Politics of Piety: The Islamic Revival and the Feminist Subject

Politics Of Piety - The Islamic Revival And Feminist Subject By Saba Mahmood Online. Book Details: Language: English Published Original Language Unknown .
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If you are a seller for this product, would you like to suggest updates through seller support? Politics of Piety is a groundbreaking analysis of Islamist cultural politics through the ethnography of a thriving, grassroots women's piety movement in the mosques of Cairo, Egypt. Unlike those organized Islamist activities that seek to seize or transform the state, this is a moral reform movement whose orthodox practices are commonly viewed as inconsequential to Egypt's political landscape. Saba Mahmood's compelling exposition of these practices challenges this assumption by showing how the ethical and the political are indelibly linked within the context of such movements.

Not only is this book a sensitive ethnography of a critical but largely ignored dimension of the Islamic revival, it is also an unflinching critique of the secular-liberal assumptions by which some people hold such movements to account. The book addresses three central questions: How do movements of moral reform help us rethink the normative liberal account of politics? How does the adherence of women to the patriarchal norms at the core of such movements parochialize key assumptions within feminist theory about freedom, agency, authority, and the human subject?

How does a consideration of debates about embodied religious rituals among Islamists and their secular critics help us understand the conceptual relationship between bodily form and political imaginaries? Politics of Piety is essential reading for anyone interested in issues at the nexus of ethics and politics, embodiment and gender, and liberalism and postcolonialism. In a substantial new preface, Mahmood addresses the controversy sparked by the original publication of her book and the scholarly discussions that have ensued. Read more Read less.

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Customers who bought this item also bought. The Annotated Critical Edition. The Making of the Modern Identity "This brilliant study of women in the contemporary mosque movement in Egypt is a provocative challenge to secular feminists and a testament to what anthropology can still offer--through its insistence on serious listening to other worlds--to critical social theory. Honor and Poetry in a Bedouin Society "My enthusiasm for this brave and stunning book is unqualified, and I learned something on every page.

To get the free app, enter mobile phone number. Mahmood maintains her location as rational anthropologist, researching female Islamists for the sake of a primarily western audience. Thus, there is little evidence that the women depicted in this book could themselves benefit from the book written about them. Mahmood identifies herself early, by her involvement with the progressive leftist political agenda in Pakistan, her place of birth.

She admits the progressive leftists tended to reduce Islamists movements and participants to limitations in education and reasoning. What moves her project forward is her own self-realization of the inadequacies of the explanations used to dismiss them, rather than to engage in-depth with more sensitive discursive modes of analysis.

She introduces the subjects of her fieldwork, and they speak—thereby introducing the readers of the book to the distinction between western "universalist" human rights discourse and these women's own consideration of their human dignity and intense meaning and formulas of agency. They have too frequently been dismissed as self-defeating socially, culturally, religiously, and politically for what appears to be acquiescence to dominating patriarchal norms and expectations. This book assures western readers that all discourse premised on certain western epistemological and philosophical ideas must be re-examined in detail before blanket application to the female Muslim subject.

Her first chapter "The Subject of Freedom" quickly clarifies the need for additional or more specific categories to utilize western liberal thought to measure the most sensitive and unusual circumstances of Islamist movements and the female Muslim subject. She provides an analysis of the major trends in western epistemology and philosophy when they are the basis of analogy and notes the strengths and limitations regarding alternative discussions on this subject.

Her methodology highlights both her knowledge of those strengths and the challenges her own anthropological case study produces by shifting the lens of observation to a keener look at both the interiority and outward embodiment of the female Muslim subject enmeshed within a larger Islamist context with their own means for self-regulating choice and development. Rather, my suggestion is that we leave open the possibility that our political and analytical certainties might be transformed in the process of exploring nonliberal movements of the kind I studied, that the lives of the women with whom I worked might have some The point is to cultivate.

If there is a normative political position that underlies this book, it is to urge that we-my readers and myself-embark upon an inquiry in which we do not assume that the political positions we uphold will necessarily be vindi.. The Umar mosque offers a relief from the opulent and consumerist aura of this thoroughfare, not only in its architectural sobriety, but also in the welfare ser The women making their way discreetly to the top floor of the mosque are here to attend a religious lesson dars; plural: While not all the ditiyat had performed the l.

