Contribution short abstract:

Muslims in the Americas and southern Spain reclaim the largely silenced heritage of Al-Andalus. While the former speak of reversión rather than conversión, Muslims in Spain associate Islamic cultural revival with sustainability and alternative concepts of nature, service, learning and community.

Contribution long abstract:

Al-Andalus: From 711 to 1492, the Iberian Peninsula belonged to the Muslim Empire, which left its mark on architecture, science, philosophy, art and agriculture. The reconquista of the Iberian Peninsula by the Spanish kings, which ended with the conquest of Granada in 1492, and the conquista that began a new era with the so-called discovery of the Americas by Christopher Columbus in the same year, are closely linked ideologically. Both events were characterised by violence, oppression, control and forced conversion to the Christian faith. While converts in Latin American countries today invoke this Muslim heritage when they frame their conversion to Islam in a predominantly Catholic society as a reversión - a return to the roots that were forcibly torn from them - and associate it with solidarity, empowerment and self-determination, a form of return is also taking place in southern Spain. Here, communities are rediscovering a Muslim heritage and linking it to issues of sustainability and alternative concepts of nature, service, learning and community life. Drawing on empirical examples from both sides of the Atlantic, I will show how Muslims are reclaiming a heritage that plays only a minor role in hegemonic European and Latin American discourses of identity. Through volunteer programmes, public events and debates, teaching units, open doors and retreats, these actors engage both local and transnational Muslims and non-Muslims to make visible an almost forgotten past, thus challenging the dominant narrative of a predominantly Christian imprint in Europe and the Americas.