Date of Award

6-1-2009

Document Type

Masters Thesis

Degree Name

M.A.

Organizational Unit

College of Arts Humanities and Social Sciences

First Advisor

Liyakat Takim, Ph.D.

Second Advisor

Luis Leon

Third Advisor

Nader Hashemi

Keywords

Conversion, Islam, Latino, United States, West, White

Abstract

In the scholarship concerning conversion to Islam in the West, few books or articles have been written that examine non-African American US converts. Furthermore, this literature generally neglects using models of conversion for analyzing US Muslims. This thesis is an attempt to begin such a project. For this thesis, I interviewed 13 converts to Islam over the course of a month and a half at a local mosque: 8 females and 5 males; 9 white, 3 Latina/o, and 1 non-African American black. These converts told me their stories of conversion: beginning with their life prior to conversion, the process leading up to conversion, the conversion experience, and the events that took place after their conversion. In this thesis I compare their responses with other studies of non-African American converts in the West. While these converts share many similarities with their European counterparts, there are 4 prominent differences: the Denver converts, on the whole, had religious upbringings; most have moved several times throughout their lives; European converts tended to have higher education levels; and Denver converts are far less attracted to intellectual aspects of Islam, while being more attracted to spiritual aspects.

Publication Statement

Copyright is held by the author. User is responsible for all copyright compliance.

Rights Holder

Patrick D. Bowen

Provenance

Received from ProQuest

File Format

application/pdf

Language

en

File Size

90 p.

Discipline

Religion

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