From Muslim punks to taqwacore: an incomplete history of punk Islam

This article is an attempt to provide a very rough outline of the historical interaction between punk rock and the Muslim world. For the most part, the antino- mian youth culture of punk rock was relatively slow to reach Muslims outside of Europe and North America. When it did reach Muslim youth (from Europe to Asia to the Middle East), it tended to initially manifest in secular and antireligious terms. Yet by the 1990s, some examples of punk arose that claimed a Muslim identity, and by the year 2005, a scene called “taqwacore” developed. This new scene embraced both religious and nonreligious Muslim punks and others who did not self-identify as Muslim in any way. It’s been called “punk Islam” and has made a place for itself on the fringes of the punk scene and the Muslim world. Finally, this article briefly addresses some ways in which taqwacore can be seen as a theological development within Islam.