Allah in the West: Islamic Movements in America and Europe (Mestizo Spaces/Espaces Metisses)

Rating:
Summary: Catchy title incoherent content
Review: I picked up this book as title looked very interesting. I read a good part of the book in travel. The book does a fairly in-depth objective analysis of a few specific case studies (eg Rushdie affair in UK, Hijab issue in France and Nation of Islam/Louis Frakhan coverage). However, these are but random samplings of events which got a lot of media coverage but do a poor job of reflecting the overall Muslim presence in the West. Not an easy read and not as objective as I hoped.

Rating:
Summary: Ignore the title, go by the subtitle
Review: I would really like to know why the author chose 'Allah in the West' as the title(perhaps for sales). His book has nothing to say about the concept of Allah at all. The subtitle is accurate, it should have been the title. Its tone is that of a university study. Provides a lot of history about Muslim organizations in Britain and France.Totally ignores Muslims in general in the US but focuses on the Black Muslim movement instead. To me the Black Muslim movement in the US is a very different type of organization so putting it in the same book as studies of the Muslim organizations in Britain and France does not strike the right chord.