Muslim encounters in the global economy Identity developments of labor migrants from Bangladesh to the Middle East

The contemporary international migrations of Muslims are associated with a rise in religiosity, specifically with a rise in engagements with orthodox and revivalist practices and movements of Islam. In this article, I examine the narratives of 'life while abroad' of 47 returned Bangladeshi Muslim labor migrants to the Middle East. For these largely unskilled, male migrants, the experience of living in Muslim states had produced a sharp and multifaceted awareness of the complexities of religion and nationality in the modern world. Based on their experiences while abroad, the returned migrants expressed support for the project of Islamization in Bangladesh, seeing it as a means to foster prosperity and social order in the country.