New expressions of Islam in Tunisia: an ethnographic approach

Abstract

This article analyses ‘new expressions of Islam’ in Tunisia before the popular uprising in 2010–2011. It does so from an ethnographic approach through which the researcher follows people as they go about their daily lives. The four ‘new expressions’ which constitute the framework of the analysis are new in the sense that they have not been presented before, have a twist to them in either message or form, and have attracted very little attention from scholars both inside and outside Tunisia. The article concludes that Islam did not disappear in the decades under President Bourguiba and Ben Ali's rule, but shifted from the public to the private realm; that pictures, sounds, and changes in the physical surroundings created by the regimes within the area of Islam were important factors for peoples’ experience of being in society; that many Tunisians were searching for values which could counter other changes in society; and that society did not remain silent, passive, or immune to reforms launched by the regime, but reacted and responded in ways which were originally detached from the regime and politics.

Keywords:

• Tunisia
• Islam
• reforms
• societal responses
• ‘slow changes’
• ethnography

Acknowledgements

The author is grateful to the many Tunisians who agreed to talk to her in the difficult political environment before the regime change in 2011. The author is indebted to Professor Hassan Rachik, University of Hassan II, Rabat, and to Dr. Isabelle Werenfels, German Institute for International and Security Affairs (SWP), for comments and conversations which improved the article considerably.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Funding

This work was part of my Ph.D. fellowship supported by the Center for the New Islamic Public, University of Copenhagen.

Notes

1 Other aspects of these gradual changes taking place ‘below the radar' have been presented in Cavatorta and Haugbølle (2012).

2 As many of the interviews were carried out while the authoritarian regime was still in power most informants wished to stay anonymous. Their names have been changed.

3 Decree law no. 89–118 from 9 January 1989, published in the Journal Officielle de la République Tunisienne, JORT (5), 20-2411189: 108. Available at: http://aan.mmsh.univ-aix.fr/volumes/1989/Documents/A-M_Rubr-legisl.pdf (accessed on 28 September 2012). The council remained in place with the same tasks after 14 January 2011 regime change; see http://www.pm.gov.tn/pm/article/article.php?id=99&lang=fr, last accessed on 29 September 2012.

4 Free books with the president's speeches and other propaganda material in French and Arabic were available at the library in the head office of the state party RCD and collected in 2009. The library and the RCD office were also closed down in 2011 by the transitional authorities, and all RCD material was seized. Translations from French into English by the author.

5 Interview by the author with the chief editor of a Tunisian journal, Tunis, October 2008. The editor wants to remain anonymous.