Ken Chitwood, "Borícua Muslims: Everyday Cosmopolitanism Among Puerto Rican Converts to Islam" (U Texas Press, 2025)

Mar 23, 2026

Ken Chitwood, a researcher of Puerto Rican and Latinx Muslim communities, explores multi-sited and digital ethnography of Borícua Muslims. He discusses everyday cosmopolitanism, historical threads of Islam in Puerto Rico, foodscapes and cultural negotiation, intra-community tensions around authenticity, and solidarities linking Puerto Rican and Palestinian anti-colonial struggles.

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ANECDOTE

How A Houston Mosque Sparked The Project

Ken Chitwood discovered Puerto Rican Muslim communities after meeting Isa Parada at a Houston mosque where Isa greeted attendees in Spanish.
That encounter led Ken into Latinx Muslim networks and shaped his long-term research trajectory across Puerto Rico and the U.S.

ADVICE

Be Transparent With Names When Ethically Possible

Use journalistic naming conventions and transparency when ethically justified to make ethnography verifiable and accessible.
Ken names public interlocutors and seeks consent for others so readers can follow up and challenge his accounts.

INSIGHT

Everyday Cosmopolitanism From The Margins

Cosmopolitanism must be reframed away from elite Western norms to capture everyday practices of Puerto Rican Muslims.
Ken calls this vernacular everyday cosmopolitanism born from marginality and Puerto Rico's liminal colonial status.

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Ken Chitwood's Borícua Muslims: Everyday Cosmopolitanism among Puerto Rican Converts to Islam (University of Texas Press, 2025), uses rich ethnographic fieldwork across multiple cities and the digital space to capture the complex lived realities of Puerto Rican Muslims both on the island and in the United States. The study is attuned to the archipelago’s context that accents Puerto Rican Islam, such as through histories that link it to Andalusian Spain, and culture, especially through foodscapes. Puerto Rico also has a diverse Arab Muslim diasporic population, especially Palestinians. Due to this diversity of Muslim experiences, throughout the book there emerge conversations about the boundaries of Islam in relation to culture, ethnicity, and theology. At times, when these varied communities share ritual and communal space together, questions of authenticity unfold, such as over language or notions of piety. Despite moments of tension around tribalism and questions of legitimacy, we learn that often Islam for both these communities is understood through their experiences of colonialism, and so anti-colonial registers of Islam influence the solidarity building and social justice organizing that unites Puerto Rican and Palestinian Muslims. The book also has an accompanying Spotify playlist that you definitely should check out. This book will be of interest to anyone working on Islam in South America and/or North America, and Arab and Palestinian diasporic studies, and food studies.

Ken Chitwood is a postdoctoral researcher and lecturer with the Department for the Study of Religion at Universität Bayreuth and Affiliate of the University of Southern California's Center for Religion and Civic Culture.

Shobhana Xavier is an Associate Professor of Religious Studies at Queen’s University. More details about her research and scholarship may be found here. She may be reached at shobhana.xavier@queensu.ca.

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