In this thesis, I describe the appropriation, contestation and impact of globally-oriented Salafi-inspired understandings of Islam in Bairro Acordado. As outlined above, life in this peri-urban neighbourhood is marked by religious and legal pluralism: Islamic reformists, Sufi Muslims, Catholics and others share the same social space, and have a variety of fora and mechanisms at their disposal for dispute resolution. The focus of the thesis is on the articulation of Islamic reformism in this context of pluralism, as well as on the
manifestation of reformist ideas in the domain of dispute management. Specifically, I explore both the success of Islamic reformism and the uncertainty it generates in the urban periphery of northern Mozambique.
There are five chapters in the thesis. Each chapter explores a different aspect of the themes of Islamic reformism, pluralism and dispute management. While the emphasis of the first chapters is on the broader socio-cultural environment of the neighbourhood and on the doubts and dilemmas Muslims experience when they become involved with reformist mosques, later chapters concentrate on Muslims who are further along the path of
reformism, and on the uncertainty their statements and Islamic understandings produce in others in their social surroundings.
In Chapter 3, I study the relevance of Makhuwa understandings of matrilineal descent for patterns of social organisation. By analysing the significance of the marital home in separation and divorce cases, I demonstrate that the model of the nuclear family promoted by the state has become increasingly important in ordering social relations in peri-urban households. Nevertheless, in a context of decentralisation, principles of descent continue
82 to hold relevance as well. The manifestation of Islamic reformism raises new questions about the importance of descent and citizenship in Bairro Acordado. While reformist mosques actively encourage their members to shape family relations in accordance with reformist interpretations of Islam, their interventions in this domain are constrained by people’s existing social engagements, as well as by disagreements between reformists over the correct interpretation of Islamic texts.
In Chapter 4, I continue to explore the nexus between patterns of Makhuwa kinship and Islamic reformism, but with a focus on urban migration and perceptions of sorcery. I show that sorcery fears in the urban periphery are structured by Makhuwa notions of relatedness and interdependence, which lead urbanites to feel vulnerable to the use of sorcery by rural kin as well as by neighbours. Islamic reformism offers a break from these notions of personhood by introducing individualised understandings of the self focused on God. This break makes reformist mosques particularly attractive to urban migrants whose experience of migration and social mobility has led them to worry about sorcery attacks by their rural kin. At the same time, I demonstrate, once people become more actively involved in reformism, it may also increase their fears of sorcery.
Chapter 5 analyses how the adoption of the aforementioned reformist self-understandings affects people’s normative commitments. I present two findings. On the one hand, Islamic reformists can be distinguished from others in Bairro Acordado by their explicit reactions to offensive behaviour and their attitudes towards Makhuwa initiation rites, which evince distinct ethical preferences. On the other hand, in people’s responses to a pilot survey designed to test for similar commitments at the implicit level of embodied morality, the differences largely disappear. This disparity has implications, I argue, for the
anthropology of morality and ethics. It leads me to wonder whether the deliberate actions of Islamic reformists and their reflections on morality are structured by other factors than their moral commitments.
In Chapter 6, I turn to one of these other factors: the epistemological dimensions of reformist self-understandings. In analysing the decreasing role of oath taking ceremonies
83 in dispute management in northern Mozambique, I show that Islamic reformism represents and contributes to broader epistemological shifts. Whereas Sufi Islam, in line with
Makhuwa conceptions of reality, conceptualises truth as located in the workings of an invisible realm, the uncovering of which requires specialist knowledge, perceptions of reality are becoming increasingly objectified under the influence of truth regimes
introduced by the state and Islamic reformism. This process of objectification influences people’s attitudes to accountability. Due to their individualised conceptions of
personhood, Islamic reformists see action as structured by intentions, which increases their willingness to hold others individually to account.
Chapter 7 analyses the political implications of the epistemological shifts identified in Chapter 6. I demonstrate that reformist attitudes to knowledge and personhood imply a duty on the part of Islamic reformists to pronounce the truth. Such attitudes result in the emergence of novel forms of mutuality and public engagement that collide with existing modes of relating to authorities in northern Mozambique, which are characterised by understandings of dependence. This leads to confrontations between reformists and authority figures of various types, both at the local and the national level. While these confrontations expose the socially isolating and disuniting tendencies intrinsic to Islamic reformism, they also show its powerful effects and its capacity to upset existing
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