Abstract

Based on the ethnography of mosques and halal cafes in Astana, this chapter argues that aspirations for modernity, urbanity, and civility can be manifested in various Islamic forms. Moreover, in these new forms of Islamic visibility, entrepreneurship, and community-making, we are witnessing a peaceful local decolonization movement that is trying to “break away” from the Soviet and Western-imposed norms of ethics, rationality, and visions of moral order. The concept of “decolonial turn” developed by postcolonial theorists like Madina Tlostanova and Walter Mignolo (Learning to Unlearn: Decolonial Reflection from Eurasia and the Americas, Ohio State University Press, 2012) comes particularly useful here as we theorize how newly emerging actors on the ground attempt to create an “alternative modernity” through reinventing religious tradition.