Tidsskriftet

Anthropological research on migration has primarily studied the topic of community in relation to migrants' national, religious, or political identities. Yet, it is important to also explore the concrete, social relations that develop among imigrants at the place where they are currently living. This article investigates how Shia Muslim Iraqi women in Copenhagen use religious rituals and stories to construct different kinds of community. Based on an analysis of the calendrical rite of Muharram, it examines the ways in which the women through the ritualrelate to abstract communities drawing on their religious and national identities. It also explores how women's other social interactions may lead to more concretecommunities that are based on shared presence, activities, and the exchange of gossip and personal stories. The religious milieu gains its importance because women can negotiate their sense of belonging in relation to both their socio-culturalbackground and their everyday lives as part of an ethnic minority in Denmark. Nevertheless, the sense of community constructed among women does not necessarily extend outside of the religious activities. The article argues that it is necessary to thoroughly examine the sometimes contingent forms of community and belonging constructed among ethnic minorities rather than taking for granted that such communities exist on the basis of people's shared point of origin.