Throughout this book, Arabic honorific terms such as hajja, sayyid, and shaikh , as with the proper names they precede, are neither italicized nor have diacritical marks. See my earlier note on transcription. She is well known in mosque circles, both for her scholarly erudition and for her dedication to providing lessons to women since the inception of the mosque movement approximately twenty Each week between fifty and one hundred women sit for two hours in an air Some of the attendees are housewives, others are students, and a large num While the maj ority of women are between the ages of thirty and forty, there are attendees as young as twenty and as old as sixty.

Some of these women drive to the mosque in private cars, others arrive on Cairo's overcrowded public transportation, and still others come in taxis. The women's attire is striking in its variety. Many come dressed in finely tailored ankle.. Others, including Hajja Faiza, wear well. There are even bareheaded women dressed in j eans and short tops, with styled hair and face makeup, who attend Hajj a Faiza's lessons-a sight almost impossible to find in other mosques.

And yet, while a wide variety of attire is represented, it is rare to see a woman wear See Robson 1 b. Sharciyya, and provides extensive welfare services to the neigh.. In contrast to the reserved decorum of the Umar mosque, an informal and un.. For example, women attendees often interrupt the teacher to ask questions or to put for.. There is constant ban.. The daciyat here, as in the other mosques, also speak in Egyptian colloquial Arabic, but their speech is marked by street colloquialisms that are characteristic of their and their audience's working..

While the age spectrum of women attendees at the Ayesha mosque is simi.. Women attendees sit on the thinly carpeted concrete floor, most of them dressed in crumpled ankle.. In contrast to the Umar mosque, where women wearing the full face and body veil niqab are almost never present, here a full one.. A majority wear the customary printed headscarves, and others dress in what has come to be called the baladi dress, worn by the rural poor, comprised of a loose black gown and a thin black headscarf tightly wrapped around the head.

If the Umar and Ayesha mosques stand at two extremes of the Cairene so.. This suburb is home to a large number of public and state employees, as well as to Egyptians who have returned from the Gulf States after working there during the oil boom years of the 1 s and 1 s. About five hundred women attend the weekly lesson; a majority of them are housewives, although a fair number are students from one of the largest Cairene universities, located nearby.

Unlike the women in the other two mosques, all three dac: Women who wear the niqab understand their practice to accord with a strict interpretation of Islamic edicts on female modesty, and often see themselves as more virtuous than women who wear the khimar the veil that covers the head and torso or the hij ab headscarf. The sense of rigorous piety at the mosque embodied in the predominance of the niqab is further accentuated by the fire In what follows, I will examine what the mosque participants meant when they talked about "secularization," what aspects of social behavior they considered most consequential to this process, and finally, what form of religiosity they sought to restore through their activities.

I will situate my discussion within the context of the various currents that comprise the current Islamic Revival, and the relationship of these currents to the history of Egyptian religious ac My aim in this chapter is not only to provide a brief sketch of the historical developments against which the contemporary Beinin and Stork ; Moensch For the most part, this view is based on an association drawn between the rate of returning workers and the rise of the Islamist movement in Egypt, but I do not know of any sociological or ethnographic study that has tracked or verified this claim.

Many of the mosque participants criticized what they con While a handful of mosque participants used the terms "secularization" and "westernization" to refer to specific events in recent Egyptian history,8 most employed the terms more loosely to describe a transformative force beyond their control that was corro Hajj a Samira from the Nafisa mosque was one of the daciyat who spoke pas This is what she had to say during one of her lessons: Look around in our society and ask yourselves: We emulate the Westerners [gharbiyyin] , the secularists ['"almaniyyin] , and the Christians: When you enter the homes of Muslims, you are surprised: We are Muslims in name, but our acts are not those of Muslims.

Our sight, dress, drink, and food should also be for God and out of love for Him [ibna muslimin wi lakin af'"alna mish ka muslimin: These remarks may be interpreted as abiding by a discourse of cultural iden.. I would like to propose an alternative reading, however, that draws upon a set of debates taking place in mosque circles that express con..

In Hajj a Samira's eyes, this is demonstrated by the fact that one cannot tell Muslims apart from either Christians or non..

