Thijl Sunier

Vrije Universiteit, Hoogleraar Antropologie

Most of my academic career has been devoted to the study of migrants in Europe and their offshoot. After studying anthropology, first at the University of Utrecht, later at the University of Amsterdam in the 1980s, I became part of a network of academics working on ethnicity. I focused on Turkish migrants and conducted a number of research projects on inter-ethnic relations in neighbourhoods in European cities. In the late 1980s my research agenda gradually shifted to Islam, and I conducted research for my PhD on Turkish Islamic organizations in Europe and Turkey. From the mid-1990s until the mid-2000s I was involved in several international research projects on Islam, education and nation-building in Europe. In that period, I broadened my research focus to include Muslims from other ethnic backgrounds, and I focused more on religiosity and religious world-making.