Social prescriptions can constitute the self rather than constrain it.

Evidence

The account I have presented of the mosque movement shows that the distinction between the subject’s real desires and obligatory social conventions-a distinction at the center of liberal, and at times progressive, thought-cannot be assumed, precisely because socially prescribed forms of behavior constitute the conditions for the emergence of the self as such and are integral to its realization. One of the issues such a conception of self raises is: How does one rethink the question of individual freedom in a context where the distinction between the subject’s own desires and socially pre.. scribed performances cannot be so easily presumed, and where submission to certain forms of (extern ) authority is a condition for the self to achieve its potentiality? What kind of politics would be deemed desirable and viable in a discursive tradition that regards conventions ( socially prescribed perfor.. mances) as necessary to the self’s realization? — Saba Mahmood, Politics of Piety, 1033

Categorization

• DEEPTHINKING: The core inversion of the chapter: freedom rethought where submission to external authority is the very condition of self-realization — resists framing as either liberation or subjugation.
• XREF: Resonates with Butler’s performativity debates, MacIntyre’s tradition-constituted selves, and Foucault’s subjectivation. — connects to: Feed the need for others’ approval and self-construction is impaired. — Shoshana Zuboff, The Age of Surveillance Capitalism, 1454; Agency is better understood as accomplished social action than as individual autonomous intent. — Mary Bucholtz and Kira Hall, Identity and Interaction: A…, 114; Agency is best theorized as accomplished social action, not individual autonomy. — Mary Bucholtz and Kira Hall, Identity and Interaction: A…, 114 (+1 more)