I ♡ Islam

Abstract

This essay explores how and why Muslim Sierra Leoneans living and working in the Washington DC metropolitan area inscribe religious identity onto their work sites by means of a variety of Islamic commodities. These items, ranging from bumper stickers and decals to informational pamphlets and kosher hot dogs, are physical manifestations of experience, a means of situating individual and community in transnational space. Looking at how individuals use religious objects to make and maintain their worlds points to the act of display as a physical manifestation of experience. How such objects are utilized on, in, and around taxi cabs and food vending stands - my male and female informants’ primary work sites - reveals the artistic creation of new sensitivities towards self and religion, highlighting the complexity of multiple gazes and responses in multi-cultural Muslim and broader non-Muslim spaces.

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