Praxis and policy: Discourse on Cham Bani religious identity in Vietnam

Abstract

Past scholarship has described the Cham Bani religious community as a heterodox and syncretic version of Islam. We argue for a more nuanced interpretation: assertions of orthopraxy and heteropraxy shape contemporary debates in Cham communities in Vietnam. Based on a robust selection of source material—including the positions of government officials, high-ranking clerics, community members, and local activists, along with historicised anthropological accounts, Cham manuscripts, and government documents—our multidisciplinary approach, combining in-depth interviews and historical analysis, suggests religious classifications cannot be viewed as static in Cham communities, especially in the case of the ‘Cham Bani’, currently best thought of as a Cham particularist religious community.