An Islam of Her Own: Reconsidering Religion and Secularism in Women's Islamic Movements * By SHERINE HAFEZ

Hossain, Mary

doi:10.1093/jis/ets049

Cited by 5 publications

(6 citation statements)

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“…Studying women from religious groups poses unique challenges to Western feminist theorists since they conceptualize resistance and oppression differently than postcolonial and non‐Western feminists do, and they do not sufficiently acknowledge the complexity of experiences, interpretations, and aspirations of women from these groups (Abu‐Lughod, 2013; Alkhaled, 2021; Avishai et al., 2015; Fotaki & Harding, 2017; Mahmood, 2001). While liberal feminism underlines the oppressive aspects of religious traditions—emphasizing women's submissiveness, passivity, and the need to be “freed” by the West—critical/postcolonial feminists highlight the freedom of choice and the ability of women in religious societies to be agentic despite their membership in religious communities considered oppressive (Abu‐Lughod, 2013; Alkhaled, 2021; Altorki, 1986; Deeb, 2006; Hafez, 2011; Jeffery & Basu, 1998; Mahmood, 2001, 2005; Ozkazanc‐Pan, 2012).…”

Section: Theoretical Backgroundmentioning

confidence: 99%

Fashion as embodied resistance: The case of Jewish ultraorthodox female entrepreneurs

Wasserman,

Baikovich

2023

Gender Work & Organization

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Drawing on the qualitative research of Jewish ultraorthodox female fashion entrepreneurs (JUFFE) in Israel, we examine how women's body regulations are collectively negotiated, challenged, and resisted. Our paper shows that, through the disruption of religious clothing and hairstyling, JUFFEs have challenged the patriarchal expectations of women's ideal type in their authoritative society and triggered various changes that allowed for the construction of alternative forms of femininity. Our contributions are twofold: First, we advance the understanding of the body as a site of resistance by exposing the analytical constituents of embodied resistance, namely, the forms of femininity constructed through embodied resistance, which demands are challenged, which types of modesty are resisted, which bodily means are used in women's resistance acts, and the implications of the resistance. By deepening our understanding of the constitutive resources of embodied resistance, we offer a more nuanced and detailed analysis of the various embodied ways and means through which women of religious communities may prompt changes regarding women's visibility and economic status. Second, we broaden the conceptualization of resistance's outcomes in authoritarian regimes by demonstrating how alternative religious femininities are constructed through the collective power of fashion. We present two manifestations of femininity: femininity as a marker of diversity (individualized femininity) and femininity as a marker of economic status (affluent femininity)—both deviate from the one prescribed by their leadership and community. We demonstrate how entrepreneurs' subversive messages are diffused through their clientele's bodies as the carriers of their subversive messages.

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Section: Theoretical Backgroundmentioning

confidence: 99%

Fashion as embodied resistance: The case of Jewish ultraorthodox female entrepreneurs

Wasserman,

Baikovich

2023

Gender Work & Organization

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“…Veena Das draws attention to how the Begriffsgeschichte School, on which Talal Asad relies heavily in his genealogy of secularism, "has a somewhat restricted notion of context," thereby creating "a picture of the secular as a unitary system" (2006: 101). Other anthropologists have critiqued Asadian works for promoting a binary between their vision of a unitary, modern, and secular state, on one hand, and premodern religion on the other (Hafez 2011;Schielke 2019). The dichotomous inverse of the modern and secular state, Atalia Omer notes, often takes on nostalgic properties in Asadian scholarship, which present a "utopian interpretation of tradition as the opposite of the unfavorable ideological logic of the liberal state" (2015: 39).…”

Section: The Centrality Of Secularism In the Anthropological Literaturementioning

confidence: 99%

“…It was Sisi, after all, who led the overthrow of the Muslim Brotherhood president, thereby curbing the ostensible rise of religious politics in Egypt. The co-imbrication of religious and secular politics (Hafez 2011), however, has hardly dissipated under a new regime that has repeatedly catered to religious conservatives in the country. To take one example, Egyptian police launched a massive crackdown on LGBT Egyptians in January 2018 with no obvious political purpose other than to demonstrate its conservative guardianship over society (Ghoshal 2018).…”

Section: Ordinary Experiences Of the Centralized Egyptian Statementioning

confidence: 99%

Flexible States in History: Rethinking Secularism, Violence, and Centralized Power in Modern Egypt

Friesen

2023

Comp Stud Soc Hist

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In recent decades, secularism has emerged as one of the most studied concepts in sociocultural anthropology, and Egypt a primary site of its analysis. This article considers trends in Egypt’s modern and contemporary history in order to complicate the great explanatory power some anthropological works have granted to secularism. Above all else, it interrogates the manner in which the state’s regulation of religion (which is the defining feature of Asadian conceptions of secularism) has unfolded in recent Egyptian history. First, I survey the different ways scholars have portrayed secularism in Egypt, focusing in particular on the insights and limitations of Asadian theories. A second section employs ethnographic data to uncover how ordinary Egyptians in the provincial capital of Beni Suef have experienced state power, religion, and secularism in their everyday lives. Contextualizing these ethnographic perspectives alongside several prominent instances of state violence between 2011 and 2013, I elucidate how, rather than typifying a secular state, Egyptian politics, above all else, have been driven by an opportunistic realpolitik. My final section brings historical and ethnographic perspectives into sustained conversation to argue that the state regulation anthropologists sometimes frame as secularism is better conceptualized as a form of state centralization. I conclude, in turn, that political developments in modern Egypt have most often been shaped by flexible national and imperial interests.

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“…Much of this scholarly work relates to women and Islam and has been framed within the tradition of anthropological ethnographies. Examples include studies of adult women in the Middle East (notably Cairo, Egypt) (Hafiz 2011;Mahmood 2005), Europe (Jouili 2015) and the United States of America (USA) (Grewal 2014) who navigate their lived experiences, of which Islamic practice is an important part. These studies are centred on quagmires, difficulties and challenges related to how individuals who choose to follow a religion generally, and Islam in particular, make sense of themselves in a world where this is not the norm.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Women generating, reproducing and disseminating texts in a Deobandi madrasa in South Africa

McDonald

2022

HTS Teologiese Studies / Theological Studies

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An Islam of Her Own: Reconsidering Religion and Secularism in Women's Islamic Movements * By SHERINE HAFEZ

Cited by 5 publications

References 0 publications

Fashion as embodied resistance: The case of Jewish ultraorthodox female entrepreneurs

Fashion as embodied resistance: The case of Jewish ultraorthodox female entrepreneurs

Flexible States in History: Rethinking Secularism, Violence, and Centralized Power in Modern Egypt

Women generating, reproducing and disseminating texts in a Deobandi madrasa in South Africa

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