"They have no taste in Morocco": Home furnishing, belonging, and notions of religious (im)perfection among white Dutch and Flemish converts in Morocco

Abstract

This article focuses on furnishing practices of the domestic space in the homes of white Flemish and Dutch female Muslim converts who have made hijra (Islamic migration) and settled in Morocco. Fed up with European Islamophobia and longing for a place that supports and strengthens their faith, they decided to emigrate to a Muslim country. Yet, remarkably, once settled in Morocco, many experience discontent with regard to a perceived ‘lack of true Islam’ in the country. To understand the positions and experiences of the Flemish and Dutch converts, I look at how they create a sense of home through homemaking practices, and in particular the organization of objects and images in the domestic space. Building on literature on home, transnational migration, conversion, and material religion, I demonstrate that mechanisms of distinction and notions of religious (im)perfection intersect in the organization of the domestic space. Based on ethnographic accounts, I argue that my interlocutors bring a culturalized Islam to Morocco, that jostles uneasily against local Moroccan religious sensibilities, but also allows them to repair some of the privileges they lost upon their conversion in their homeland. This article also shows that it is through the engagement with profane material forms, but also with immateriality and emptiness, that Islam becomes present in their domestic spaces, enhancing the cultivation of their ethical selves.