week 8: Saba Mahmood: Agency, Gender and Embodiment (post by Sophie de Seriere)

Agency, Gender and Embodiment

In the The Subject of Freedom we have seen Saba Mahmood analyze certain concepts and issues such as freedom, agency, piety, subjectivation and power. She offered a critique to liberal assumptions about human nature against which Islamic movements are often held accountable, specifically in relation to the role women play in Islamic religion. In Agency, Gender and Embodiment, Mahmood wants to focus on the ethical practices of the mosque movement in the context of gender inequality and the disavowment of the humanist subject. I believe that the possible modalities of agency she explores and the examples she offers raise important questions regarding what freedom is and how one achieves the agency to acquire and exercise this freedom: ''I hope to redress the profound inability within current feminist political thought to envision valuable forms of human flourishing outside the bounds of a liberal progressive imaginary.''¹

An important example I think Mahmood gives of the way in which someone can flourish that differs from the liberalist assumption of flourishing, is the practice of the Islamic virtue al-haya, which means shyness or modesty. The conversation of al-haya raises interesting questions on the kind of relationship between subject and norm, and performative behaviour and inward disposition.² We often think of the motivation for our actions being natural feelings or intuition, but Mahmood explains that in the case of al-haya and other muslim practices - like veiling - it is the sequence of practices and actions that determines these natural feelings.³ Mahmood explains that in liberal conceptions of the self a dissonance between internal feelings and external expressions would be considered a form of dishonesty. For me this raised an interesting question on how we for example treat criminals. Maybe repeating bodily acts to train one's memory, desire and intellect to behave according to established standards of conduct, could serve as an alternative solution to locking up criminals without reeducating them?

Another important theme I believe Mahmood explores in this chapter is how living in a society where subjects are not seen as completely responsible for their own actions can affect women's ability to survive within a system of inequality and to flourish despite its constraints.⁴ Certain virtues Mahmood argues, - like sabr, the ability to persevere within the face of difficulty - have lost their value in the liberal imagination and are considered as a symbol of passivity and inaction. The case of Nadia however offers an important counter example: for her the virtue sabr is constructive! So to end with the important lesson Mahmood gives the reader: ''Analyzing people in terms of attempts at social transformation is reducing lives to the flat narrative of succumbing to or resisting narratives of domination.''⁵ This again connects to the 'white saviour' narrative of many (feminist) scholars regarding muslim women. Mahmood urges us to understand that there are different modalities of agency and we should think about the hierarchy we commonly attribute to these modalities of agency.

1Mahmood, Saba. p. 155

2Mahmood, Saba. p. 157

3Mahmood, Saba. p. 157

4Mahmood, Saba. p. 168

5Mahmood, Saba. p. 174

Week 8: Saba Mahmood: "Agency, Gender, and Embodiment"

After reading Saba Mahmood’s “Agency, Gender, and Embodiment” one of the topics that stood out to me the most was concerning the virtue of “Al-Haya” and the insight she gave regarding this virtue and the relationship practicing Muslim had with it. According to the text, “Al-haya” is the virtue of shyness or modesty, something that Mahmood notes as a coveted virtue for pious Muslims, but especially for Muslim women. What really intrigued me about this virtue and the relationship that these women had with it, was their understanding and process of practicing it. For example, one of the women named Amal who by all means wanted to be a pious woman, stated that it wasn’t in her nature to be a shy person and so by trying to practice al-haya when her heart wasn’t in it felt hypocritical. However, Amal explained that she found a resolution by making herself become a shy person, to create the shyness within her and therefore, become a shy person to herself and to the outside world. 

Mahmood captured Amal’s testimony by stating, “action does not issues forth from natural feeling but it creates them.” What really intrigued me about this was the idea that instead of your being defining your actions based on who you are naturally, you let actions mold you into a being that you ideally want to be and makes it so that  that ideal becomes your “new” natural state of you as a being. It’s like making yourself  uncomfortable with what you are comfortable and so then you make yourself choose to be comfortable with something different than what you were originally comfortable with. In this instance, the women chose the al-haya virtue to be their new “comfort,” which was their ultimate goal. 

I find this concept really interesting because I never really have heard of this. I understand their rationalization and could see how it works, but I just wonder if you could ever lose your “original” true sense of self or you simply let yourself be uncomfortable with it. I find it very aspiring especially for one who is so devoted to their faith. I really enjoyed this piece because it just shows the power of a human beings free will and the ability to transform ourselves.

Week 7 Sara Mahmood

What I found most interesting about this week’s reading was a constant reminder of the differentiation from western beliefs and eastern beliefs on the subject where women are seen as oppressed in one and being devoted to their faith on the other. Western culture is mentioned in the beginning and is seen to me a constant reevaluation of a Muslim’s beliefs. And these beliefs are interpreted much worse from a western perspective than they really are meant to be.

