Julian Millie
- Published in print:
- 2017
- Published Online:
- May 2018
- ISBN:
- 9781501713118
- eISBN:
- 9781501709609
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Cornell University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7591/cornell/9781501713118.003.0001
- Subject:
- Anthropology, Asian Cultural Anthropology
West Java is a diverse Islamic society in which different segments attach contrasting meanings to Islamic communications. Many Muslims are accustomed to listening to preachers when carrying out their ...
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West Java is a diverse Islamic society in which different segments attach contrasting meanings to Islamic communications. Many Muslims are accustomed to listening to preachers when carrying out their routines of piety and celebration. These preachers shape their messages to everyday realities. Other segments problematize routine preaching, arguing that preaching should enable Muslims to transcend their everyday realities. The chapter introduces West Java and its capital city, Bandung, and conveys the multi-faceted Islamic heritage of the region, providing background to the critiques of preaching produced by Muslim elites of the region.Less
West Java is a diverse Islamic society in which different segments attach contrasting meanings to Islamic communications. Many Muslims are accustomed to listening to preachers when carrying out their routines of piety and celebration. These preachers shape their messages to everyday realities. Other segments problematize routine preaching, arguing that preaching should enable Muslims to transcend their everyday realities. The chapter introduces West Java and its capital city, Bandung, and conveys the multi-faceted Islamic heritage of the region, providing background to the critiques of preaching produced by Muslim elites of the region.
Julian Millie
- Published in print:
- 2017
- Published Online:
- May 2018
- ISBN:
- 9781501713118
- eISBN:
- 9781501709609
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Cornell University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7591/cornell/9781501713118.003.0002
- Subject:
- Anthropology, Asian Cultural Anthropology
Chapter Two documents waves of novelty in preaching styles, plotting successive embraces by West Javanese Muslims of new preaching forms that remain valid for contemporary audiences. The sketch is ...
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Chapter Two documents waves of novelty in preaching styles, plotting successive embraces by West Javanese Muslims of new preaching forms that remain valid for contemporary audiences. The sketch is constructed around clusters of terms that correspond to historically-specific understandings of Muslim subjectivity.Less
Chapter Two documents waves of novelty in preaching styles, plotting successive embraces by West Javanese Muslims of new preaching forms that remain valid for contemporary audiences. The sketch is constructed around clusters of terms that correspond to historically-specific understandings of Muslim subjectivity.
Julian Millie
- Published in print:
- 2017
- Published Online:
- May 2018
- ISBN:
- 9781501713118
- eISBN:
- 9781501709609
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- Cornell University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7591/cornell/9781501713118.001.0001
- Subject:
- Anthropology, Asian Cultural Anthropology
For many Muslims throughout the world, oral preaching provides the most accessible and enjoyable medium for learning about Islam and its meanings for everyday life. This is true in Indonesia’s West ...
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For many Muslims throughout the world, oral preaching provides the most accessible and enjoyable medium for learning about Islam and its meanings for everyday life. This is true in Indonesia’s West Java province, where almost 98% of the population of around forty-three million practices Islam. Despite its popularity, Indonesia’s Islamic elites are concerned about the value of preaching. They see that Islam provides directives and motivations towards progress in areas of social and political concern, but argue that this progress will not be achieved if Muslims are satisfied with the pleasing artifice of clever preachers. Millie spent fourteen months in the company of some of West Java’s most successful Islamic preachers, but also spent time with critics of listening. He described and explores a dichotomy between Islamic speech which succeeds because it is shaped to suit listeners’ social realities, and discourses about Muslim subjectivity that connect media consumption with aspirations for social and political progress, and which portray listening as anachronistic and inefficacious. This detailed analysis sheds light on a question that is increasingly important in efforts to understand contemporary Muslim societies: What is the place of pious listening in the complex societies of today?Less
For many Muslims throughout the world, oral preaching provides the most accessible and enjoyable medium for learning about Islam and its meanings for everyday life. This is true in Indonesia’s West Java province, where almost 98% of the population of around forty-three million practices Islam. Despite its popularity, Indonesia’s Islamic elites are concerned about the value of preaching. They see that Islam provides directives and motivations towards progress in areas of social and political concern, but argue that this progress will not be achieved if Muslims are satisfied with the pleasing artifice of clever preachers. Millie spent fourteen months in the company of some of West Java’s most successful Islamic preachers, but also spent time with critics of listening. He described and explores a dichotomy between Islamic speech which succeeds because it is shaped to suit listeners’ social realities, and discourses about Muslim subjectivity that connect media consumption with aspirations for social and political progress, and which portray listening as anachronistic and inefficacious. This detailed analysis sheds light on a question that is increasingly important in efforts to understand contemporary Muslim societies: What is the place of pious listening in the complex societies of today?
Julian Millie
- Published in print:
- 2017
- Published Online:
- May 2018
- ISBN:
- 9781501713118
- eISBN:
- 9781501709609
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Cornell University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7591/cornell/9781501713118.003.0005
- Subject:
- Anthropology, Asian Cultural Anthropology
Chapter Five explores the ways in which the preaching styles analysed in the two preceding chapters are publically evaluated, pointing out the way in which public norms about appropriate ...
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Chapter Five explores the ways in which the preaching styles analysed in the two preceding chapters are publically evaluated, pointing out the way in which public norms about appropriate communication inform negative judgements of one of them (Al-Jauhari’s). The analytical approach to those norms is made through the subject of language selection (Sundanese versus Indonesian), a variable that expresses listeners’ recognition of a hierarchy of preaching styles.Less
Chapter Five explores the ways in which the preaching styles analysed in the two preceding chapters are publically evaluated, pointing out the way in which public norms about appropriate communication inform negative judgements of one of them (Al-Jauhari’s). The analytical approach to those norms is made through the subject of language selection (Sundanese versus Indonesian), a variable that expresses listeners’ recognition of a hierarchy of preaching styles.
