Partners of Zaynab: A Gendered Perspective of Shia Muslim Faith by Diane D’Souza (review)

Abstract

Reviewed by: Partners of Zaynab: A Gendered Perspective of Shia Muslim Faith by Diane D’Souza Yafa Shanneik Partners of Zaynab: A Gendered Perspective of Shia Muslim Faith, by Diane D’Souza, 2014. Columbia, South Carolina: The University of South Carolina Press, 264 pp., $49.95. isbn: 978-1-61117-377-2 (hbk). In Partners of Zaynab, the author examines the lived religious experiences and ritual practices of Twelver Shiʿa South Asian urban women. The research is based on ethnographic fieldwork conducted between 1994 and 2000 in Hyderabad, India. D’Souza examines religious narratives that shape the women’s spiritual lives and highlights the important and influential role women play within the traditionally male-centred Shiʿa religious context of Hyderabad. She argues that women are not mere followers of men’s religious practices but are rather active in constructing their own understanding of Shiʿa religious devotion that is articulated through their own defined ritual performances. The book starts with a historical overview of the historical events Shiʿa believe caused the split of the Muslim community after the death of the Prophet Muhammad. It describes the Umayyad period that led to the events of Karbala and caused the death of Imam Husayn and his family and supporters whom Shiʿa have been mourning each year since then. What gives these accounts their distinctive contribution is the detailed description of the political and socio-religious roles Shiʿa female figures played within these historical events such as the Prophet Muhammad’s daughter Fatimah; his granddaughter Zaynab; or Hind, the wife of the Umayyad caliph, Yazid, who ordered the killing of Husayn. Taking these role models as an example of female agency, Hyderabadi women actively engaged in collecting donations and were able to secure enough funds to build their own communal space for female religious activities exclusively. In this ashurkhanah in Hyderabad’s Old City, women exercise religious and social leadership and authority in organising and defining their own mourning and remembrance gatherings. Within these gatherings different women play various roles, in arranging the place and making it ready for the ritual, organising the food afterwards as well as leading the [End Page 242] ritual in the form of reciting the Qurʾan and saying prayers, retelling the events they are commemorating, reciting lamentation poetry and ending with performing self-flagellation as an expression of their sorrow for the killing of Imam Husayn and his family. Partners of Zaynab offers a valuable overview of the various types of Shiʿa religious rituals, whether mourning or celebratory. For instance, events such as the wedding of Fatimah and ʿAli are also celebrated by the women. The author engages in more detail with religious Shiʿa symbols such as the ʿalam, the Shiʿa emblematic crest, and the meaning and role it plays in ritual performances. It discusses rituals of intercession and blessing such as dastarkhan, also known as sofreh in Pakistan and Iran. It highlights how women use the ʿalam and/or dastarkhan in times of hardship, such as sickness, or when they are in need for divine blessings and seek an intervention from the family of the Prophet through a prayer of petition. It describes the components and meanings of such rituals of supplications and what role women play therein, particularly highlighting the unique power women have in such rituals, since men have no access to rituals such as the dastarkhan and ask women to perform them on their behalf. Supplication rituals therefore offer women the exclusive space to exercise autonomy, leadership, and authority within their community. In Partners of Zaynab, the ethnographic and the textual foci harmonically complement each other. The book engages particularly with Hyderabadi Shiʿa poetry and the meanings women assign to it in their ritual practises. The author highlights the importance and power of recalling Shiʿa historical events, through reciting lamentation poetry or retelling the story in prose form, both playing a major part in Shiʿa rituals and being the driving force for the ultimate ritual climax – weeping and self-flagellation. It states the qualities and characteristics that women, performing the role of an orator, should have in order to successfully lead the...