Aside from that, Sara Mahmood discusses how the mosque movement should be able to teach women how to structure their beliefs in day to day practices and how to maintain that stability within themselves. There is also a sense of being more independently free in regards from progressive feminists. So, there is a sense of keeping one’s beliefs and culture in check, while also having an independent lifestyle as well. Overall, the readings gave deep questioning to myself, especially coming from a westernized male perspective. My thoughts and expressions of freedom will continue to be more refined as I continue to experience different cultures. In the case of a Muslim’s freedom, they are just as free as we are. There just seems to be a loss in communication from both western and eastern perspective.

The Subject of Freedom

In the subject of Freedom, Saba Mahmood discusses freedom from a Muslim feminist view, whereas women are not just “pawns in a grand patriarchal plan, who, if freed from their bondage, would naturally express their instinctual abhorrence for the traditional Islamic mores used to enchain them” (Mahmood 2004, 1-2). The text gives insight into why women of the Muslim world actively supports a movement that through Western eyes can be seen as oppressive towards women. Mahmood builds parts of the chapter on a fieldwork she conducted with a women’s mosque movement, and other parts on secondary sources, of which she discusses their validity, strengths and weaknesses. She also brings her own approach to the table, and discusses the critique she is expecting others may have towards it.

I am going to discuss the women’s mosque movement and Islamic revival, or Da’wa, which she describes as both state-oriented activities as well as a broader religious ethos aimed to increase the Islamic knowledge in society. The Women’s mosque movement emerged as a part of the response to the westernization of the governmental structures, a process which they state has reduced Islamic knowledge throughout Egypt. Da’wa has also transformed social and political structures, from how to dress and entertain oneself properly, to household management and the provision of care for the poor in society. The author brings up the issue of equalizing this trend in Islamism with fundamentalism or cultural backwardness, and the problem of other (mainly western) authors on the subject treating it as facts. Mahmood’s own framework and arguments discusses how important it is to have a proper grasp of the ethics in a political agency to really understand it – ignoring this and only seeing it as a reaction to the secular-liberal governance of Egypt means you are missing an entire dimension of the issue.

The text mentions some similar issues as some previous critique we have red on Western feminism, like Mohanty’s text Under Western Eyes – the view of women as a homogenous group with identical values and ambitions is misleading, and the look we get into a women-led movement through Mahmood’s work gives insight into this. As she puts it, “the majority of the participants of the mosque movement […] argue that the veil is a necessary component of the virtue of modesty […] they draw, therefore, an ineluctable relationship between the norm (modesty) and the bodily form it takes (the veil) such that the veiled body becomes the necessary means through which the virtue of modesty is both created and expressed” (Mahmood 2004, 23). Mahmood finally states clearly that she does not expect or ask for people to stop looking critically at oppressive systems in society, but that we should study those systems and practices with an open mind, leaving the possibility to transform our own analytical and political certainties according to the new information we are given. This makes me think of Abu-Lughod’s text as well as our discussion in class about cultural relativism. 

Week 7: The Subject of Freedom

In this week's reading, Saba Mahood discusses the concept of freedom and how the western, liberal view of freedom and agency is not as universal as many assume it to be. I believe Mahood sums up her argument with the statement, "...what may appear to be a case of deplorable passivity and docility from a progressivist point of view, may actually be a form of agency - but one that can be understood only from within the discourses and structures of subordination that create the conditions of its enactment" (15). This point reminds me a lot of the Chandra Mohanty piece we read, where she emphasized taking into account the whole context of a situation before simply assuming Muslim women are oppressed. 

Mahood specifically looks at the mosque movement in Egypt, which has been going on for around the last 25 years. The mosque movement is a rise in the amount of teaching of Islam beliefs in the mosques, especially by and to Muslim women. These "classes" aim to teach women how to incorporate their religious beliefs into their everyday practices. Mahood talks about the importance of taking into account these women’s perspectives in regards to their own agency.

What I found to be most interesting in this piece was towards the beginning of the chapter when she talks about how progressive feminists define freedom and agency. She says that according to progressive feminists, “In order for an individual to be free, her actions must be consequence of her ‘own will’ rather than of custom, tradition, or social coercion” (11). I find this definition of freedom to be completely contradictory to the most basic of Muslim beliefs we have studied. Islam is based around the belief that the best way to live is in submission to Allah. Therefore, you forsake your “own will” for the will of Allah. However, it is unclear whether or not this definition of freedom is referring to the individual’s actual belief that she should submit to Allah or if it refers to her freedom to choose to submit to Allah. However, even if it is the latter (which through my understanding is what Mahood would belive), would that mean Muslim women use their freedom and agency and choose to be “less free”  by being Muslims?

