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Agency and the Roles of Southern Jordanian Bedouin Women on Pilgrimage and Visiting Holy Sites

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Agency and the Roles of Southern Jordanian Bedouin Women on Pilgrimage and Visiting Holy Sites PÄIVI MIETTUNEN Agency and the roles of Southern Jordanian Bedouin women on pilgrimage and visiting holy sites n the Islamic world, numerous shrines shape and significant in the daily lives of the people. The women define its spiritual landscapes. While some of the who participated in both the private and communal Ishrines are tombs and memorials of major religious pilgrimages played several roles in these events. and historical figures, a majority of the sites are dedi- In this paper, I will discuss the active, independ- cated to ancestors of the local families and tribes. They ent – and even rebellious – participatory or leader- function as centres of the religious community, but they ship roles of women in the local religious practices, also provide a secluded location for private spiritual vis- especi ally pilgrimage. My main questions are: what its and individual prayers. Women have participated in types of roles have the women performed, and what public rituals also, but it is in the private religious sphere kind of religious agency do these roles enable? An that the women have created a space for independent important issue is also the change that has taken religious action, connected, and yet separate from their place in recent decades, and how recent fluctuations mundane roles. in the interpretations and implementations of the Islamic tradition have affected women’s agency in the context of both local and global pilgrimages. Introduction I will first introduce the theoretical framework, Apparently my mother-in-law had lost her focusing on the work of Mustafa Emirbayer and voice. It had been getting worse since the wed- Ann Mische (1998), which discusses agency as being ding (all that singing) and she had tried herbal embedded in the surrounding structure, continu- drinks and some pills from another woman ously reconstructed and re-evaluated through the without success. I thought she should rest her three temporal dimensions: past, present and future. voice, but she had decided an act of appease- Following a description of the methodology, I will ment was called for: a visit to the ancestors give a brief introduction to the tradition of saints Ayal Awwad. She was seven months pregnant, in Islam, and then move on to introduce the region, but that apparently was no obstacle. the holy sites, and traditions related to these sites, (van Geldermalsen 2009: 86) focusing on women’s participation and their narra- tives. While a large part of my material is about Jabal This memory, narrated by Marguerite van Gelder- Harun, the mountain of Aaron, which is the central malsen, a New Zealander, who married a Bedouin shrine in Southern Jordan, I will also introduce other man in 1978 and raised her family in the local com- important holy sites known to the tribes. These repre- munity in Petra, offers a glimpse of the common sent small-scale traditions, rarely known outside the trad ition of visiting a holy site to find a resolution for tribe, village or community. Yet, on this local level, a personal issue. While the memories of the annual these sites have been an uncontested part of the lived pilgrimage and celebrations attended by the whole religion. The types of pilgrimage documented from community abound in people’s narratives, it is quite the region range from large and annual celebrations, likely, that small, personal visits like the one above attended by hundreds of people, to small, individual were much more common, and probably also more stops at a shrine during the course of the daily routine. 40 Approaching Religion • Vol. 8, No. 2 • December 2018 Subsequently, I will analyse the role of women and Emirbayer and Mische (1998: 970) present a their agency on public and private pilgrimages, com- theory which defines agency as paring the practices found here with other regions of the Islamic world (Abu Lughod 1990; Andezian … the temporally constructed engagement by 1997; Cuffel 2005; Hegland 2003; Greenberg 2007; actors of different structural environments – the Mernissi 1977), but also paying attention to tempor al temporal-relational contexts of action – which, changes in the structure. I present the pilgrimage through the interplay of habit, imagination, to Jabal Harun and other local sites as a tradition and judgment, both reproduces and trans- deeply embedded in the identity and religious cul- forms those structures in interactive response ture of the region, yet at the same time embedded to the problems posed by changing historical in trans national structures and affected by global situations. fluctuations.1 This definition combines elements from vari- ous preceding definitions, such as Bourdieu’s idea Religion, agency and structure of agency as habitual and repetitive; the goal-seek- Agency is one of the much-debated yet elusive con- ing element emphasized by rational choice theory, cepts in sociology (Kristiansen 2014; Hitlin and and the idea of agency as deliberation and