‘If there was no <i>jaad</i> ’: poetics of khat and remembering the future in a London Somali community

Abstract The Somali people have suffered from a devastating civil war and large‐scale forced displacement since the late 1980s. This article is based on ethnographic fieldwork with Northwest London Somalis during khat ( Catha edulis ) control debates that led to prohibition of substance in June 2014. It argues diaspora poetics can become an expression deeply divisive past offering ways rearticulate ruptured interpersonal community relationships terms their restorative potential. When United Kingdom used poetry engage debates, anti‐khat poems entangled this mild stimulant history state collapse displacement. revealed that, for Somalis, stakes vastly exceeded concerns about potential social health harms Kingdom. situate acts remembering within distinctive conception ideas nationhood, need conciliation, visions common future. Yet proved be less nostalgic longing more enacting new moral political relations enabled by momentum prohibition.