Transformation as reversion to fitrah: Muslim Māori women's self-transformation through reflexive consumption

There is a dearth of research on the role of fitrah, the innate receptiveness to goodness, uprightness, and justice as Muslims understand it, and how it is expressed in and through consumption experiences, practices, and choices. The objective of this research is to study Muslim Māori women, the indigenous people of New Zealand, who have faced significant historical and personal fracturing of their identity narrative, and the reformulation and continuity of the narrative upon reversion to Islam (Islamic fitrah). Through participant observation, personal interviews, and immersion in the field, this study takes an ethnographic approach to uncovering the consumption habits and meanings of these new Muslims. We find that our informants are extraordinarily successful in “rewriting” the format of their lives and of securing for themselves ontological security and active, even vibrant, presentation and performance of themselves as Muslim women.