Muslims and expectations from their own community. The current study, conducted in the United States and France, shows that as religion is central to their identity negotiation process, young Arab women who are religious Muslims struggle to express who they feel they are, as citizens of their country of residence as well as members of an ethnic and religious minority.