The Interplay between Ethnicity, Religion, and Gender among Second-Generation Christian and Muslim Arabs in Montreal

ABSTRACT/RESUME This study explores how religion operates as an "ethnic-like" identity marker, or group binder, among both Christian and Muslim college students of Arab origin in Montreal. Special attention is also paid to the relation between traditional attitudes toward gender relations and ethno-religious identity building. A sample of 250 second-generation Arabs from five different Montreal colleges filled out a questionnaire. Sixteen of these students participated in in-depth interviews. The findings lend support to the hypothesis of a triadic relationship between ethnic identity, religious identity and gender. More specifically, these Arab-origin youth perform heuristic re-appropriations of religion and gender-related traditions, which are freely recycled into an identity vector delineating distinct ethnic group boundaries. This ethnicisation of religion is coupled with a shift toward a "symbolic religiosity," where religion comes to the foreground not as a fixed set of socially binding norms, behavioural rules, and rituals, but rather as a contributor to ethno-cultural identity building. This research also yielded two unexpected findings. First, the intersection of ethnic and religious identity turned out to be significantly more pronounced among Christian than Muslim respondents. Second, the hypothesis that females would be more likely than males to oppose traditional gender roles as an ethno-religious identity marker was only partially supported by the data. Cette recherche explore dans quelle mesure la religion fair office de marqueur identitaire a caractere ethnique, ou encore de ciment identitaire collectif, chez des jeunes cegepiens chretiens et musulmans d'origine arabe a Montreal. L'auteur accorde une importance particuliere aux liens entre le degre de traditionalisme en matiere de rapports de genre et le processus de construction de l'identite ethnoreligieuse. L'echantillon se compose de 250 jeunes d'origine arabe issus de 5 cegeps montrealais differents. Tous ont repondu a un questionnaire et 16 d'entre eux ont participe a des entretiens approfondis. Les resultats confirment l'hypothese d'une relation tripartite entre ethnicite, religion et genre. Plus precisement, ces jeunes procedent a des re-appropriations heuristiques de la religion et des traditions relatives aux rapports de genre afin de les recycler en vecteurs identitaires qui delimitent des frontieres ethniques distinctes. Cette ethnicisation de la religion s'accompagne d' un glissement vers une "religiosite symbolique" qui se distingue alors, non pas en tant que systeme preetabli de normes socialement contraignantes, de regles de conduite et de rituels, mais plutot en tant qu'element constitutif du processus de construction de l'identite ethno-culturelle. Cette recherche a egalement debouche sur deux resultats inattendus. Premierement, l'enchev&rement des identites ethniques et religieuses s'est avere etre considerablement plus prononce chez les repondants chretiens que chez les repondants musulmans. Deuxiemement, l'hypothese selon laquelle les femmes seraient plus portees que les hommes a s'opposer a ce que les roles sexuels traditionnels soient eriges en marqueurs identitaires ethno-religieux n'a ete confirmee que partiellement par l'analyse. INTRODUCTION Using both quantitative and qualitative analysis, this research explores how religion operates as an "ethnic-like" identity marker, or group binder, among both Christian and Muslim Cegep (1) students of Arab origin in Montreal. Special attention is also paid to traditional models of gender relations, which are posited to be a pivotal axis of these youth's ethno-religious boundaries. The interplay between religion and ethnicity constitutes a largely understudied issue within ethnic studies (with the notable exception of Jewish studies). Indeed, many studies on ethnic identity construction or retention still neglect to take into account the intersections of religion and ethnicity as identity markers. …