Anne M. Jennings, Nubian women of West Aswan: negotiating tradition and change

Excerpt

Anne Jennings has written a new, updated edition of her 1995 book on Nubian women in West Aswan. She initially chose to study Nubian women because as an Africanist (at least at the outset) she wanted to examine points of resemblance and distinction with other Muslim ethnicities to the south and west of Nubia. She returned to the hamlet of Gubba, her specific research site (repeatedly it seems, in 1981–82, 1986, 1992, 1997 and 2007) in order to understand the significant changes taking place in gender relations, attitudes, behaviors, and the community at large. Her intent was not only to conduct a longitudinal study, but also to reissue her book so that the growing throngs of tourists and increasingly modernizing locals could buy copies to learn about Nubia’s traditional customs. …