On Archaeology of Sainthood and Local Spirituality in Islam: Past and Present Crossroads of Events and Ideas

This volume addresses the diversity of sainthood in Islam with respect to rural and urban and metropolitan ideas, practices and cults, their networks and institutions. Ranging from ethnography and history to political science and social theory, this work includes studies of places and the local cultural significance of sainthood, its ethnic or genealogical origin, the constitution of corporations and brotherhoods and drives for sacredness in Algeria, Egypt, Germany and Turkey.

Georg Stauth is an orientalist and sociologist who specializes on the Middle East and has spent several years in Southeast Asia. Using this vantage point, he observes the emerging ideas of a modern Islamic future as forces of both local self-assertiveness and transnational relations.