RACIALISING AL-AJNABIYA: On Whiteness and conversion in Jordan

Abstract

This chapter studies whiteness in relation to the racialisation of religion through the lenses of conversion and kinship. It complicates the study of both the racialisation of Islam and of convert women by displacing the discussion to Jordan, where Islam cannot be labelled as foreign and where whiteness and its significance for the national imaginary and identity emerge from a history shaped by the colonial encounter. By highlighting how the racialisation of white convert women is inevitably linked to the nature and functioning of their kin relations, we address the gendered foundations on which these intersections manifest. The analysis is based on in-depth interviews conducted with white women converts to Islam living and having raised their children in Jordan. Our final aim is to, on the one hand, contribute to the study of whiteness as a lived experience of (universal, but situated) privilege and, on the other, to help articulate the significant links between race and religious identification.