Shifting markers of identity in East London's diasporic religious spaces

ABSTRACT

This article discusses the historical and geographical contexts of diasporic religious buildings in East London, revealing – contrary both to conventional narratives of immigrant integration, mobility, and succession and to identitarian understandings of belonging – that in such spaces and in the concrete devotional practices enacted in them, markers and boundaries of identity (ritual, spatial, and political) are contested, renegotiated, erased, and rewritten. It draws on a series of case-studies: Fieldgate Street Synagogue in its interrelationship with the East London Mosque; St Antony's Catholic Church in Forest Gate where Hindus and Christians worship together; and the intertwined histories of Methodism and Anglicanism in Bow Road. Exploration of the intersections between ethnicity, religiosity, and class illuminates the ambiguity and instability of identity-formation and expression within East London's diasporic faith spaces.

KEYWORDS:

• Diaspora
• East London
• faith spaces

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Funding

This work was supported by the Leverhulme Trust through the Oxford Diasporas Programme [grant number F/08 000/H].