Introduction

The study of Islamic texts, mainly in the Arabic language, has traditionally shaped and demarcated the field of Islamic Studies and Theologies in the academy. Scholarly approaches to Islamic texts, however, have largely focused on socio-political and intellectual history in the fields of law, theology, politics, philosophy and Sufism. This focus traditionally constituted, and to some extent still constitutes, the field of Islamic Studies. Research on contemporary Islam also draws primarily on texts in the form of speeches, interviews and treatises in order to elucidate the ideas and positions of Muslim intellectuals and authorities. Despite the necessity of these works, however, this has led to the neglect of a variety of sources such as ritual texts, dream interpretations, prayer books and other manuals of worship (ʿibāda), devotional literature, ethnographic observations in ordinary settings and in everyday life, as well as audio and video material, to name a few. However, the textual approach is not problematic per se, but quite often the essentialist reading of texts produces a particular normative notion of Islam. Consequently, a myriad of phenomena that constitutes the Islamic will be excluded, as Talal Asad has pointed out in his important analysis of textual approaches that have been hegemonic in the academy for a long time. This has led to the development of a canon of texts, topics and authors within the field that has excluded those that do not conform to a specific idea of what texts should do so to speak. Since Asad's significant contributions on the pitfalls of the study of an anthropology of Islam, decontextualised positivistic approaches to Islamic knowledge have been challenged by several scholars who have drawn attention to discourses, practices and social contexts and settings, through which ideas come to life. This chapter aims to demonstrate the value of an interdisciplinary methodology for the study of Islam and Muslims, both in the past and the present, by drawing on a broad range of practice theories.

In recent studies, scholars of Islamic texts have attempted to address these gaps in the study of Islam by extending the boundaries of the field of textual research while broadening the analytical tools of ethnographic analysis. Kevin Reinhart, for example, has noted that textual scholars struggle to engage with ritual and fiqh texts, ultimately ignoring writings on rituals that attempt to inform Muslim behaviour.