Is Prose Poetry a Conspiracy Against the Noble Qur'an? Poetics, Humans, and God in Contemporary Egypt

There is a peculiar relationship between contemporary poetry and perspectives that are deemed to be heretical by conservative audiences. This relationship is not fully accounted for by current anthropological theories of the secular. The field of literature has been successfully studied as a secular institution – both in the sense of the differentiation of institutions as well as in the sense of the subordination of the religious to the political. Such secularity appears as a rather safe, less controversial way to claim the power of some human entities in relation to God. Some poetry, by contrast, may be accused of heresy or unbelief even when written with pious intention. This suggests a dimension to being secular that is more offensive to conservative societal sensibilities, as it contrasts with deeply-held views on the proper form of the God-human relationship and the associated imaginaries, languages, and aesthetics. Based on a combination of ethnographic research in historical context and a theoretical focus on aesthetics and imagination of divine power as a constituent of human lives, it is proposed in this article that in addition to looking at state power, institutions, and the creation of a secular aesthetic normality, it is also necessary to look more closely at issues of faith, including heretical faith

There will be blood: expecting violence in Egypt, 2011-2013

Samuli Schielk

Second thoughts about the anthropology of Islam, or how to make sense of grand schemes in everyday life

"A growing body of anthropological research has turned to study Islam as a discursive tradition that informs the attempts of Muslims to live pious and moral lives, the aff ects and emotions they cultivate and the challenges they pose to a liberal secular ideology. While this turn has provided direction for a number of innovative studies, it appears to stop short of some key questions regarding everyday religious and moral practice, notably the ambivalence, the inconsistencies and the openness of people’s lives that never fi t into the framework of a single tradition. In short, there is too much Islam in the anthropology of Islam. To fi nd ways to account for both the ambivalence of people’s everyday lives and the often perfectionist ideals of good life, society and self they articulate, I argue that we may have to talk a little less about traditions, discourses and powers and a little more about the existential and pragmatic sensibilities of living a life in a complex and often troubling world. By broadening our focus to include the concerns, practice and experience of everyday life in its various moments and directions, we may eventually also be better able to make sense of the signifi cance of a grand scheme like Islam in it." [author's abstract

On snacks and saints: when discourses of rationality and order enter the Egyptian mawlid

Les festivités entourant les mawlids en Égypte font régulièrement l'objet de critiques qui visent leur caractère « inculte » et l'accusent de constituer une innovation non-islamique (bid‘a). Ces critiques ont eu pour effet de susciter différentes tentatives de réformer le déroulement de ces festivités. Dans le passé récent, les institutions d'État se sont efforcés de donner une apparence plus « civilisée » et « ordonnée » aux célébrations et cet objectif est partagé dans une grande mesure par certains ordres soufis qui ont également cherché à réformer les mawlids. Le caractère utopique de ces festivités a été modifié de manière considérable par l'introduction de nouvelles pratiques qui visent à transformer le mawlid, lieu de suspension de l'ordre normal des choses, en un spectacle éducatif qui contribuerait justement à consolider cet ordre par le renforcement de ses normes et ses valeurs.Egyptian mawlid festivals are regularly subject to criticism which describes them as an uncivilised and un-Islamic bid‘a. In response to this, attempts to reform mawlids have emerged in the recent years. State institutions attempt to reorganise mawlids to give them a more “civilised” and “ordered” appearance, while some Sûfî orders reshape their festive practice, following similar objectives. These practices significantly alter the character of the festivities, attempting to transform them from a utopian festivity where the normal order of things is suspended, into an educational celebration where norms and values are reinforced.Las festividades que rodean los mawlid en Egipto son, regularmente, objeto de críticas que apuntan a su carácter « inculto » y lo acusan de constituir una innovación no islámica (bid‘a). El efecto de estas críticas ha culminado en diferentes intentos de reformar el desarrollo de estas festividades. En el pasado reciente, las instituciones de estado se han esforzado por dar una apariencia más « civilizada » y « ordenada » a las celebraciones, y este objetivo es compartido en gran medida por ciertas órdenes sufis que han igualmente intentado reformar los mawlids. El carácter utópico de estas festividades ha sido modificado de manera considerable por la introducción de nuevas prácticas que apuntan a transformar el mawlid, lugar de suspensión del orden normal de las cosas en un espectáculo educativo que contribuiría justamente a consolidar este orden a través del refuerzo de sus normas y sus valores

Shared Margins: an Ethnography with Writers in Alexandria after the Revolution

Shared Margins tells of writers, writing, and literary milieus in Alexandria, Egypt's second city. It de-centres cosmopolitan avant-gardes and secular-revolutionary aesthetics that have been intensively documented and studied since 2011. Instead, it offers a fieldwork-based account of various milieus and styles, and their common grounds and lines of division. Structured in two parts, Shared Margins gives an account of literature as a social practice embedded in milieus that at once enable and limit literary imagination, and of a life-worldly experience of plurality in absence of pluralism that marks literary engagements with the intimate and social realities of Alexandria after 2011. Literary writing, this book argues, has marginality as an at once enabling and limiting condition. It provides shared spaces of imaginary excess that may go beyond the taken-for-granted of a societal milieu, and yet are never unlimited. Literary imagination is part and parcel of such social conflicts and transformations, its role being neither one of resistance against power nor of guidance towards norms, but rather one of open-ended complicity

Sakralisierung des Alltags und Banalisierung des Heiligen : Religion und Konsum in Ägypten

Religiöse Güter hatten schon immer etwas Besonderes. Amulette und Souvenirs, die an heiligen Stätten verkauft werden, oder Bücher und Audiokassetten mit religiösem Inhalt, wie sie überall erhältlich sind, strahlen einen Segen aus, der sie von profanen Gütern unterscheidet. Im heutigen Ägypten sind sie indes nicht unumstritten, was eng mit der sich wandelnden Grenzziehung zwischen Profanem und Religiösem zusammenhängt. Diente der spirituelle Bezug früher zur Legitimation und versah selbst alltägliche Güter wie Kichererbsen mit einer Aura der Heiligkeit, hat sich seit dem 20. Jahrhundert eine Sicht verbreitet, die diesen Zusammenhang problematisiert. Sie versteht Religion als ein ordnendes Prinzip, das den Alltag durchdringt. Gleichzeitig muss, folgt man dieser Sicht, die Religion in ihrem Kern gegen jedwede Profanität geschützt werden. Tatsächlich aber wird Religion dadurch immer mehr konsumiert. Dies führt zu einer schwer lösbaren Spannung zwischen dem Anspruch auf allumfassende religiöse Disziplin und einem Alltag, der trotz der allgegenwärtigen Religion seinen ambivalenten, widersprüchlichen Charakter behält