Muslim Women’s Pilgrimage to Mecca and Beyond (Routledge Studies in Pilgrimage, Religious Travel and Tourism)

This book investigates female Muslims pilgrimage practices and how these relate to women’s mobility, social relations, identities, and the power structures that shape women’s lives. Bringing together scholars from different disciplines and regional expertise, it offers in-depth investigation of the gendered dimensions of Muslim pilgrimage and the life-worlds of female pilgrims. With a variety of case studies, the contributors explore the experiences of female pilgrims to Mecca and other pilgrimage sites, and how these are embedded in historical and current contexts of globalisation and transnational mobility. This volume will be relevant to a broad audience of researchers across pilgrimage, gender, religious, and Islamic studies.

Marjo Buitelaar is an anthropologist and Professor of Contemporary Islam at the University of Groningen, The Netherlands. She is programme-leader of the research project 'Modern Articulations of Pilgrimage to Mecca', funded by the Netherlands Organisation for Scientific Research (NWO).

Manja Stephan-Emmrich is Professor of Transregional Central Asian Studies, with a special focus on Islam and migration, at the Institute for Asian and African Studies at Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, Germany, and a socio-cultural anthropologist. She is a Principal Investigator at the Berlin Graduate School Muslim Cultures and Societies (BGSMCS) and co-leader of the research project 'Women’s Pathways to Professionalization in Muslim Asia. Reconfiguring religious knowledge, gender, and connectivity', which is part of the Shaping Asia network initiative (2020–2023, funded by the German Research Foundation, DFG).

Viola Thimm is Professorial Candidate (Habilitandin) at the Institute of Anthropology, University of Heidelberg, Germany. She has been Principal Investigator of the project 'From Malaysia to Dubai: Muslim pilgrimage and gender in the context of consuming practices', since October 2013 (funded by the Olympia Morata Programme in support of young female professors, DFG, and the 'Nachwuchsinitiative Universität Hamburg' – Initiative for young scholars).