The Mosque in the West

Nebahat Avcioglu
Columbia University
Institute for Scholars in Paris,
France

Abstract
This article is a reconsideration of the ethical conceptual framework developed by Edward Said in his book Orientalism
within an art historical context. It focuses primarily on the relationship between form and cultural identity in the architecture of contemporary mosques in Europe and North America to discuss key theoretical issues and current methodological tendencies in cross-cultural art history. The aim is to explore the highly charged topic of contemporary mosque architecture and minority cultural identity through the prism of what I call the Saidian turn. The article concludes by suggesting that one of the virtues of the Saidian turn is to contextualize ‘otherness’ not as a cultural dead-end burdened by an over-determining sense of identity but as an opportunity to participate in a material and open-ended becoming.

The Mosque in the West