The Hybrid Researcher: Entering the Field, Ethnography and Research among Dutch Muslim Women from 2009 to 2019

Bat Sheva Hass

doi:10.3390/rel12040278

Abstract

This paper focuses on ethnography among Dutch Muslim women who chose to practice Islam (whether they were born Muslim, known as ‘Newly practicing Muslims,’ or they chose to convert, known as ‘New Muslims’), which is often considered by the native Dutch population as a religion oppressive to women. This paper is part of a larger project that seeks to understand how these Dutch Muslim women build their identity in a way that it is both Dutch and Muslim, whether or not they mix Dutch parameters in their Muslim identity, while at the same time intersplicing Islamic principles in their Dutch senses of self. This study is based on an annual ethnography conducted in the city of Amsterdam from September 2009 to October 2019, that combines insights taken from in-depth interviews with Dutch Muslimas, observations in gatherings for Quranic and Religious studies, observations in a mosque located in a block of neighborhoods with a high percentage of immigrant and Muslim populations, and one-time events occurring during special times (i.e., Ramadan, the summer, Christmas, and the Burka Ban). This paper has a special focus on the ethnography and the positionality of the author as a researcher who is both an insider and outsider in this specific field and her subjective experiences that could be methodologically relevant for other scholars and ethnographers. This paper will explore the techniques that helped the author enter the field, collect data for this ethnography and the construction of knowledge in this specific field, including the insider–outsider axis, code switching, emotions and assumptions in the field and positionality, which will all be explained in detail. This paper takes the reader on the journey of entering the field and shows them the various techniques that were used to enter the field in order to build report and trust between the researcher and the participants in this study.

Highlights

The Netherlands has specific sensitivities, affected by the historical and collective memory of the country as one of tolerance, and historical events related to society and immigration and religion and immigration, and a very interesting religious history that has been characterized by considerable diversity of religious thought and practice
I became acquainted with issues such as belonging, identity, the quest for a pure Islam, and the wish to disconnect from cultural influences of religion vs. culture
I will broadly discuss the tools that helped me enter the field and that could be of relevance to other researchers, in the way that knowledge is constructed in the context of this specific field, with its specific history and context as well as the identities met in the dialogues that emerged during ethnography, mainly the identities of the researcher and the identities of the interlocutors

Summary

Introduction

Publisher’s Note: MDPI stays neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published maps and institutional affiliations. “It was rough to be a Muslim in the Netherlands . No matter what they do, they’ll never be Dutch . They are well educated, and they have jobs. They feel that they’ve done everything right, and still they’re rejected” They feel that they’ve done everything right, and still they’re rejected” (Nachmani 2010, p. 58)

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Conclusion