Outward bodily practices are the material means for cultivating religiosity

Evidence

When compared with the views of the mosque participants, comments such as these suggest a very different understanding of the relationship between public behavior and interiority, and of the role exemplary models should play in shaping the pious self. Amna’s skepticism about the public display of emo.. tions registers a detachment between the inner life of a self and its outward expressions wherein the experience of the former cannot be adequately cap.. tured in the latter, and where its true force can only be felt within the val.. orized space of personal self..refl Amna questions the mosque partici.. pants’ sincerity precisely because they place undue weight on performative behavior and social conventions as a measure of their religiosity; indeed, if the proper location of religion and emotions is the inner life of the individual, as Amna seems to suggest, then it follows that one’s sincerity in these two domains cannot be measured in one’s outward performances. In contrast, for the women I worked with, outward behavioral forms were not only expressions of their interiorized religiosity but also a necessary means of acquiring it. — Saba Mahmood, Politics of Piety, 1020 (#corroborates, via linked claim)

In contrast, for the women I worked with, outward behavioral forms were not only expressions of their interiorized religiosity but also a necessary means of acquiring it. — Saba Mahmood, Politics of Piety, 1021 (#corroborates, via linked claim)

Mahmood extends this exploration of countervailing types of female agency in The Politics of Piety, her anthropological study of religious practice and identity formation among women involved in Cairo’s da’wa, or mosque movement. According to Mahmood, the faithful subject is produced through the performance of pious behavior and ritual rather than such behavior and ritual symbolizing an inward state of faith. — Peter Morey, Islamophobia and the Novel, 488 (#corroborates, via linked claim)

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: Embodied practice constitutes a precondition for religious experience; Pious bodily practice constitutes identity rather than symbolizing it — Peter Morey, Islamophobia and the Novel, 491; Outward religious behavior can be a means of producing inner piety — Saba Mahmood, Politics of Piety: The Islamic Revival…, 1020 (+8 more)

Broader Connections

• Outward religious behavior can be a means of producing inner piety #corroborates (0.95) — Saba Mahmood, Politics of Piety, 1020
• Outward practice produces inward virtue rather than merely expressing it #corroborates (0.95) — Saba Mahmood, Politics of Piety, 1021
• Piety is produced through outward ritual performance rather than symbolizing inner belief #corroborates (0.95) — Peter Morey, Islamophobia and the Novel, 488
• External bodily acts like prayer are understood to produce inward moral dispositions #exemplifies (0.92) — Saba Mahmood, Politics of Piety, 944