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- Convenors:
-
Raquel Gil Carvalheira
(Universidade NOVA de Lisboa)
Guillermo Martín-Sáiz (Durham University)
Send message to Convenors
- Formats:
- Panel
- Mode:
- Face-to-face
- Sessions:
- Tuesday 23 July, -, -
Time zone: Europe/Madrid
Short Abstract:
This panel focuses on the idea of the anthropology of Islam and the Muslim world, and specifically, on the contributions made by scholars in 2024 and the opportunities and challenges they may face in the world in the coming years.
Long Abstract:
Historically, scholars in the humanities and the social sciences have made important contributions to the study of Islam, from detailed ethnographic portrayals of the Muslim world to discussions regarding intellectual biases that characterize them. This includes the work of a wide diversity of scholars, from Edward Said’s Orientalismto Talal Asad’s revision of the idea of the anthropology of Islam. In this context, some have made claims regarding the need to counter these biases by interrogating the position of researchers vis-à-vis their archival and field interlocutors, and by extension, the coloniality of their work. This is the case, for instance, of Salman Sayyid and Junaid Rana, who have suggested the need to address issues such as the racialization of religious difference, the possibilities of decolonizing scholarship about it, and the possible problems of such an agenda. Based on these claims, a series of key questions arise: How are we to situate the study of Islam within the same framework of opportunities and constraints where we situate other religious traditions? In what do we conceptualize the Muslim world, its spaces, and its temporalities through our research and teaching? How does this contribute to understand (or not) the complexities that characterize the lives of our field interlocutors? We invite papers touching on one or more of these issues and presented by colleagues working in disciplines in the humanities and the social sciences, from literary and religious studies to archaeology and history to social anthropology and cultural sociology.
Accepted papers:
Session 1 Tuesday 23 July, 2024, -Umtul Aleem Kokab (Indian Institute of technology Delhi, India)
Paper short abstract:
The paper attempts to discuss public imaginaries of Islam using performative assertion of Ahmadis within the Indian subcontinent and the global Ahmadi diaspora using the trope of an 'insider witness' to contextualise the anthropological knowledge production in religion traditions.
Paper long abstract:
Anthropological writings and ethnographers find themselves struggling with the dilemma of encountering events that are vested with latent meanings and a certain form of interiority. The constant tension between ‘presence’ and ‘absence’ as eminent categories in the field of research imparts an ethnographer a sensitized manner of operability in the field. Islam has witnessed transformative aspirations across the globe especially in the context of South Asia in the last two centuries. The term ‘Muslim’, both as a religious ascription and social identification, underwent significant mutations over the years. However, the contemporary definition of ‘being’ and being described as a ‘Muslim’ requires critical intervention. The creation of hysteria in the Islamic world by the pronouncement of Ahmadi doctrines in the late 19th century led to the development of newer debates causing a rupture among several factions of Islam. Thinking through Naveeda Khan’s (2012) proposition about the obscurity of the question : what kind of Muslim one should be, and what kind of Islamic state or Muslim society one should strive for, I attempt to complicate the category of muslimness by looking at Ahmadi Muslims as a ‘hyphenated category’
The paper deliberates upon the diasporic sentimentalities demonstrated by Ahmadi Muslims who escape religious persecutions and employ creative ways to animate their religious life in an unfamiliar setting. The sense of being and belonging in the society acquires new meaning when a community is circumscribed from practicing one’s religious identity (in this context Islam). Thus, the front is expanded to discuss the public imaginaries of Islam using the performative assertion of Ahmadis within the Indian subcontinent and the global Ahmadi diaspora amidst an incriminating everyday. Therefore, opening a dialogue on the poetics of incarceration as a Muslim, and the positionality of researcher as both ‘endurer’ and ‘witness’ .The paper, using the trope of an insider witness, contextualises the transactions carried through translation of suffering for anthropological knowledge production. How is a subjective experience converted into a social experience for public consumption through academic writings and framings? What happens when the researcher steps into a familiar setting and re-invents it as an ‘Anthropological location’? The horoscope of field interlocutors needs to inculcate a newer perspective that is cogent enough to stitch the insider-outsider entities cohesively as consubstantial and complimenting each other. Will the ‘Field’ have a porous and wider outlook when reworked with a new range of spatial metaphors that are situated in religion traditions?
