Sonic Virtues in Contemporary Egyptian Sufism

The paper analyses the performance of inshād and samʿa within the collective haḍra ritual of a contemporary Egyptian brotherhood, with the aim of describing how Sufi disciples engage with competing aesthetic discourses in the definition of modernity and morality in Egypt. Through an in-depth ethnographic description of ritual aesthetics, it describes on one hand the specific sensory epistemology that backgrounds the interlocutors’ notion of virtuous self and their grammar of aesthetics and, on the other hand, it describes how the interlocutors creatively build trajectories of sounds that blur the boundaries between both religious/secular and modern/traditional conceptions of aesthetics, dominant within the contemporary Egyptian soundscape. The Burhani grammar of aesthetics implies a particular conception of moral personhood, which draws together the mundane and the religious in a quest for a modern form of Islam, seeking for the spiritual within everyday life and throughout contingent sensibilities. It thus brings about a specific articulation of the sensorium and an architecture of the self, which are alternative to the forms of modern and moral selfhood dominant in the Egyptian contemporary public sphere. In a wider perspective, this study has the double aim of highlighting the often-overlooked position of Sufism within the contemporary Islamic Revival through the lens of the contemporary debate over music, and of exploring the bearing of such debate on the everyday ritual practice and experience of the disciples of a contemporary Sufi brotherhood

Fragile bodies and Sensuous Spirits: performing womenly virtues in a contemporary Egyptian brotherhood

No Abstrac

Chih Rachida et Mayeur-Jaouen Catherine (dir.), Le Soufisme à l’époque ottomane, xvie-xviiie siècle, Le Caire, IFAO, Cahier des Annales Islamologiques, 2010, 442 p.

The volume is a collection of essays on the history of Sufism in Egypt, and more generally in the Arab world, during three centuries of Ottoman rule. In line with recent trends within historiography on the Ottoman period, all the authors share the aim of challenging a paradigm that formerly shaped research on Sufism, i.e. the decline paradigm, which assumed a progressive loss and corruption of true mystical quest due to the institutionalisation and popularisation of ṭarîqa Sufism under Ottom..

Chih Rachida et Mayeur-Jaouen Catherine (dir.), Le Soufisme à l’époque ottomane, xvie-xviiie siècle, Le Caire, IFAO, Cahier des Annales Islamologiques, 2010, 442 p.

The volume is a collection of essays on the history of Sufism in Egypt, and more generally in the Arab world, during three centuries of Ottoman rule. In line with recent trends within historiography on the Ottoman period, all the authors share the aim of challenging a paradigm that formerly shaped research on Sufism, i.e. the decline paradigm, which assumed a progressive loss and corruption of true mystical quest due to the institutionalisation and popularisation of ṭarîqa Sufism under Ottom..

Chih Rachida et Mayeur-Jaouen Catherine (dir.), Le Soufisme à l’époque ottomane, xvie-xviiie siècle, Le Caire, IFAO, Cahier des Annales Islamologiques, 2010, 442 p.

The volume is a collection of essays on the history of Sufism in Egypt, and more generally in the Arab world, during three centuries of Ottoman rule. In line with recent trends within historiography on the Ottoman period, all the authors share the aim of challenging a paradigm that formerly shaped research on Sufism, i.e. the decline paradigm, which assumed a progressive loss and corruption of true mystical quest due to the institutionalisation and popularisation of ṭarîqa Sufism under Ottom..

ACHAB-Rivista di Antropologia

Nella letteratura antropologica sul medioriente, prevale spesso la tendenza a vedere l'islam come una risorsa culturale "autentica", utilizzata dagli attori locali in risposta all'egemonia esercitata dallo stato attraverso la promozione del suo progetto di "modernit\ue0". Inoltre, in questo genere di letteratura si tende a ridurre l'agency di coloro che si prestano a vivere secondo una condotta etica islamica, al loro carattere "oppositivo" rispetto al potere dominante esercitato dallo stato secolare. In questo breve scritto, si cercher\ue0 invece di descrivere il progetto di riforma morale portato avanti dalla comunit\ue0 di Fethullah G\ufclen come un particolare tipo di proposta circa cosa debba essere la "modernit\ue0", non necessariamente in contraddizione con il dominio esercitato dal progetto "secolare"

La sicurezza sul lavoro dei ricercatori in zone a rischio geopolitico Cos\u2019\ue8 la normalit\ue0 tra intelligence e terrorismo?

Il volume presenta una questione non ancora adeguatamente analizzata, proponendo una connessione tra conoscenze e strategie gi\ue0 in possesso e abitualmente utilizzate da varie e diverse organizzazioni, ognuna delle quali ha proprie esperienze e punti vista. Questo con la consapevolezza che la condivisione pu\uf2 risultare estremamente utile e importante per contribuire a costruire una cultura, anche in questo particolare ambito. L\u2019intento del volume \ue8 quello di fornire una metodica riflessione che, a partire dalle esperienze, possa fornire un quadro di riferimento costituito da regole e normative, un\u2019utile base di riferimento per chi, per lavoro o studio, debba recarsi per lavoro in zone a rischio geopolitic

Sufism

While the term\u201cSufism\u201d has long been used within the academic literature to define themystic dimension of Islam, later works have questioned the orientalizing tendencies ofsuch a definition and have shown the deep interconnectedness of the phenomenon withsocial and political change in modern times. After an overviewof the history of the termand how it has been employed in seminal sociological and anthropological scholarship,the entry illustrates how a new body of literature has explored the interconnectednessbetween Sufism and modernity from different perspectives. It mainly explains Sufism\u2019sresilience as a result of the flexibility of its foundational pedagogical and intersubjectivepatterns. Moreover, it highlights this particular tradition\u2019s capacity for recreatingconnectivity at a translocal level, as well as for offering replies to questions that, thoughframed partly in new ways, address long-standing human problems

Enseignement supérieur, pouvoirs et mondialisation dans le monde arabe

Plus d'une décennie de réformes universitaires dans le monde arabe, menées au nom de la « crise de l'enseignement supérieur » et de la « mondialisation », permet de premiers bilans. Comme dans d'autres régions du monde, les systèmes universitaires connaissent des mutations de grande ampleur, résultant tant des réformes mises en œuvre par les États que de l’arrivée de nouveaux acteurs transnationaux. De nouvelles missions leur sont attribuées. Transmission de savoirs efficaces, production de diplômés employables, préparation de l'ère post-rentière, arrimage aux normes internationales, préservation de l'ordre social, préférence nationale à l'emploi, objectif d’excellence et d’acquisition de références internationales : ces injonctions sont ambivalentes. Si la marchandisation de l'enseignement supérieur tend à uniformiser les modes de « gouvernance », l’adaptation de ces derniers aux contextes nationaux et politiques singuliers est souvent problématique. Le présent dossier dresse un bilan contrasté des nouvelles dynamiques académiques dans le monde arabe. Diversifiant les perspectives – études de cas ou comparaisons régionales, il traite des questions suivantes : qui sont les acteurs des réformes universitaires ? Comme ces réformes sont-elles justifiées et appliquées et avec quelles conséquences ? Peut-on déceler, à travers elles, de nouvelles formes d'exercice du pouvoir et de légitimité ? De nouvelles hiérarchies sociales, régionales et politiques émergent-elles, ou bien assiste-t-on à la consolidation d'anciennes