The impact of inter‐generational change on the attitudes of working‐class South Asian Muslim parents on the education of their daughters

Abstract

This paper presents the findings of ethnographic research into inter‐generational attitudinal change of parents towards the education of young British Muslim women. Based on in‐depth interviews with parents of different generations, given social class and ethnicity, there is a universal belief in the importance of education for young Muslim women per se, with economic and cultural factors significant in shaping this sentiment. A range of important differences in attitudes towards Islamic schooling and mainstream education, and questions relating to marriage, however, were found. There are complex issues of identity and religion among Muslims in relation to educational issues, but there has been a move towards Islamisation among both generations; the first generations through a form of cultural traditionalism and the second generations through Islamic conservatism. Although this finding is based on a study of a relatively small and isolated working‐class Muslim community in a declining post‐industrial town in the West Midlands, it is argued that this Islamisation places both particular risks and opportunities in relation to young Muslim women in education in such isolated and disaffected communities which have a wider conceptual, theoretical and policy impact.

Keywords:

• South Asian Muslims
• inter‐generational change
• attitudes
• education

Acknowledgements

The principal author would like to thank her sister, Amna Ijaz, for the tremendous support and guidance she provided in generating the sample of respondents for this research project. Her assistance is gratefully appreciated.