I don’t believe Muslim women would say that they are “less free” than women who make all decisions according to their “own will” as opposed to Allah’s.  As seen in the example given by Mahood regarding veiling, many Muslim women choose to veil to act modestly, while others do not believe the veil is not necessary to be modest. In this example, is any woman “more free” than the other based on the decision she makes?

While this article brought up even more to discuss, what I left questioning the most was whether or not it presented an alternative definition of freedom that I felt comfortable with.  And even more, how a definition of freedom can be reached by Mahood, without subscribing to total cultural relativism.                                                                                                                                                                                                                             

The Subject of Freedom: Week 7: Grace Balmet

     This work shows the vast need to undermine 'Western' beliefs on the reality of Muslim feminisms as a conglomerate institution. One of the strongest links to in-class discussion topics that I noticed in this piece was the idea of 'white saviorism'- from the very beginning of the book, the agenda is clear: to clarify the norms on outside views into the existing and complex world of Islam as a whole. 

     It's a quite simple viewpoint: speculation is a killer of understanding. A very poignant example of this point is the idea of female modesty. The idea of the veil is one that is deeply engrained into the culture of modesty, but is widely speculated as a sign of female subjection to male dominance. All in all, this work shows the utter need to shirk such ideals [this being the shining example in my opinion], and cease the 'understanding' that Western ideology is the correct view. It is very interesting to view this as the universal cry for understanding-- and this is a point that is needed. The speculation shows a need for not understanding, but, the cry for an almost air of ignorance. Basically, it is the vast need for the West to cease their need to explore [dominate] other cultures in order to save them. It is fascinating to see this actualized in words by a Muslim feminist, but more importantly, this is the work of an intelligent woman who shows the reality of the lack of need for the West to come in with superior ANYTHINGS in this realm. 

Works Cited

Mahmood, Saba. 2005."The Subject of Freedom" in Politics of Piety: The Islamic Revival and the Feminist Subject. New Jersey: Princeton University Press    

Week 7: Critiquing Western Feminism II: Saba Mahmood (post by Sophie de Seriere)

The Subject of Freedom - Saba Mahmood

In The Subject of Freedom Saba Mahmood analyses the relationship of feminism and (islamic) religion and herein examines concepts and issues such as freedom, (moral) agency, piety, subjectivation, subjugation and power. I believe the The Subject of Freedom is an important contribution to our understanding of these concepts and the way their definitions are argued to be historically and culturally specific by Mahmood.

In The Subject of Freedom Mahmood offers a critique to liberal assumptions about human nature against which Islamic movements are often held accountable - such as the belief that all human beings have an innate desire for freedom, that we all seek to assert our autonomy when allowed to do so, and that agency consists of acts that challenge social norms and not that uphold them.¹ In ''the West'', the notion of agency is explained as political and moral autonomy of the subject: the ability to realise one's own interests against the weight of custom, tradition, transcendental will, or other obstacles.² It is in this way I believe, that Muslim women are often 'diagnosed' by feminists as unfree and without agency. What is problematic about this feminist project is that it locates the desire for submission in an ahistorical essence. And this is what is key to understanding Mahmood's arguments on all the above-mentioned concepts: Agency, freedom, subjectivity are not ahistorical and universally defined concepts, but it is under certain historical, cultural and practical conditions that these concepts, modes of being, desires and subjects are created.

This critique of the liberalist framework in which notions such as freedom and agency are defined as immanent and universal, is based on Foucault's analysis of agency and power. Foucault encourages us to think of agency a) in terms of the capacities and skills required to undertake particular kinds of moral actions and b) as ineluctably bound up with the historically and culturally specific disciplines through which a subject is formed. So in viewing Muslim movements in which female supporters for example take on the veil, it is necessary not to criticize this act by means of our own definition of agency but to see that this can also be a form of agency, a form of self-realisation in their particular historic and cultural environment. This critique of western feminism is in my eyes closely related to the issue of white saviour which we have discussed last week. When we want to 'save' Muslim women, or 'liberate' them from their supposed bondage of the Islamic patriarchy, Mahmood as well as Lila Abu-Lughod encourage us to think about what we want to save these women from³ - it might actually be their own particular agency and freedom - and what we are saving them into.

A recent form of resistance (to Western feminism) that I believe addresses this issue of the veil as being a sign of agency - namely the submission to certain forms of external authority as being a condition for achieving the subjects potentiality - in stead of oppression is the hashtag #coveredgirl to 'expose' the freedom of muslim women wearing the veil. Some women have also added the caption ''Do we look oppressed?!''⁴ on social media to emphasize that it is western feminists/liberalists who are saying they are oppressed, not they themselves. 

1Mahmood, Saba. p. 5

2Mahmood, Saba. p. 8

3Abu-Lughod, Lila.

4Muhammed, Jerron. http://www.philly.com/philly/blogs/jehron_muhammad/Jehron-Muhammad-Muslim-Women-Say-Wearing-Modest-Attire-Brings-Respect.html