Empire, Colonialism, and Religious Mobility in Transnational History

The expansion of empires and colonial rule significantly shaped the movement of religious communities, practices, and institutions across borders. This article examines the intersections of empire, colonialism, and religious mobility with a view to exploring how colonial administrations facilitated, restricted, or co-opted religious movements for governance and control. Religious actors—such as missionaries, clerics, traders, and diasporic communities—played roles in transnational exchanges, carrying faith traditions across imperial networks while simultaneously influencing local spiritual landscapes. The study situates religious mobility within the broader framework of colonial power structures and analyzes how missionary enterprises, religious conversions, and state-sponsored religious policies were used to consolidate imperial control. It also considers how indigenous religious movements navigated, resisted, or transformed under colonial rule. The case studies include Christian missionary networks in British and French colonies, the movement of Islamic scholars across the Ottoman and Mughal empires, and the role of Buddhism in colonial southeast Asia. These examples highlight the role of religion not just as a tool of empire but as a vehicle for indigenous agency, resistance, and syncretic transformation. This article explores the transnational mobility of religious artifacts, sacred texts, and pilgrimage networks, demonstrating how colonial expansion altered religious landscapes beyond political boundaries. The study critically engages with postcolonial perspectives to interrogate how colonial legacies continue to shape contemporary religious diasporas and global faith-based movements.