Based on a connected, relational and multidisciplinary approach (history, ethnography, political science, and theology), Mission and Preaching tackles the notion of mission through the analysis of preaching activities and religious dynamics across Christianity, Islam and Judaism, in the Middle East and North Africa, from the late 19th century until today. The 13 chapters reveal points of contact, exchange, and circulation, considering the MENA region as a central observatory. The volume offers a new chronology of the missionary phenomenon and calls for further cross-cutting approaches to decompartmentalise it, arguing that these approaches constitute useful entry points to shed new light on religious dynamics and social transformations in the MENA region.
Norig Neveu is a research fellow at CNRS (IREMAM), member of the research projects Lajeh (ANR) and MAGYC (H2020), and MisSMO (EFR). Her research focuses on social dynamics around holy sites and religious politics in southern Jordan, a connected history of Christian and Muslim religious authorities in Jordan, Palestine and Irak (19th -21st c.).
Karène Sanchez Summerer is Associate Professor at Leiden University (Professor of Middle Eastern studies at Groningen University from Sept. 2022), and PI of the NWO project CrossRoads (2017-2022) and MisSMO (EFR). Her research considers interactions between European linguistic and cultural policies and Arab communities (1860-1960) in the Levant, missionariesâ modalities and impact, and Arab Catholic communities in Palestine.
Annalaura Turiano is a postdoctoral researcher, member of the research network EGY-Class (CNRS), MisSMO (EFR), and the coordinator of Philanthropic action and development in the Middle East: actors, practices and expertise, 20th -21st c. (IFAO). Her research interests include missionary education, trans-Mediterranean migrations, and philanthropy in the Middle East.
2 Protestant Missions in Ethiopia: From Jewish Falashas (Beta Israel) to Christian Falashas and Falas Mura, and Back: A Blurred Status (1858â1960)
âEmanuela Trevisan ()
3 From Missionaries to Missionary Labour: Hypotheses on Evangelicalism in Contemporary Istanbul
âArmand Aupiais ()
Part 2 Preachers, Negotiations, and Interactions
Introduction: What Is Preaching and Who Is It for?
âHeather Sharkey ()
4 Reshaping the Preaching Spaces in Post-Revolutionary Egypt: AnsÄr al-Sunna al-Muhammadiyya Women Preachers and Religious Reform
âNaima Bouras ()
5 Being a Teacher in the Missionary Schools of the Gülen Movement in Sub-Saharan Africa: Interactions, Trajectories, and Differentiated Investments of the Role
âGabrielle Angey ()
6 Shifting Missions: Languages, Texts, and Experiences between Jews and Roman Catholics in Israel (1940sâ1970s)
âMaria-Chiara Rioli ()
Part 3 Missionary Strategies, between Political Power(s) and Everyday Practices
Introduction: Mapping in, Mapping out. Strategies and Dynamic(s) of Preaching and Mission(s)
âMariachiara Giorda ()
8 The Late Ottoman Sunni Missionary Project
âNecati Alkan ()
9 Early Protestant Missionary Activity, Heresy and Church in Ottoman Armenia (1782â1909)
âFederico Alpi ()
10 A Jewish Mission in the âOrientsâ (Nineteenth Centuryâ1920)?
âVincent Vilmain ()
11 Reconceptualising the Political Role of daʿwa in Civil Society: Associations and Islamic Activism in Tunisia
âEster Sigilló ()
Conclusion: Thinking through Missionary Work. Moral Geographies, Regeneration from the Margins, Sincerity, and the Gift Economy
âEmir Mahieddin () and Katia Boissevain ()
Epilogue: Decolonising Missions and Preaching: The Implicated Self and the Reframing of the Missionary Phenomenon
âMichael Marten
Index
Those interested in the modern and contemporary history of the Middle East, religious studies, history and anthropology of missions, contacts between Christianity, Islam and Judaism. University students (history, social sciences, political science and theology) will easily read the book, all the chapters are very good cases for undergraduates.