El Hadji Samba Amadou Diallo (Washington University in St. Louis)
Paper long abstract:
Senegalese Islam has a good standing in the global studies of religions in sub-Saharan Africa. However, most of these studies have focused on the Murids back home and abroad. In their research, scholars have also ignored other Sufi orders including the largest one, the Tijaniyya, and its numerous offshoots. This Sufi order is understudied in all academic disciplines, not to mention the anthropology of Islam in Senegal. Another epistemic hiatus is the lack of studies on the anthropology of the Tijaniyya, except for a few on the Tijaniyya Ibrahimiyya of Kaloalck and its widespread networks in West Africa and the diaspora. One of the most visible Sufi school of thought and sociopolitical movement in the Senegalese public sphere is the Tijaniyya Malikiyya, however it remains very little studied in anthropology -- if at all, to my knowledge as a specialist in this Sufi branch. In this paper, I will talk about the status of anthropology in Senegalese Islam, considering the Tijaniyya Malikiyya as a case study, to explain why this imbalance has arisen and how anthropologists could circumvent those epistemic hurdles.
fatima dhanani (SOAS, University of London)
Paper short abstract:
Pluralism is a unique lens to approach studying Islam and the Muslim world. Lebanon is a good case study, with religious pluralism enshrined its constitution. Pluralism can decolonise our thinking as anthropologists and provide a novel way to see the lived experience of Muslims in their context.
Paper long abstract:
Conceptualising Islam and the Muslim world using pluralism theories provides researchers a unique way of studying the religion through people, civilisations and worldviews. Pluralism is more than just diversity or the recognition of diversities in society. Pluralism is the active engagement of these diversities and how societies respond to these diversities. Pluralism can be an antidote to colonisation as it does not favour to rank any diversity over another. The Muslim world is resplendent with diversities in practice, laws, ethnicities, languages, geographies and interpretations. This is particularly the case in Lebanon where religious pluralism is enshrined in its constitution and is a facet that is promoted historically and the contemporary period. The challenge today is that this diversity – which could a strength and an opportunity to progress the nation – has lead to political sectarianism. Pluralism is lost a governance level which therefore has a trickle-down effect.
My paper would consider how pluralism as a theory can be applied to decolonise our thinking and our approach to studying the Muslim world. I use Lebanon as an example of a diverse and dynamic society with a high Muslim population and where Muslims are interconnected with their neighbours from other religious communities. Using my fieldwork, the focus would be legal pluralism and the implications and lived experience of the state, non-state actors and Lebanese residents. As anthropologists, we could look at our positionality within this framework and where we sit epistemologically in the data collection and analysis stages of research.
José Mapril (Center for Research in Anthropology (CRIA), Universidade Nova de Lisboa)
Paper short abstract:
This paper argues that the emergence of a normative dichotomy in Portugal between the “good” and the “other”, the “foreigner” or the “immigrant” Muslim is a process of “othering” that relates to citizenship, national identity, colonial legacies, and cultural assimilation.
