Sisterly intimacies: Islam, gift‐giving, and women's relations of care in Russia

Abstract

AbstractDrawing on ethnographic fieldwork in Saint Petersburg (Russia) between 2015 and 2016, this article weaves together gift exchange and affect theory to analyze how low‐income Muslim women cultivated sisterly intimacies, a materially mediated and affect‐laden form of attachment. Sustained through the practices of giving clothing, food, and other spiritually significant items to one another, sisterly intimacies illuminates not only how the women survived and thrived on the margins of Russian society amid socioeconomic crises and political volatility but also how their material exchanges facilitated their ability to remain continuously oriented toward their community and God while striving for an ethical Muslim life and a favorable afterlife. Sisterly intimacies as a cultural formation also offers a broader glimpse into the affective landscapes of Russia, where indignation about socioeconomic injustices and authoritarianism coexist with a desire for (religious) connectivity, ethical living, and collective world‐making. Sisterly intimacies as a mode of relationality and self‐making highlights the agentive capacity of intimacy to create worlds for those who struggle to live in ways that they consider meaningful.