Politics of Piety Chapters 1-3

The daeiyat and the mosque attendees want to ameliorate this situation through the cultivation of those bodily apti.. The mosque lessons provide a training in the requisite strategies and skills to enable such a manner of conduct, and the lives of the most devoted participants are organized around gradually learning and perfecting these skills.

As the end of the quote above suggests, Hajja Samira's position is articulated against those Egyptians who consider such quotidian attention to religious practice to be passe, or uncivilized ghair mutaQ. Hajja Samira's concern about the way popular religiosity has been trans.. Consider, for example, a similar sentiment expressed by Hajj a Faiza, from the upper..

The challenge that we face as Muslims right now is how to understand and follow the example of the Prophet, how to act in accord with the Quran and the l adith in our daily lives [biytmil bil All of us [Muslims] know the basics of religion [al.. For me, proselytization [daewa] means doing it from within ordinary acts and practicalities [eamaliyyat] , and translating worship [eibada] into everyday practices so that these are always directed toward God [fahm il Note that the challenge Hajj a Faiza regards as central to her work does not have to do with educating Muslims in the basic performance of religious du She is concerned in..

Hajj a Faiza's emphasis on practice, therefore, addresses the problem of how to make moral precepts, doctrinal principles, and acts of worship relevant to the or.. Her engagement with sacred texts is aimed at de.. Like the other daeiyat, Hajja Faiza recognizes that there are numerous as.. The distinction Hajj a Faiza makes between acts of worship Cibadat and those actions pertaining to social transactions mueamalat 10 has been part of the Islamic juridical tradition since at least the tenth century.

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In the modern period, although shari ea proce.. As was the case with most non.. Western nations, Egypt adopted a European legal code the French code in the mid. For debates among Muslim reformers on this issue, see D. For contentious debates about changes in Muslim family law in India, where Muslims are a significant minority, see Hasan 1 ; for similar debates in Egypt, where Muslims are the majority, see Skovgaard.

Even though women like Hajja Faiza do not ad.. Secularism has often been understood in two primary ways: The piety activists seek to imbue each of the various spheres of contemporary life with a regulative sensibility that takes its cue from the Islamic theological corpus rather than from modem secular ethics. In this sense, the mosque movement's goal is to introduce a common set of shared norms or standards by which one 12 For example, during the question. Instead, it was required of parents that they inculcate a sense of modesty and knowledge of proper conduct in youth so as to prevent them from con..


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Thus the focus of the mosque lessons was precisely on those manners of thought, movements, and practices that needed to be policed in order to forestall the possibility of zina', not on the punishment that the act required. By "worldly" acts I mean those behaviors that pertain to matters in life that are distinct from acts of worship. This debate cooled off substantially in the 1 s, and by the time I conducted my fieldwork 1 7 the focus of the Islamist move For a general discussion of this debate and the reasons for its decline, see Skovgaard..

Petersen 1 99 7 , The mosque participants' activi.. This includes emphasizing the study of religious materials that are al.. Insofar as this strategy makes Islamic ethics central to the process of acquiring different kinds of knowledges and skills, it infuses the current educational institutions with a sensibility that is potentially transformative. According to them, this has led to the decline of an alternative understanding of worship, one in which rituals are performed as a means to the training and realization of piety in the entirety of one's life. Part of the aim of the mosque movement is to restore this understanding of worship by teaching women the requisite skills involved in its practice.

Mitchell 1 , 27; Starrett , The teaching of Islam, however, was not eradicated from the curriculum but continued as one subj ect among others in public and private schools in Egypt. The Turkish state has reacted in a similar fashion, prohibiting students from en.. Fatma was in her late twenties when I met her and, after the death of her father, was one of three breadwin Despite the long hours she worked, Fatma found time to attend mosque lessons regularly.

She strongly believed that her involve In an interview with me, Fatma voiced her concerns about the folklorization of Islam: The state and society want to reduce Islatn to folklore , as if Islam is just a collection of ceremonies and customs, such as hanging lanterns from doorways or baking cookies during Ramadan, or eating meat on al Noting the look of puzzlement on my face, Fatma asked, "Have you spent the month of Ramadan in Cairo?

