Bartered Bridegrooms: Transacting Muslim masculinities as colonial legacy (Suriyah Bi)
| Dates: | 19 May 2025 |
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| Times: | 16:15 - 18:00 |
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| What is it: | Seminar |
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| Organiser: | Centre on Dynamics of Ethnicity (CoDE) |
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| Speaker: | Suriyah Bi |
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In this hybrid seminar, Dr Suriyah Bi (Cardiff University) introduces research from her recent book 'Bartered Bridegrooms: Transacting Muslim masculinities as colonial legacy' published by Manchester University Press.
Please join us for this event either in person at The University of Manchester or online (zoom details below). If you are joining in person there will be tea, coffee and cake from 4.15pm and the seminar will start at 4.30pm. It will be followed by questions and discussion and we will be finished by 6pm. If you are joining online then the same applies...apart from the cake, sadly.
ABSTRACT
Muslim men are often portrayed in academic and popular discourses as violent patriarchs and/or as terrorists. Against the backdrop of an increasingly hostile environment within the United Kingdom, Suriyah Bi explores the experiences of Muslim migrant husbands in the Pakistani and Kashmiri diaspora. The uncertainties of migrant journeys tethered to cultural and religious marital norms intersect with gendered experiences of masculinity across space and time. In-depth interviews with 62 migrant husbands shed light on the precarity and vulnerability they experience. Their aspirational masculinities often start in the home country with collective familial dreams of migration, but can turn sour through the exposure of domestic and employment power dynamics upon arriving in the United Kingdom. The ethnography highlights experiences of domestic violence experienced by migrant husbands, which supports the notion of an in-between or liminal masculinity becoming a lived reality for these men on the move, ultimately resulting in novel ways in which a reassertion of masculinity is sought through religious Sufi traditions and musical lamentations. The book weaves together transnational dynamics between people and place along the contours of colonial legacies, showing the self and other power dynamics present within a single group identity. Violence is inflicted on incoming migrants by British-born or British citizen counterparts, through the immigration system. The book shows how citizenship can be weaponised as a performance of whiteness, namely White power, resulting in the notion that gender is performed on.
HOW TO JOIN US
You can attend this seminar in person or online. If there are any changes to this event we will share them on this page, so please check back here before you travel. No need to register.
Zoom link: https://zoom.us/j/95245518052
FINDING US AND ACCESSIBILITY
See links on this page to the University of Manchester Maps page (for information on getting to the university and finding the building) and AccessAble (for accessibility information). For any other accessibility questions please contact us.
Travel and Contact Information
Find event
Hanson Room (Ground Floor, turn right after you enter building)
Humanities Bridgeford Street
Manchester
