Between 1963 and 1986, eminent American anthropologists Clifford and Hildred Geertz - together and alone - conducted ethnographic fieldwork for varying periods in Sefrou, a town situated in north-central Morocco, south of Fez. This book considers Geertz’s contributions to sociocultural theory and symbolic anthropology.
Clifford Geertz made an immense impact on the American academy: his interpretative and symbolic approaches reoriented anthropology analytically away from classic social science presuppositions, while his publications profoundly influenced both North American and Maghribi researchers alike. After his death at the age of 80 on October 30, 2006, scholars from local, national, and international universities gathered at the University of California, Los Angeles, to analyze his contributions to sociocultural theory and symbolic anthropology in relation to Islam; ideas of the sacred; Morocco’s cityscapes (notably Sefrou’s bazaar or suq); colonialism and post-independence economic development; gender, and political structures at the household and village levels.
This book looks back to a specific era of American anthropology beginning in the 1960s as it unfolded in Morocco; and at the same time, the contributions examine new lines of enquiry that opened up after key texts by Geertz were translated into French and introduced to generations of francophone Maghribi researchers who sustain lively and inventive meditations on his Morocco writings.
This book was published as a special issue of Journal of North African Studies.
1. Introduction to Clifford Geertz in Morocco: "Why Sefrou? Why Anthropology? Why Me?" - Susan Slyomovics (UCLA)
Part I: Islam Re-Observed
2. Introduction to Islam Observed (Hebrew Translation, 2007) - Clifford Geertz
3. Islam Re-Observed: Sanctity, Salafism, and Islamism - Lahouari Addi (University of Lyon, France)
4. How Religion Turns into Ideology - Hassan Rachik (Hassan II University, Morocco)
5. Religious Act, Public Space: Reflections on Some Geertzian Concepts - Mondher Kilani (University of Lausanne, Switzerland)
6. Interpretation and the Limits of Interpretability: On Rethinking Clifford Geertz’s Semiotics of Religious Experience - C. Jason Throop (University of California Los Angeles, USA)
Part II: Translation, Metaphor, Humor
7. Not Lost in Translation: The Influence of Clifford Geertz’s Work and Life on Anthropology in Morocco - Dale F. Eickelman (Dartmouth College, USA)
8. Geertz, Humor, and Morocco - Kevin Dwyer (American University of Cairo, Egypt)
9. Culture as Text: Hazards and Possibilities of Geertz’s Literary/Literacy Metaphor - Katherine E. Hoffman (Northwestern University, USA)
Part III: Photography, Paul Hyman, and Clifford Geertz
10. Paul Hyman, photographer. A (Fashion) Photographer’s Reflections on Fieldwork
11. Susan Slyomovics, UCLA. Perceptions, Not Illustrations, of Sefrou, Morocco: Paul Hyman’s Images and the Work of Ethnographic Photography
12. Chicken or Glass: In the Vicinity of Clifford Geertz and Paul Hyman - Paul Rabinow (UC Berkeley)
Part IV: Urban Space and Sefrou
13. Of Time and the City: Clifford Geertz on Urban History - Susan Gilson Miller (University of California, Davis, USA)
14. Observing Islam Observed: The Family Resemblance and the Pun - Lawrence Rosen (Princeton University, USA)
15. Sidi Lahcen Blues - Aziz Abbassi
Part V: Modernism, Meaning, and Order
16. How Life is Hard: Visceral Notes on Meaning, Order, and Morocco - David Crawford (Fairfield University, USA)
17. Are We There Yet? Geertz, Morocco, and Modernization - Thomas Dichter
18. Welcome Message from the Mayor of Sefrou - Hafid Ouchchak
Biography
Susan Slyomovics is Professor of Anthropology and Near Eastern Languages and Cultures at the University of California, Los Angeles, USA.
