Muslim-Jewish encounter, diversity & distance in urban Europe: religion, culture and social model (ENCOUNTERS)

• Applicants: Professor Dr. Matthias Koenig; Professor Steven Vertovec, Ph.D.
• Subject Area: Empirical Social Research ; Social and Cultural Anthropology and Ethnology ; Human Geography
• Term: since 2020
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 440842327

This proposal is for a study of intercultural, interethnic and interreligious encounters as exemplified by Jews and Muslims in urban Europe. The largest European populations of these two groups - overwhelmingly urban, concentrated in the same cities, and, strikingly, often in the same neighbourhoods - are in France, Germany and the UK, countries which on the face of it have followed different models of framing majority-minority relations, creating ideal conditions for a comparative study of the possibilities of living together in urban Europe. Although academic evidence indicates negative attitudes to Jews and to Muslims correlate with each other in wider society, current public discourse has instead emphasised growing antagonism between them, relating to events in the Middle East (including the Israel/Palestine conflict) and to the rise of Islamist terror and its counteraction. I.e. commentators have pointed to Muslims as key perpetrators of antisemitism. Ethnographic research, however, suggests that relations in urban neighbourhoods are often more complex: everyday commercial exchange, cultural traffic within music and arts scenes,spontaneous and institutionalised interfaith initiatives, nostalgic attempts to retrieve periods of conviviality, and banal contact in the street are among the many forms these relations can take. To address the lack of empirical and conceptual research of these two minorities, we will bring together a breadth of attitudinal quantitative data and qualitative (ethnographic and discourse analysis) research. To do this our transnational collaboration will explore the specificities of and commonalities between the countries, shaped by different national histories of integration including the place of religion in social and political life, but also by local variations on national policies, to better understand how different types of relations might arise. At the national scale, this includes an examination of migration and colonial histories, and of the classical models often attributed -British "pluralism", French "republicanism", German "federalism", each involving a different settlement between confessional and public life and national and ethnic identities. However, as the picture can radically differ on local level, the project will be grounded in urban sites: two diverse city-regions in each country including significant Jewish and Muslim populations or histories and differing approaches to urban governance. We propose an interdisciplinary collaboration across six leading European research universities, involving sociologists, anthropologists, urbanists and migration policy experts, with a history of collaboration. The core of the project methodologically will be intensive, granular participative observation in areas of potential Muslim-Jewish encounter, combined with quantitative analysis of attitudes and discourse analysis. The project will foster dialogue across academic disciplines and with societal stakeholders.

• DFG Programme: Research Grants
• International Connection: France, United Kingdom
• Cooperation Partners: Dr. Ben Gidley; Professorin Dr. Anne-Sophie Lamine