Mabrouk Mansouri

Ethno-Religious Minorities in The United States: Mabrouk Mansouri

This study explores the process of religious identity construction and examines religion and ethnicity as the most salient sources of the personal and social identities of two heterogeneous, ethno-religious minorities in the United States by focusing on the intersection of ethnic and religious identities. The scrutiny is intended to contribute to the understanding of the significance of religion for African-American and Arab-American ethno-religious minorities by examining the factors and processes contributing to the development of an ethno-religious identity. Despite belonging to the same faith, these minorities derived from two different ethnic roots: Arabs and Africans. Each of them represents a religious minority within an ethnic minority, as the majority of African-Americans and Arab-Americans are Christians. Each of them is a tiny religious minority within an ethnic minority in a white Christian majority or a minority within a minority. Even having the same faith; Islam-which seems to be their unique unifying trait- is misleading, as Islam has never had a monolithic religious or cultural experience.
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