Post date: Oct 27, 2016 10:29:26 PM
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/3130234.stm
In this article, Safa Faisal reports on factors that restrict girl’s access to education in a number of Middle Eastern countries. It is part of a six-part series on the topic that was broadcasted on BBC Arabic in 2003. This article relates to Talal Asad’s, “The Idea of an Anthropology of Islam” in two ways. First, is offers an example of failing to carefully choose analytical concepts when writing about the Middle East. Asad writes that, “not using such concepts simply means failing to ask particular questions, and misconstruing historical structures” (Asad, 9). Faisal misconstrues Islam by equating the “Arab world” with the “Muslim world.” The reasons for why girls struggle for education in this article are multifold: civil war, poor resources for quality learning, long travel distances to school, conservative values concerning gender, tribal traditions, family economics, gender roles, and pedagogy. Analytical concepts as, “Muslim,” “the Arab world,” and “the Muslim world” are used to encompass these numerous historical structures. Just as “the vocabulary of motives, behavior, and utterances does not belong [] in analytic accounts whose principal object is “tribe”", it is disadvantageous to conflate Islam and the Arab world, and then use those terms instead of referring to the true network of social, economic, political, historical factors at play in making it difficult for girls in certain places to get an education (Asad, 10). Secondly, this article related to the Asad reading by falling into the Great Tradition/ Little Tradition model. At the end of the article Faisal writes, "the Mufti of Egypt, Dr Ahmed Al-Tayeb from Luxor, told me he found a huge difference between his society and what he had been taught about Islam at university." This quote, in conjunction with examples given in the piece, situates the Great Tradition of Islam -- that of the text -- as more correct than flawed practices of Islam, which restrict girl's access to education.