In his works he applies perspectives derived from Weber, Nietzsche and Foucault to an empirical and historically informed “Islamwissenschaft”.
Educated in Darmstadt, he went on to study ‘Islamwissenschaft’, sociology and philosophy in Frankfurt am Main and Giessen, where he took a D.Phil.
His first employment as a full academic was at Alexandria University, Egypt 1969 to 1971, from where he returned to Bochum and Strasbourg.
He held various fellowships in Oxford (St. Antony's), Singapore (NUS) Adelaide (Flinders) Geelong/Melbourne (Deakin) and also at universities in Egypt (Ain Shams and Cairo Univ.).
He serves at the Advisory Board of ‘Theory, Culture and Society’ (from 1984 on) and is the co-founder of the ‘Yearbook of the Sociology of Islam’ (1998-2008).