Introduction

Weiß, Max; Hanssen, Jens

doi:10.1017/9781108147781.003

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“…With these debates and questions in mind, Gregory Starrett’s classification of the secular as an essentially contested concept (one that is internally complex but is portrayed by some anthropologists as whole) is most helpful (2010: 635). Indeed, the perspectives of ordinary Egyptians in the pages ahead elucidate the inherent contestations around meaning in different contexts, a multiplicity that mirrors the malleable character of secularism described in the works of Samuli Schielke (2019) and Max Weiss (2018). Building on this robust, interdisciplinary body of literature on secularism, the subsequent sections of this article engage ethnographic data, as well as the historiography of modern Egypt, in order to trace the particularities of contemporary Egyptian political developments across local, national, and international networks of power.…”

Section: The Centrality Of Secularism In the Anthropological Literaturementioning

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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Section: The Centrality Of Secularism In the Anthropological Literaturementioning

confidence: 99%

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

Friesen

2023

Comp Stud Soc Hist

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

show abstract

Introduction

Cited by 1 publication

References 0 publications

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

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

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