Based on in-depth and multi-sited fieldwork among participants of a transnational Turkish Islamic movement since 2015, this paper traces the social trajectory of Ahmet, a 40-year-old journalist, since he first left his parents’ home in Turkey in 2010 to make hicret (religiously motivated migration) to Brazil. While Ahmet’s migratory movement was initiated in a historical context in which he benefited from a comfortable social and economic situation – a formal job as correspondent for a news agency and participation in a prestigious religious movement – but was suddenly affected by political persecution from the Turkish government following July 2016 failed coup in Turkey. In a few months, Ahmet’s life went through critical changes, including the loss of his job and restrictions on mobility due to a set of political measures taken by the ruling party back home. Unable to return home and feeling unsafe in his host country in South America, Ahmet became a refugee in Europe. Ahmet has interpreted the dramatic shift in his life as a test of faith and has relied in his religious leader’s teachings in order to make sense of the new situation. Drawing on the religious notion of hicret, Ahmet’s migratory trajectory constitutes an ethnographic ground for better understanding the ways in which certain forms of interpreting and experiencing Islam inform and shape individuals’ trajectories and social practices. This paper argues that Ahmet’s articulation of the Islamic tradition in framing the losses and difficulties he has gone through functions as a wellspring of resilience to rebuild his life and make home wherever he may go.
