Migrants and Militants English 2004

Being part of a violent community in revolt can be addictive-it can be fun. This book offers a fascinating inside look at present daypolitical violence in Pakistan through a historical ethnography of the MuhajirQaumi Movement (MQM), one of the most remarkable and successful religiousnationalist movements in postcolonial South Asia. Drawing on bothanthropological fieldwork, including participatory observation among politicalmilitants, and historical analyses of state information, nation building, andthe ethnicization of Islam since 1947, he provides an absorbing and important contributionto theoretical debates about political- religious and nationalist-violence.