Arndt Emmerich is a Lecturer in Sociology at the University of Hertfordshire. Between 2021 and 2023, he was a Postdoctoral Researcher at the Max Weber Institute of Sociology at Heidelberg University, as part of the pan-European project ENCOUNTERS (Muslim-Jewish Encounter, Diversity and Distance in Urban Europe: Religion, Culture and Social Model). Prior to that, he was a Research Fellow at the Max Planck Institute for the Study of Religious and Ethnic Diversity and a Research Officer with the Changing Structures of Islamic Authority project at the University of Oxford. Using a variety of qualitative research methods, he has focused on generational and institutional transformations within local mosque communities in Germany and Britain. In his book, “Islamic Movements in India”, he drew on insights from political sociology, social movement theory and Islamic studies to analyse the ways religious groups utilise spiritual, material and organisational strategies for collective action, community development and political alignment. He holds a DPhil and MPhil from the University of Oxford and a BA in Sociology from the University of Essex.

Arndt's research explores the role of religion in democratic institutions, the governance of urban diversity, interfaith relations, and organisational changes within  diaspora, and migrant communities. He is currently a Guest Researcher at the Max Planck Institute for the Study of Religious and Ethnic Diversity and an Honorary Research Fellow at the Department of Psychosocial Studies at Birkbeck, University of London.

His findings and commentaries have been published in academic journals such as Politics and Religion, Social Compass, Journal of Muslims in Europe, Entangled Religions, Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies, Asian Survey, and featured in the BBC, Al Jazeera, Deutsche, Welle, Times of India, and the podcast, Religion Inside.

He is the author of “Islamic movements in India: Moderation and its discontents” (Routledge, 2020).

Reviewed in: Commonwealth & Comparative Politics; Journal of Asian Affairs; Revue des mondes musulmans et de la Méditerranée.

Featured in: Times of India, BBC, Al Jazeera, The Diplomat, New Indian Express, The News Minute, Scroll, India Today, Open Magazine, First Post, Onmanorama, Boom Fact Check, South Asia Journal.

Arndt has taught courses in cultural sociology, sociology of religion, social theory, development and migration studies and qualitative research methods. During the 2023-2024 academic year, he is teaching the following modules in Sociology:

• Sociology in Practice
• Crime and Culture
• Activism and Change