Our guest will be Amira Mittermaier, Associate Professor in the Departments for the Study of Religion & Near and Middle Eastern Civilizations at the University of Toronto. She received her PhD in socio-cultural anthropology from Columbia University and is cross-appointed to the Anthropology Department. Bringing together textual analysis and ethnographic fieldwork, her research to date has focused on modern Islam in Egypt. Her first book, Dreams that Matter: Egyptian Landscapes of the Imagination, explores Muslim practices of dream interpretation, as they are inflected by Islamic reformism, Western psychology, and mass mediation. Professor Mittermaier’s current book project, tentatively titled The Ethics of Giving: Islamic Charity in Contemporary Egypt, examines different Islamic modes of giving in post-revolutionary Egypt. Professor Mittermaier has shared with us her introduction to this book project, entitled “Giving to God: Islamic Charity in Revolutionary Times.”
As always, the seminar is an opportunity to discuss material that participants have a chance to read in advance. Discussion will occupy the greatest portion of the event.