Young, Muslim and German: Precarious identity constructions and the need for communal belonging

“Individualization of religious belief” has been described as the paramount development among post-immigrant Muslim youth in Germany that connects them with European modernity. In many studies this individualized Islam is caught in descriptions of privatization, religious bricolage and the declining importance of religious institutions. The increasing pluralization of a vital Muslim youth culture in class, gender, ethnicity and understanding of Islam reflects these notions of modern adolescence. This paper provides a deep insight into one facet of today´s German Muslim youth culture and argues against a one-sided interpretation of individualized Muslim subjectivity. Muslims women from a religious youth organization who resist superimposed narratives of Islam and ethnicity are presented. Their identity constructions are strongly informed by Muslim piety and claims of German citizenship. This study’s analysis is based on ethnographic fieldwork, group discussions, and six biographical narratives of Muslim women aged between 16 and 26 years old. By taking contemporary theories of identity and religion into account, the paper will question the individualization thesis in two ways. First, the biographical accounts and collective negotiations within the faith-based community illustrate the need for communal belonging in a context of minority experience, discrimination, and non-recognition of the hybrid self-understanding. The results show that, against a self-chosen and privatized religiosity, having mutual affirmation and collective experience within an institutional stetting is a precondition in order to maintain the precarious religious-national identity. Second, the ways these women speak about themselves reveal not only a language of individualism and conscious engagement with the Islamic tradition, but also a strong orientation towards the community and opposition against certain liberal understandings of the self. These findings show a differentiated picture of the ongoing transformations within the German Muslim community and thus encourage us to rethink theories of postmodernity and reflexive modernization in the light of youthful religiosity.