Transcultural Muslim Middlemen and the Diversification of Bangkok’s Religious Economy

Abstract

Abstract:This article examines how Bangkok’s religious economy has been diversified by Ahmad Wahab (1883–1956), Direk Kulsiriswad (also known as Ibrahim Qureshi) (1922–2005) and Sheikh Rida Ahmad Samadi (1969–) from the 1920s onwards. In addition to engaging with a series of recent empirically rich contributions from Thai Muslim scholars, we introduce elements of Nile Green’s conceptual framework—such as ‘religious economies’, ‘terrains of exchange’ and ‘transcultural religious entrepreneurs’—that bring into focus how developments in Bangkok resemble accounts of religious change elsewhere. We completed local case studies around the time that other scholars were documenting Muslim elements of central Bangkok’s cultural kaleidoscope that highlighted the complex cultural geography of Bangkok’s Muslim enclaves and transnational connections with the wider Muslim world.