Paper long abstract:
In the early 2000s, Nina Clara Tiesler showed that Muslims and Islam in Portugal were invisible in comparison with other European contexts. Ever since things changed considerably. Not only there has been a growing islamization of the public debates around Muslims but, at the same time, the new Islamic presence in Portugal went through several changes. Besides the increasing diversification in terms of national, linguistic, social, and doctrinal backgrounds, one of the major changes in the past years is the emergence of a normative dichotomy between the “good” and the “other”, the “foreigner” or the “immigrant” Muslim, a discourse that is reinforced by non-Muslim actors and that becomes increasingly visible in the public sphere. Based on a research about public debates on Muslims and immigration, this paper argues that this is a process of “othering” that consubstantiates a moral hierarchy in which many de jure Portuguese citizens are categorized as foreigners and subjects of suspicion in the public sphere. The objective of this presentation is to explore this process of “othering” and how it relates to citizenship, national identity, colonial legacies, and cultural assimilation
Francesco Piraino (Harvard University)
Paper short abstract:
By re-elaborating the categories of Shahab Ahmed, this paper will propose an alternative socio-anthropology of Islam
Paper long abstract:
The socio-anthropology of Islam has been revolutionized by the “discursive tradition paradigm” elaborated by Asad and Mahmood. These authors questioned Western ethnocentrism and (neo)colonialism present in social sciences, proposing a new socio-anthropology of Islam focused on power and knowledge. This paradigm has been criticized for its rigidity, which does not allow it to grasp emotions (Marranci) and everyday life (Schielke), because it is too focused on power structures (Vicini) and on secular/religious divide (Bangstad). This paper proposes a different perspective arguing that the “discursive tradition paradigm”, by focusing mainly on power relations and orthodoxy, artificially separated Islam from other religious and cultural discourses and traditions.
By re-elaborating the ideas of Shahab Ahmed (What is Islam?), this paper will discuss the categories of Text, Con-Text, and Pre-Text. The latter is crucial because it allows to analyze dimensions such as social justice, mystical experience, aesthetics, and philosophy, which are often belittled or considered as secular and exogenous to Islam. This paper argues that these dimensions are transversals/universals, which means that they are part of the Islamic tradition, but at the same time they transcend it, belonging to other traditions as well.
Bringing back these dimensions does not mean to deny the “discursive tradition paradigm” (the Text, Con-Text), but to add another layer – the Pre-Text – able to better situate Islam with other traditions. This approach will allow a better understanding of phenomena such as the Nation of Islam, the philosophy Abu Zayd, and some trends of Sufism and contemporary Muslim artists
Douglas Santos da Silva (ISCTE-IUL)
Paper short abstract:
Goan Muslims, or Moir, have witnessed political and social changes in Goa by Hindu and Catholic rules since the 8th century. In the 1990s, the emergence of "outsider" Muslims created a division between “us” and “them” and struggles between belongingness and ethnicity have been faced in the society
Paper long abstract:
Islam in India can be distinctive in each context, rather than conforming to a singular Middle Eastern tradition. As Talal Assad (2009) has shown, anthropologists must account for this diversity when studying Islamic practices and beliefs. Gabriele Marranci (2008) also sustained that Muslim societies cannot be viewed as monolithic cultural expressions. Muslims have been present in Goa since the 8th century, when they settled in various areas and contributed to commerce, transforming Goa into a significant port city, and improving the Indian Spice route. The majority of these settlers were Arabs, Persians, and Turks. While the Mughal empire climated Sufism to the Indian context, things changed dramatically in Goa with the arrival of the Portuguese in the 16th century. Goan Muslims had to adapt to Hinduism and Christianity because of the Inquisition, Proscription, and the Portuguese incorporation of New Conquests. As a result of this incorporation, Goan Muslims were labelled as mouro in India like those in the Iberian Peninsula, and subsequently were called moir, in Konkani, the local language."
Goan Muslims, or Moir, still live in the state today, attempting to maintain their traditions despite facing numerous challenges, dominantly due to internal migration throughout the subcontinent. As a consequence, social movements against citizens from other states have emerged, leading to a new form of Islamic practice in Goa. The Moir have self-defined by categorising outsiders as musalmans, a struggle to determine who belongs to the lands of Goa and what it means to be Goan.
Ross Wignall (Oxford Brookes University)
Paper short abstract:
Through ethnographic research with young Muslim men in The Gambia, I explore how their view of both immediate time and future time is marked by their experiences of Islam, precarity, and sport as they look to an array of possible futures which influence their present actions, attitudes and beliefs.
