Latino Muslims as Interfaith Bridge-builders: Theorizing Identity Negotiation and Jewish-Muslim Relations in Miami’s Polarized Landscape

Abstract This theoretical paper examines how Spanish-speaking Muslims of Latin American descent occupy a unique position as potential interfaith bridge-builders between Jewish and Muslim communities in contemporary Miami. Drawing on scholarship across Latino Muslim studies, Jewish–Muslim interfaith relations, conversion theory, diaspora studies, and lived religion frameworks, I argue that existing research has treated these fields in isolation, missing the theoretical significance of Latino Muslims’ hybrid positionality in polarized contexts. Latino Muslims navigate what Homi Bhabha terms a “third space” at the intersection of Latino cultural heritage, Muslim religious identity, and American civic belonging—a position that generates distinctive capacity for cross-cultural translation and interfaith mediation. Miami’s exceptional demographic composition—a Hispanic-majority city hosting both one of the world’s largest Jewish populations and ethnically diverse Muslim communities—provides an ideal site for theorizing this bridge-building potential. However, the October 7, 2023 attacks and subsequent regional tensions have intensified American political polarization, constraining the interfaith space within which Latino Muslims might exercise their mediating role. This paper synthesizes fragmented literatures to develop a theoretical framework for understanding Latino Muslims as “bridge communities,” analyzing how sectarian variation (Sunni, Shia, Ahmadi), conversion narratives emphasizing “reversion,” and embodied practices of cultural hybridity shape interfaith engagement. By bringing diaspora theory, performativity, and contact hypothesis into conversation with religious studies frameworks of lived religion and positionality, this analysis reveals both the possibilities and limitations of identity-based bridge-building in an era of deepening polarization. The paper concludes by identifying implications for interfaith praxis and proposing directions for empirical research on Latino Muslim interfaith engagement in South Florida and beyond.