So you know what happens during Ramadan in Cairo. You find special programs that the state television puts on every evening, showing all kinds of things that are prohibited [l: The entire society seems to be focused on preparing food all day long and festivities in the evenings, all of which are contrary [bititnaqi4] to the real meaning and spirit of Ramadan.

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If it were not for the mosque lessons [duriis] I began to attend two years ago , I vvould also have continued to think, like others, that Ramadan was about abstaining from food during the day, and in the evenings eating a lot and going out to the market or al-1 7 Ramadan is the ninth month of the Muslim calendar during which Muslims are required to fast, abstaining from food and drink from sunrise to sunset.

Television and the entertainment industry put on special shows, and markets are full of consumer items prepared foods, household goods, etc. It is to these aspects of Egyptian Ramadan that Fatma refers. When I questioned Fatma further about what she meant by "the real mean.. It was not that baking cookies or decorating one's house during Ramadan was wrong, she said: What gets lost in these popular festivities, she argued, is the understanding that the act of fasting is a neces..

Fatma's concerns were echoed widely in mosque circles. In her characteristically lucid style of argument, she reiterated Fatma's critique of the way Islamic obli.. It is the project of the government and the secularists ralmaniyin] to transform religion [al. An example of this is the use of the veil [Q. When you [here she addressed me directly] as a foreigner look at Egyptian society right now and see all these women wearing the Q. These people are in fact no different than those who argue against the Q. Fatma and Hajja Nur are critical of the process by which practices that are supposed to be part of a larger program for shaping ethical capacities lose this function and become little more than markers of identity: Notably, Hajja Nur's statement above suggests that the attitude of those women who wear the veil out of habit is not dissimilar from those who regard the veil as a local custom similar to regional styles of clothing, eating habits, and so on.

In making her argument, she uses a key distinction, often invoked by the mosque participants, between customary and religious acts, a distinction that women like Hajja Nur think is elided when religion is understood as yet another kind of cultural practice. Hajja Nur's remarks about the veil can be usefully compared to the views of a key Islamist public figure, Adil Hussein, who served as the general secretary of the Islamist Labor Party l: Amal until his death a few years ago.

The following is an excerpt from an interview with him in a documentary on the Islamic Revival produced by the American Public Broadcasting System, PBS , where he explains why he thinks the veil is important: In this period of [Islamic] Revival and renewed pride in ourselves and our past, why should we not take pride in the symbols that distinguish us from others [like 21 See, for example, Harb , 1 ; Muhammed 1 For a comparable point of view, also see Leila Ahmed's discussion of the origins of the veil 1 , 1 So we say that the first condition is that clothing should be modest.

But why can't we add a second condition that we would like this dress to be a continuation of what we have created in this region, like the Indian sari? Why can't we have our own dress which expresses decency, a requirement of Islam, as well as the special beauty that would be the mark of our society which has excelled in the arts and civilization?

York 1 While Adil Hussein, like the daciyat, recognizes that the veil is an expres.. Hussein regards the veil as a symbol of, among o ther things, an Islamic identity, culture, and civilization-not unlike the sari worn by South Asian women. For people like Adil Hussein, the increased popularity of the veil is a sign of the vitality of the Islamic Revival al. Islamiyya , which in turn is interpreted as the Muslim world's awakening to its true identity and cultural heritage.

While women like Hajja Nur and Fatma do not entirely disagree with this view, they do, in contrast, regard the phenomenon of veiling as an insufficient, though necessary, part of making the society more religiously devout. As Haj j a Nur's remarks reveal, the criti.. The remarks of Adil Hussein and Haj j a Nur about the veil register a differ.. Islamist political figures and publications often criticize mosque par.. In the PBS documentary from which I quote above, Saad Eddin is asked how she, as a prominent Islamist activist who is veiled herself, views the popular resurgence of the veil in Egypt.

She responds skeptically by saying: In many cases religion is used as a kind of escape where the focus of the individual is to pray and read the Quran. But if we mean by [the Islamic] Revival more involvement in social change, I believe then that the [resurgence of the] veil should be understood as religiosity [al--tadayyun] , but not Revival.

