Halāl Habichuelas: Food, Belonging, and the Conundrums of Being a Puerto Rican Muslim

Based on multiple years of ethnographic fieldwork alongside Puerto Rican Muslims in Puerto Rico and the United States, this article explores issues of identification and belonging among Puerto Rican converts to Islam, as expressed in their food practices. As "quadruple minorities" - Muslim...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Journal of the American Academy of Religion
Main Author: Chitwood, Ken 1984- (Author)
Format: Electronic Article
Language:English
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Published: Oxford University Press 2022
In: Journal of the American Academy of Religion
Year: 2022, Volume: 90, Issue: 4, Pages: 916-936
Online Access: Presumably Free Access
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Summary:Based on multiple years of ethnographic fieldwork alongside Puerto Rican Muslims in Puerto Rico and the United States, this article explores issues of identification and belonging among Puerto Rican converts to Islam, as expressed in their food practices. As "quadruple minorities" - Muslim among Puerto Ricans, Puerto Rican among Muslims, and both Puerto Rican and Muslim in the shadow of American empire - I suggest that Puerto Rican converts seek ways to restore a sense of coherence and selfhood through cooking, consuming, and forming community around food. For Puerto Rican Muslim converts, halāl consumption practices are about more than making their food, drink, or actions permissible; they are also about making their very identifications permissible, what one interlocutor called "Boricua halāl." This focus on religious actors' food practices showcases affective encounters with what we call religion in the everyday, showing matter's ability to reflect the quotidian complexity of late-modern lifeworlds.
ISSN:1477-4585
Contains:Enthalten in: American Academy of Religion, Journal of the American Academy of Religion
Persistent identifiers:DOI: 10.1093/jaarel/lfad003