judg- Johnson 2015; Kupari 2016: 29). The main focus of ment (Emirbayer and Mische 1998: 963). More than the theoretical discourse has been on the relationship merely action, agency is seen as a dynamic deliber- between agency and structure (e.g. Giddens 1984). It ation that takes place in three temporal zones. The is the structure that is often considered to be defini- iterational dimension focuses on the past, recognizing tive (Mahmood 2005) and constraining of (Gulati and selecting traditions, routines and habits that are and Srivastava 2012) agency. In feminist studies, relevant to the current act. It is the choice of accepted structure was originally seen as inherently oppres- models of action, practices that have been used sive towards women, whose only means of showing before, and whose effects are easy to predict, based agency would be through resistance (Mernissi 1977; on earlier experience. These actions provide stabil- Abu-Lughod 1990). In the wake of a subsequent ity and continuity, and strengthen the relationships approach to agency and structure which has empha- between agents, as they can always trust that others sized the dynamic interplay of the two, the traditional will act in the same, predictable way. view of women’s agency has also been contested The second, projective dimension extends into (Mahmood 2001, 2005; Kupari 2016). Instead of por- the future. It is an imaginative distancing from the traying women as a powerless, passive and homoge- prevailing structures, containing both future possi- neous group who are victims of the dominant social bilities and narrative reconstructions of the past with structure, the various forms of agency – including a reference to future desires and goals. Such experi- the ones that appear to support the structures – need mentations can also take place in ritual activities, to be recognized and discussed (Teppo 2007: 382; such as a pilgrimage. The third dimension, practical- Korteweg 2008; Kupari 2016: 26). evaluative, takes place in the present. It is a contextual response to a contingency, based on desired goals 1 Georg Stauth and Samuli Schielke (2008) note how and results. The decision may be semi-automatic, the ‘local traditions’ of the Islamic world are in fact based on habits and traditions, or lead to projective very unified in structure and form, and portray a executions, as an attempt to change the prevailing number of similar elements. Thus it would be a fallacy condition. The actions may also contain subtle resist- to approach them as ‘folk’, ‘popular’ or ‘local’ trad- ance or disguised dissent. Such tactics of resistance itions, as opposed to a ‘scholarly’ or ‘formal’ religion. While I use the concept ‘local tradition’ in this article, are used to sidestep constraining rules (Emirbayer it is intended as a reference to the geographic area and Mische 1998: 1001; see also Hegland 2003 for the from which my empirical data originates, and as topic of subtle power resistance). a definition of the locally known sites within this The work of Emirbayer and Mische has been region, compared to the more nationally and globally criticized for focusing mainly on intentions and pre- oriented structure that has mostly replaced the earlier liminary evaluations, never reaching the point of the ones. In general, I consider both forms of religious thought as part of ‘lived religion’. taking of action (Porpora 2015: 135). Despite this, the Approaching Religion • Vol. 8, No. 2 • December 2018 41 authors provide a framework that allows the study of support the structure. For Saba Mahmood (2005: structure as it is in constant interplay with agency, 32), this type of behaviour does not constitute any especially with regard to the past, where previous form of agency. Rather, they are activities controlled experiences are evaluated in relation to the current and produced by the prevailing power structures and situation. Thus, the structure is not seen as purely authorities. On the other hand, Pierre Bourdieu’s separate from agency, but being in constant interac- definition of any human action as a means to gain tion with agency, and as such, being also reshaped status, prestige and power extends to pious and moral by the course of action. Subjects are culturally-con- actions (Winchester 2008: 1759). However, David structed beings who sometimes show agency even Winchester’s (2008) study of Muslim converts in through subordinate actions, intentionally choos- Missouri attests to how creating a moral or pious self ing to comply with, or reinforce, the existing system is not merely a dictation of power structures, but a (Ahearn 2000: 13; Teppo 2007: 382; Svärd 2013; conscious action. Moreover, he concludes that moral O’Brien 2015). In relation to religious agency, Laura actions should be viewed from a wider perspective Leming (2007: 73) discusses how individuals simul- than merely arising from a desire to gain status. taneously endorse and uphold the prevailing societal This work is an empirical, micro-level study that structures and participate in the ongoing, gradual focuses on women’s narratives concerning religious transformation of these same structures, also acting practices and pilgrimage.
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