It does not necessarily reflect a bigger participation in social life for the sake of social change toward Islam. She has published under both names. In one of her weekly columns, "Saut al A number of scholars of the modern Muslim world have noted that, as a result of widespread literacy and mass media, ordinary Muslims have become in Petersen 7 ; Zeghal 1 In making this observation, these scholars echo an argument made most forcefully by Wilfred Cantwell Smith when he proposed that "religion" in the modern period has come to be understood as a self-enclosed system whose proper practice often entails, even on the part of lay practitioners, some form of familiarity with the doctrinal assumptions and theological reasoning involved in religious rites and rituals 1 This observation has prompted some scholars of the Mid She currently writes for the Islamist website www.

While I generally agree with these scholars that modern conditions of increased literacy, urban mobility, and mass media have undoubtedly made ordinary Muslims more familiar with doctrinal reasoning than was previously the case, I would like to question the claim that this set of changes is best analyzed in terms of a universal tendency toward the "objectification of the religious imagination. Insomuch as the capacity to perform a task well requires one to be able to stand back and judge the correctness and virtuosity of one's performance, a certain amount of self--reflection is internal to such labor.

For example, in order for a child to learn to pray, the parent must make her conscious of her gestures, glances, and thoughts. When the child undertakes the act hurriedly, or forgets to perform it, her parents may present her with various kinds of explanations for why praying is important, what it signifies, and how it is different from the child's other activities. Such a pedagogical process depends upon inducing self--reflection in the child about her movements and thoughts-and their relationship to an object called God-all of which require some form of reflection about the nature of the practice.

In other words, conscious deliberation is part and parcel of any ped What is lacking in these authors' writings is an analysis of how the three processes are articulated to produce the effect of objectification. As Leila Ahmed points out in her seminal study of the discourse on the veil in the colonial and early nationalist periods in Egypt, the practice of veiling acquired a new valence for Egyptians as the British made it a key signifier of "Muslim backwardness'' and the Egyp.

Politics of piety: the Islamic revival and the feminist subject

What is needed to understand changes in notions of reflexivity is an inquiry into the creation of historically specific forms of subj ectivity that require, and in some sense make possible , particular modes of self--reflection see pp. First example, sitting in a mosque for [the purpose of] relaxation constitutes a custom, and when undertaken for ttikaf [a period of residence in a mosque dedicated to worship marked by minimal interaction with people] , it is considered an act of worship, and it is intention that makes it so.

And so with bathing: For a general discussion of the transformations in the discipli Mitchell 1 99 1 ; Starrett 1 In the cases of Adil Hussein, Heba Saad Eddin, and Hajja Nur, even though all three sup, port the adoption of the veil, their remarks are situated within very different visions of a virtuous society. For Adil Hussein, the veil stands in a relation of significance to the expression of one's cultural and nationalist heritage, whereas for women like Fatma and Hajj a Nur it is understood to be part of an entire process through which a pious individual is produced.

In the eyes of someone like Haj j a Nur, one may argue, the meaning of the veil is not ex Similarly, the goals that Heba Saad Eddin wants the prac Thus, each of these views needs to be analyzed in terms of the larger goals toward which it is teleologi, cally oriented, the different practical contexts in which each type of reflection is located, and the consequences each particular form of understanding has for how one lives practically, both in relationship to oneself and to others.

As I observed earlier, the women I worked with argue that they have had to create new structures of learning-in the form of mosque lessons-to inculcate values that were previously part of a social and familial ethos in Egypt, but which are no longer available in those arenas. As Charles Hirschkind notes, the practice of the Friday sermon khutba , a key communal event in Muslim societies since the time of Muhammed, only started to receive elaborate doctrinal atten.. Rather, what this draws our attention to is the particu.. The key concept that has been most useful for the development of institutional prac It is to the analysis of this concept that I now turn.

Daewa is the umbrella term under which the mosque movement, and the Islamist movement more generally, have organized many of their disparate activities. Daewa literally means "call, invitation, appeal, or summons.

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Muslims, the contemporary piety movement in Egypt primarily understands it to be a religious duty that requires all adult members of the Islamic community to urge fellow Muslims to greater piety, and to teach one another correct Islamic conduct. While the practice of daewa commonly takes the form of verbal admonishment, in Egypt 11 See Canard 1 See Kaabi 1 9 7 2 ; Walker 1 Since Egypt i s primarily a Sunni country, m y references are limited to the Sunni in, terpretation of daewa. The distinction is made in the plural: While many of these institutionalized practices have historical precedents, they have, in the last fifty years, increasingly come to be organized under the rubric of daewa.