Julian Millie
- Published in print:
- 2017
- Published Online:
- May 2018
- ISBN:
- 9781501713118
- eISBN:
- 9781501709609
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Cornell University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7591/cornell/9781501713118.003.0003
- Subject:
- Anthropology, Asian Cultural Anthropology
Chapter Three is the first in a bracket of two which compares orations by two skilled preachers, and which provides contextual background to the evaluations of preaching explored in later chapters. ...
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Chapter Three is the first in a bracket of two which compares orations by two skilled preachers, and which provides contextual background to the evaluations of preaching explored in later chapters. Kyai Al-Jauhari (b. 1971) is the most popular preacher amongst village audiences in West Java. His success is premised on his bold and shocking exercise of virtuoso skills in a number of performance genres. These skills are in great demand by mosque committees intent on attracting large audiences to community celebrations. At the same time, his unique voice leads to negative evaluations from outside the environment in which his preaching is valued so highly.Less
Chapter Three is the first in a bracket of two which compares orations by two skilled preachers, and which provides contextual background to the evaluations of preaching explored in later chapters. Kyai Al-Jauhari (b. 1971) is the most popular preacher amongst village audiences in West Java. His success is premised on his bold and shocking exercise of virtuoso skills in a number of performance genres. These skills are in great demand by mosque committees intent on attracting large audiences to community celebrations. At the same time, his unique voice leads to negative evaluations from outside the environment in which his preaching is valued so highly.
Julian Millie
- Published in print:
- 2017
- Published Online:
- May 2018
- ISBN:
- 9781501713118
- eISBN:
- 9781501709609
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Cornell University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7591/cornell/9781501713118.003.0008
- Subject:
- Anthropology, Asian Cultural Anthropology
Chapter Eight analyses preaching as medium for change, viewing it from the perspective of an activist group that contributes to public contest by circulating ideas through the Province’s media. The ...
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Chapter Eight analyses preaching as medium for change, viewing it from the perspective of an activist group that contributes to public contest by circulating ideas through the Province’s media. The group is frustrated by the pragmatic tendencies of preachers who realise their careers depend on avoidance of contest. The Chapter highlights the distinctions between oral preaching and print publication as modes for the conduct of public contest.Less
Chapter Eight analyses preaching as medium for change, viewing it from the perspective of an activist group that contributes to public contest by circulating ideas through the Province’s media. The group is frustrated by the pragmatic tendencies of preachers who realise their careers depend on avoidance of contest. The Chapter highlights the distinctions between oral preaching and print publication as modes for the conduct of public contest.
Patrick D. Gaffney
- Published in print:
- 1994
- Published Online:
- May 2012
- ISBN:
- 9780520084711
- eISBN:
- 9780520914582
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University of California Press
- DOI:
- 10.1525/california/9780520084711.003.0001
- Subject:
- Anthropology, Middle Eastern Cultural Anthropology
This chapter notes how the study of Islamic preaching came into fruition. This study is the accumulated product of several periods of field research, the longest of which was the first, an ...
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This chapter notes how the study of Islamic preaching came into fruition. This study is the accumulated product of several periods of field research, the longest of which was the first, an eighteen-month residence in a provincial town in Upper Egypt. The late 1970s marked the beginning of a time of exceptional socioreligious ferment in Egypt. The fact of being an American in Egypt at this time occasionally invited direct associations between the author of this book and the official foreign policy maneuvers that were then in high profile. He was Christian engaged on quite friendly terms with Islamic preachers. But when the author went back to Egypt in 1984–1985, hoping to reside in Minya to follow up and elaborate on earlier research, he shifted the focus to mosques and preaching on the national and transnational level.Less
This chapter notes how the study of Islamic preaching came into fruition. This study is the accumulated product of several periods of field research, the longest of which was the first, an eighteen-month residence in a provincial town in Upper Egypt. The late 1970s marked the beginning of a time of exceptional socioreligious ferment in Egypt. The fact of being an American in Egypt at this time occasionally invited direct associations between the author of this book and the official foreign policy maneuvers that were then in high profile. He was Christian engaged on quite friendly terms with Islamic preachers. But when the author went back to Egypt in 1984–1985, hoping to reside in Minya to follow up and elaborate on earlier research, he shifted the focus to mosques and preaching on the national and transnational level.
Julian Millie
- Published in print:
- 2017
- Published Online:
- May 2018
- ISBN:
- 9781501713118
- eISBN:
- 9781501709609
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Cornell University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7591/cornell/9781501713118.003.0009
- Subject:
- Anthropology, Asian Cultural Anthropology
Chapter Nine reflects further on the meanings of oral preaching in Indonesia’s Islamic public sphere, searching for alternatives to the modernist perspectives explored in earlier chapters. It finds ...
More
Chapter Nine reflects further on the meanings of oral preaching in Indonesia’s Islamic public sphere, searching for alternatives to the modernist perspectives explored in earlier chapters. It finds support for the medium in the traditionalist project of the mass organisation known as NU (Nahdlatul Ulama, or the Rising of the Scholars). Through its doctrine as well as its characteristic forms of public communication, the organisation advocates passivity as an acceptable Muslim position.Less
Chapter Nine reflects further on the meanings of oral preaching in Indonesia’s Islamic public sphere, searching for alternatives to the modernist perspectives explored in earlier chapters. It finds support for the medium in the traditionalist project of the mass organisation known as NU (Nahdlatul Ulama, or the Rising of the Scholars). Through its doctrine as well as its characteristic forms of public communication, the organisation advocates passivity as an acceptable Muslim position.
