Middle-class projects in modern Malaysia and beyond 1

This chapter argues that an unpacking of the Malay Muslim middle class over time is important in order to understand the broader picture surrounding this class and its relationship to Malaysian national repertoires such as Islamic revivalism, politics, consumer culture, social mobility and the state-market nexus. Controversies over what Islam is, or ought to be, are intensifying the more cultures of consumption assert themselves and urban Malay middle-class projects, that is, the making of local class culture in Malaysia, are shaped by these controversies. The chapter examines informants who are representative of the broad middle-class terrain. The central research question concerns how Malay Muslim middle-class projects have taken shape in Malaysia since the 1990s. Debates over proper Islamic consumption are of particular significance in the Malay middle class, that is, Malay middle-class projects are given shape in the interfaces between revivalist Islam, consumer culture and the blurred area of everyday respectability.