Islam in China

Abstract

When you, kind reader, think of the “Islamic World,” is China included? When you think about the kinds of religions practiced in China, does Islam come to mind? You will undoubtedly conjure up images of Daoism, Buddhism, qigong and other body-cultivation techniques, and perhaps Confucian family rituals like “ancestor worship.” Connecting “Islam” to “China” may also bring to mind sectarian violence involving some members of the Turkic Uyghur community in northwestern China. Although Muslims have lived in China since the seventh century and there are today somewhere between twenty and sixty million Muslims in China, very few histories of China and very few works that describe or analyze the “Islamic World” include any discussion of Islam in China. This is a surprising lack of recognition given that there are almost as many Muslims in China as the entire population of Syria or Saudi Arabia, and more than in Malaysia!