Backyard mosque

Backyard mosque in Baton Rouge

Backyard mosque is a common name for a converted building that was established by Muslims as a mosque and meeting place. Usually it is a former factory or an apartment, the function of which is barely recognizable from the outside. Backyard mosques only correspond to a limited extent to the space available in a normal mosque.

Social relevance

Germany

Backyard mosque in Wuppertal

In Germany, such backyard mosques are usually supported by mosque associations . The word for the building stands in the figurative sense for a secretly practiced religious practice of a Muslim minority, which is hardly noticed by the non-Muslim German majority population.

Architecturally inconspicuous mosque buildings can also be found in other western countries with Muslim minorities and in Islamic countries. In Turkey, the local mescit is the counterpart to the large Friday mosque . In Germany, the name Hinterhofmoschee is also related to the specific tradition of so-called guest workers , from the 1960s onwards recruited from abroad who , according to the ideas of the time, were only supposed to stay in Germany temporarily. The makeshift backyard mosques are a parallel phenomenon. Since the 1970s, Muslim migrants have often converted formerly commercial spaces into prayer halls themselves.

See also

• Courtyard (architecture)
• List of mosques in Germany
• List of mosques in Austria
• List of mosques in Switzerland
• Conversion (building law)

Web links

• On the situation of Islamic community life in Berlin (PDF file; 30 kB)
• The official position of the Catholic Church on backyard mosques and mosque construction in Germany - (pdf)
• Protection of the Constitution: The "collective ascent" of the backyard mosques , FAZ on November 2, 2003
• Stuttgart mosque communities: In the backyard, prayers are made to Allah five times a day ( memento from April 1, 2008 in the Internet Archive ), Stuttgarter Zeitung on March 20, 2008
• Out of the backyards , Qantara.de on May 15, 2008
• flickr.com: Backyard mosque on Wiener Strasse in Berlin-Kreuzberg

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Cornelia Reinauer : A communal political symbol. From the dirty corner to the round table. In: Riem Spielhaus , Alexa Färber (ed.): Islamic community life in Berlin. ( Memento of the original from March 4, 2016 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. (PDF; 2.4 MB) The Commissioner of the Senate for Integration and Migration, Berlin 2006, p. 38, ISBN 3-938352-14-0 . 
2. ^ Bärbel Beinhauer-Koehler, Claus Leggewie : Mosques in Germany. Religious home and social challenge. Beck, Munich 2009, pp. 25-27, ISBN 978-3-406-58423-7 .
3. ↑ Peter Heine , Aslan Syed (Ed.): Muslim Philanthropy and Civic Engagement. Maecenata, Berlin 2005, ISBN 3-935975-40-6 , p. 163