Modern Muslim Identities

Reviews / Votes

'This important study sheds new light on changing Muslim identities in contemporary Malaysia, questioning existing distinctions between state and civil society, religion and secularism and ethnicity and religion and calling for new ways of understanding processes of Islamisation in the modern world.' - Joel S. Kahn, La Trobe University 'It is simply a first-class piece of work, one of real intellectual distinction and substantive originality. It offers an important commentary on the current Malaysian situation, and how it has been sedulously fashioned over recent history, and so makes a significant contribution to Malaysian studies.' - Clive Kessler, University of New South Wales 'This marks an original and very timely contribution to Malaysian studies. Hoffstaedter has demonstrated the profound effects of state religious policies and ideologies upon the everyday identities of practicing Muslims. He does this with great ethnographic nuance and original theoretical insights.' - Andrew Willford, Cornell University 'Gerhard Hoffstaedter presents a thought provoking case study on the many social and political forces that have interacted to push Malay identity along an exclusive trajectory. - This is a dangerous pattern, unfortunately discernable also in other parts of the Muslim world.' - Shahram Akbarzadeh, University of Melbourne