Paper short abstract:

This paper evaluates standard conceptionalisations of 'heterodox Islam' and exemplifies them looking at a wide range of groups considered as apostates and heretics by mainstream Islam in order to express some ideas for representing (and teaching about) those groups in their own right.

Paper long abstract:

How can we define (and teach) 'heterodox Islam' without being normative and essentialising? Standard representations and proposed genealogies of 'heterodox Islam' usually are constructed along the lines of some greater narrative; in case of the 'Islam narrative', 'heterodox groups' serve as the diametral other. It is, then, impossible to conceive of them without 'standard' Islam. This was theorised by scholars from Max Weber up to Bourdieu and others by looking at the relationship of orthodoxy and heterodoxy. This paper evaluates these conceptionalisations and exemplifies them looking at a wide range of groups considered as apostates and heretics by mainstream Islam in order to express some ideas for representing those groups in their own right.