Similarly, the number o f Islamic nongovernmental organizations grew by 1 7 percent i n the 1 s, 3 1 percent in the 1 s, and 33 percent in the s al,Ahram Center for Political and Strate While Roest Crollius and Mendel provide a historical background for the develop Also see the important work of Barbara Metcalf , 1 , 1 on the South Asian Tablighi Jamaeat, which is also organized around the concept of daewa, but more focused on the question of spiritual renewal than social welfare, which seems to be the hallmark of the Egyptian daewa movement.

For discussions of the concept of al daula, see T. Asad 1 ; Ayalon 1 ; Zubaida Notably, the former is considered to be consub For the historical roots of the terms maeruf and munkar, both in pre.. Islamic Jahili poetry and the Quran, see lzutsu 1 , 2 1 7.

Since the principle of amr bil maeriif occurs in a num Cook's book is a remarkable synthesis of the diversity of opinions that have existed on the subject since early Islam. While I will draw upon his work, my concern here is more limited. I want to highlight those features of amr bil maeruf that under My goal is to provide a brief ge While many of these practices also fall under the rubric of daewa, there are activities-such as helping to build a mosque, or establishing an Islamic printing press-that are, strictly speaking, referred to through the concept of daewa more often than through the princi Given the overlapping contexts in which the two no The verse in Surat al On women's daewa, see al Sometimes the terms are used synonymously, as in the case of someone offering verbal advice or admonishment.

At other times, dacwa is commonly understood as a kind of vocation like that of a preacher, or a mosque teacher , while amr bil macrilf is regarded as a duty that a Muslim undertakes in the context of normal life. Finally, while both can be under A contentious issue involved in the interpretation of amr bil maeriif turns on who is qualified to act as an agent of moral reform on the basis of this moral principle, especially in light of the tutelary role the state assigns to itself in re For an example of the use of this Q.

Those who oppose this interpretation use an alternative b. The first is the emphasis he places on modern forms of knowledge and organizational practice-an emphasis that was absent in the work of earlier commentators also see Cook , 5 1 0. The second noteworthy aspect of Rida's interpretation is his unequivocal 43 The use of violence as a legitimate means to amr bil maeruf was also rejected by Ibn Taymiyya d. Both Ibn Taymiyya and al The Salafis articulated a strong critique both of the secularizing trend among Muslim elites, and what they perceived to be the stagnation of thought among Muslim j urists and the eularna: The Salafi leadership argued for an interpretation of the founding sources of the tradition, the Quran and the Sunna, in accordance with principles of scientific ra While scholars have differed historically on whether amr bil maeriif falls under the former or the latter category, the common view has been that amr bil maerilf is a collective duty best undertaken by qualified reli..

The two innovations that mark Rida's interpretation of daewa-its depen.. Muslimiin under the leadership of its founder Hasan al.. Banna 1 Banna established the Brotherhood in 1 This organization has since grown into one of the key reform.. Banna's elaboration of daewa was a key part of his larger program aimed at creating institutional structures and sensibilities capable of contesting Western cultural and political hegemony. Unlike Rida, 47 At one point, for example, Rida argues, "Calling to excellence and the doing of good and the forbidding of evil [al--daewa 3ila al--khair wa amr bil maeru,f wal--nahi ean al--munkar] is a definitive duty ffar4 batm] incumbent upon every Muslim" Rida 1 , 3 5.

Well aware of the threat such a calling entailed to social order, they went to great lengths to spell out a number of conditions that had to be met in order to perform this obligation correctly see Cook , 1 3 2 , 1 5 , ; Roest Crollius 1 , 1. Even though Rida refers to A. Ghazali's work extensively in his commentary, he departs from A. Nasser banned the Muslim Brotherhood in and j ailed the majority of its members.

