Space of Freedom and Cross-cultural Encounter in Aboulela’s Minaret

Abstract

Leila Aboulela, as one of the Muslim Anglophone novelists, attempts in her narrative to convey diverse experiences of diasporic Muslim women and the challenges they face amidst transcultural spaces. This paper aims to negotiate the representation of the narrative in the cultural spaces in the diaspora and the protagonist’s attempts to adhere to her religious affiliation in Minaret (2005), a novel which is written by Leila Aboulela. The paper attempts to give answers to questions related to cross-cultural encounters and to the significance of place and culture in sharpening the protagonist’s adherence to identity. The researcher uses the analytical-descriptive approach to study the novel. To collect and analyse data, primary and secondary sources are used such as the novel Minaret, books and scientific journals and the Internet. The researcher finds that Islam is used in this narration as a shaping social factor in the lives of devout and non-devout Muslim women and that the cross-cultural encounter in the novel helps the protagonist to choose to adhere to her religious identity suggesting that neither place nor ‘other’ cultures can divert her from her own choice.