BRITISH MUSLIMS AND COVID-19

British Muslims and Covid-19: Impacts, Experiences and Responses

Symposium Overview

Research on Covid-19 highlighted its disproportionate impact on Black and Asian Minority Ethnic groups (BAME) communities (Public Health England, 2020). However, these studies only offer a limited understanding of the particularity of experiences within the umbrella category BAME. For instance, there is only limited discussion around faith in relation to Covid-19, its impacts and the socio-economic fall-outs of lockdown. This MBRN symposium redressed this gap by taking an intersectional perspective in mapping and analysing the impact of Covid-19 on British Muslim communities. By bringing together practitioners and academics, we examined how diverse British Muslim communities have experienced the pandemic, how their lives have been impacted during and after lockdown and how they responded.

By focusing on the experiences of British Muslims, this online symposium enabled us to examine the interplay of ethnicity, religion and deprivation, in negotiating the particular challenges of living through Covid-19. We explored the diversity of ways in which British Muslims have experienced and responded to Covid-19, and seek to understand its ongoing impacts. We suggested answers for the question, “How are diverse British Muslims living through, and responding to the challenges of, Covid-19?”.

The symposium included presentations from academics and practitioners from a range of epistemological positions and disciplinary standpoints to explore dimensions of Muslim identity / lived experiences in relation to the pandemic, lockdown and subsequent socio-economic implications of Covid-19 in Britain.