- Maria Bombardieri is a PhD candidate in School of Social Sciences: Interactions, Communication and Cultural construction at the University of Padua, Italy. Her PhD thesis deals with the phenomenon of ISIS and foreign fighters and muhajirat with approaches of branding, sociology of religion and semiotic. Her research activity is mainly focused on Islam, Muslim organisations and mosques issue in Italy.edit
Research Interests:
The PhD thesis Branding Islam. The Women of ISIS among jihad, empowerment and submission contributes to the academic debate on the relationship between the religion and the brand within the framework of the consumer culture. The present... more
The PhD thesis Branding Islam. The Women of ISIS among jihad, empowerment and submission contributes to the academic debate on the relationship between the religion and the brand within the framework of the consumer culture. The present work analyses the re-signification of Islam in a brand and how the brand is a further source giving sense to people and building their identities besides the religion, in a post-modern and consumerist society. The theoretical framework involves semiotics, marketing (storytelling) and branding approaches. The theoretical framework is applied to "ISIS and the phenomenon of Western muhajirat" as an empirical case study, with a focus on Italy in comparison with European countries and United States. The thesis analyses ISIS as a brand with its own imaginary world and the Western muhajirat as consumers.