Not until Anwar Sadat came into power in 1 was the Brotherhood allowed to function again, although officially it remains outlawed. For the early history of the Muslim Brotherhood , see R. Banna directed his organizational efforts at the education and reform of fellow Muslims who, in his opinion, were becoming increasingly secularized and westernized under an indigenous leadership that had abandoned Islam in fa Banna's critique continue to be echoed by participants in the mosque movement, and their pedagogical activities have given a new life to his reconstructive proj ect.

Banna incorporated many of the concepts and organizational strategies integral to the practice of mod For example, in his writings and public speeches he addressed fellow Muslims as citizens whose collective project was to sustain the Egyptian nation as an integral part of the umma the Muslim commu.. The Brothers successfully transformed mosques from spaces reserved for worship to, what al Banna described as "schools [for] the commoners, the popular uni Banna and the activities of the Muslim Brother Banna held the Western.. In pointing to the effects of this system of education, al.. Banna 1 , Banna 1 , 1 2.

Banna wrote, "The methods of dacwa today are not those of yesterday. The dacwa of yes.. Today, it consists of publications, magazines, newspapers, articles, ordinary films, and radio broadcasting. All these have made it easy to influence the minds of all mankind, women as well as men, in their homes, places of business, factories and fields" al.. Note that even though the translator of al Banna's work, Charles Wendell, translates daewa as "propa The other trend that gained further ascendancy through al Banna and his organizational activities was a trenchant critique launched against tra Petersen 1 ; Zeghal 1 Significantly, it is not an accident that it is secular universities-!

Petersen 1 , 1 5 5. Azhar, parts of the state bureaucracy. Since then, the Egyptian government has also established a variety of governing bodies to oversee mosque activities, bringing them under the direct supervision of the Ministry of Religious Affairs. Banna and Sayyid Qutb the ideologue of the militant wing of the Is There are both theological and sociological bases for women's entrance into this field. Despite scant historical attention paid in the robust literature on amr bil maeriif to the role of women Cook , , modem interpretations of daewa often draw upon those verses of the Quran that enjoin women and men equally to undertake this duty.

Even though women's participation in the field of daewa has grown in re.. Foremost among these is the condition that women, while encour.. This is consistent with prohibitions forbidding women to deliver the Fri.. Hence the terms khatTb one who delivers a sermon and imam one who leads the prayers are reserved for men. The reasoning behind these restrictions is twofold. First is the general belief that since the Quran makes men the guardians of women, the latter should not serve in significant positions of leadership over men.

Many male leaders of the Islamic Revival support the participa.. See, for example, M. Yet despite their adherence to these limits, as we shall see later, the daciyat continue to evoke skepticism, if not outright condemnation, from the religious establishment. Women's entry into the field of dacwa is not solely the result of modem doc.. Since the 1 95 0s, there has been a dramatic increase in the number of women being educated at the secondary and higher levels, and women have entered the paid work force in large numbers.

The years between 1 and 1 witnessed a fi.

Politics of Piety: The Islamic Revival and the Feminist Subject

Azhar began admitting female students, women have been able to spe.. Azhar as there is for men. All of these de..


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In light of this, it is not surprising that a large percentage of the participants in the mosque movement are either students or working women employed in a range of fields, including education, medicine, govern.. The development of women's dacwa, therefore, is part of a shared history of transformations that have occurred in secular and religious institutions in the modem period. As we have seen, it is almost impossible to track changes in the concepts of dacwa and amr bil macriif that are purely "religious" in scope.

There is perhaps no better way to illustrate the intertwined role that secular and religious institutions have played in the articulation of women's daewa 60 Despite the doctrinally contested nature of this position, many male religious figures who sup port women's datwa also, paradoxically, espouse this position. These figures include not only promi.. Ghazali, and Yusuf al.. Qaradawi , but also the leaders of the various nonprofit religious organizations that have played a pioneering role in the establishment of datwa training institutes for women in Egypt. Shareiyya, which currently oversees the largest number of women's daewa institutes in Cairo al Nur 1 This figure does not include enrollment at the University of al..

Azhar and at private institutions of higher learning. Ghazali is believed to have been the first prominent female daeiya in Egypt, and her traj ectory as a daeiya exemplifies key developments in the history of women's daewa since the 1 s. Ironically, her story is one that remains largely undoc The Society later expanded its role to training women in the art of preaching so that they could instruct women in religious issues either in their homes or at mosques. During the first few years of the So