Transnational Islam, migrancy and cultural congruence: the case of West African Muslims in the United States

Abstract

Discourses on Islam in the West tend to focus on the Middle Eastern and South Asian Immigrant experiences. African and especially West African Muslims' presence and experience in the West are often overlooked. In today's postcolonial West Africa, the classic patterns of migration, from the former colonies to the former Metropole, are currently being altered. The prominence of North America in the international stage, has, among other reasons, helped promote that region as a new destination of choice for immigrants from West Africa; especially after the former European metropoles have been struck by protracted crises, of all sorts. The migratory experince of West African Muslims in North America, in general, and the United States in particular, shapes up differently from the one in such former colonial powers as France, for example. Religion in general, and Islam in particular, plays a major unifying role among West African immigrants in the United States.