Narrating Islam: Interpretations of the Muslim World in European Texts (Library of Modern Middle East Studies)

Mapping the diverse images of Islam and Muslims in educational texts as reproduced in national contexts across Europe and neighboring regions, Narrating Islam explores both historical perceptions and contemporary representations of Islam and Muslims as projected through instructional media. Based on interdisciplinary research, it seeks to excavate the layered images of Muslims and Islam which have been historically embedded in semantic reservoirs and which feed into the modern scripting of the ‘other’ in a global context. Narrating Islam offers a framework to critically discuss European identity through interrogating how pedagogical discourses negotiate the Muslim presence in and around Europe.

Gerdien Jonker is affiliated with the Georg-Eckert Institute for International Textbook Research in Braunschweig, Germany. Shiraz Thobani is a Research Associate at the Institute of Ismaili Studies, London.