Believing in South Central Everyday Islam in the City of Angels

The area of Los Angeles known as South Central is often overshadowed by dismal stereotypes, problematic racial stigmas, and its status as the home to some of the city’s poorest and most violent neighborhoods. Amid South Central’s shifting demographics and its struggles with poverty, sociologist Pamela J. Prickett takes a closer look, focusing on the members of an African American Muslim community who call South Central home. Believing in South Central examines how believers help each other combat poverty, job scarcity, violence, and racial injustice, providing new insights into the day-to-day lived religion of African American Muslims. The book shows why the mosque has become believers’ key system of social support in a changing neighborhood and how members deepen their spiritual practice not in spite of, but through, conditions of poverty.