Paper long abstract:
In this article I explore how temporalities are embedded in gendered imaginings of the world derived from multiple divergent forms of masculinity each with their own sometimes secret codification of time. Through ethnographic research with young Gambian men engaged in redefining their futures through a sports-leadership programme, I critically examine how their view of both immediate time and future time is marked by their experiences of time, precarity and sport as an embodied activity and as a global imaginary. I then show how these vectors of masculine becoming interact with a pervasive Islamic masculine culture which teaches a different set of spatio-temporal norms and the West African tradition of ‘blessings’ which involves passing on a spiritual legacy to your family and community. As the young men I worked with made, stole or borrowed time to help themselves and sometimes contradictorily, help their families and friends, this article situates their experiences in relation to anthropological discussions of neoliberal time and the impositions of alien forms of temporality stemming from Christianity, Development and the economic rhythms of the Global North.
Kholoud Al-Ajarma (University of Edinburgh)
Paper short abstract:
This paper highlights the findings of my recently published book "Mecca in Morocco: Articulations of Muslim Pilgrimage in Moroccan Everyday Life". It examines the complexities, ambivalences, and contradictions inherent in Muslims' everyday religiosity.
Paper long abstract:
The lives of Muslims, as depicted in the book, are characterized by intricate ambiguities. This complexity is not merely a deviation from religious norms but an inherent aspect of Muslims' daily lives, where navigating multiple social and cultural contexts is a common practice. The paper argues that everyday life, being inherently complex, demands a nuanced understanding of how Muslims negotiate and combine religious and mundane moral registers concurrently. By highlighting the appropriation of Mecca into everyday life in Morocco, this paper contributes to the broader discourse on Islam as a lived religion. It underscores the importance of recognizing and navigating the ambiguities within Muslims' everyday religiosity, offering insights that transcend traditional analyses of moral norms and individual behaviors. The study advocates for a more nuanced approach to studying Islam in practice, emphasizing the complexities inherent in the daily lives of Moroccan Muslims. The paper discusses an approach that focuses on the socio-cultural embeddedness of religion in everyday life.
Ismail Khan (The University of Edinburgh)
Paper short abstract:
This paper explores how Pakistani deported migrant workers circumvent the restrictive border regime of Saudi Arabia through Umra, a Muslim pilgrimage to Mecca. This is a creative labour mobility strategy among workers through which they challenge the Saudi immigration control and the kafala system.
Paper long abstract:
Saudi Arabia has the holiest sites of Islam, the Ka’aba and the Prophet’s Mosques in Mecca and Medina, respectively. These two places draw millions of Muslims annually for the Hajj pilgrimage and year-round Umra – a smaller, non-obligatory pilgrimage. This paper explores how Pakistani migrant workers, deported from Saudi Arabia, use “Muslim sacred geographies” (Manger, 2014) to circumvent Saudi restrictive border regimes through Umra. Under the recent nitaqat or ‘Saudization’ programme, Saudi Arabia has intensified its crackdown on irregular migrants, including those on “azad” visas which is a legal grey area between documented and undocumented migration status. Faced with deportation and a five-year ban on re-entry, Pakistani migrant workers turn to Umra as an irregular route for labour migration. This informal practice is facilitated by professional brokers and networks of relatives and friends. Adopting the state of ritual consecration (ihram), these pilgrim/labour migrants overstay their visit visas for years by working in the informal sector. Drawing on 18 months of ethnographic fieldwork in a Pukhtun migrant-sending village in Dir, Pakistan, I argue that Umra is a creative labour mobility strategy. Through this religious yet economically motivated journey, migrant workers challenge both the Saudi immigration control and the kafala system (Saudi Arabia’s migration management system), which ties foreign workers to a local sponsor, thus criminalising employment elsewhere. Significantly, this irregular migration blurs the boundaries between religious and economic migration.
Keywords: Saudi Arabia; Pakistani workers; Kafala system, deportation, Umra