Jesper Petersen – författare

This book empirically substantiates a re-conceptualization of Islam as produced and consumed by both Muslims and non-Muslims. Non-Muslim Islam is too often condemned and decried by scholars, rather than investigated. However, non-Muslim politicians, journalists, and public debaters preaching and missionizing their own interpretations of Islam to both Muslim and non-Muslim audiences, and venturing into theological debates with Muslims as non-Muslim Islamic authorities, cannot be reduced to cynical power politics, bigotry, political opportunism, prejudice, or apologetics (even if this may sometimes be the case). Neither do these labels increase our understanding of non-Muslim Islam as a phenomenon. This book argues the case for studying non-Muslim Islam and demonstrates the value of doing so through 11 case studies, opening up a new field of research, while also giving an insight into the many epistemologies at play in the production of different non-Muslim Islams.

In the last decade a number of women-led mosques have emerged in Europe and North America. In The Making of a Mosque with Female Imams Jesper Petersen documents the serendipitous, yet predictable, emergence of the Mariam Mosque in Copenhagen. The study first demonstrates that individuals’ facing the unpredictable plays a decisive role in social processes. This leads to an investigation of how serendipities are erased when narratives are erected retrospectively in the form of commodified products, autobiographical narratives, and research. Furthermore, Petersen conceptualizes non-Muslims’ theological productions of Islam – Islam without the worship of Allah, so to speak – and demonstrates how this influences Muslim productions of Islam.