New Books In Islamic Studies

Harold Morales, an associate professor of Religion at Morgan State University, is the author of the momentous new book, Latino and Muslim in America: Race, Religion, and the Making of a New Minority (Oxford University Press, 2018). Morales’ monograph provides a rich ethnographic analysis of various Latino Muslim communities, groups, and individuals in America. Situated in the context of hyper-racialization of post 9/11, Morales carefully lays out his interlocutors’ powerful journeys of reversion (instead of conversion) to Islam and how they form historical and cultural continuities but also transformations, such as through evoking Islamic Spain (Al-Andalus) or food cultures. With its intersection of race, ethnicity, religion, and media studies, Morales’ has made a formidable contribution to the study of Islam in America, but also broadly on American religious experiences. M. Shobhana Xavier is an Assistant Professor of Religion at Queen’s University. Her research areas are on contemporary Sufism in Nor