Culture and Identity in a Muslim Society

by Gary S. Gregg

Overview

In the last fifteen years, psychologists have rediscovered culture and its influence on emotion, thought, and self. Many researchers have come to the conclusion that the world's cultures can be ranked according to the degree to which they are individualist or collectivist, with Western cultures falling at the individualist end and non-Western cultures at the collectivist end. These scholars argue that while individualist cultures give rise to "independent" selves, leading Westerners to think and act autonomously, collectivist cultures foster "interdependent" selves, leading non-Westerners, embedded in social-relationships, to think and act relationally. Culture and Identity in a Muslim Society presents an alternative to the individualist- collectivist approach to identity. Unlike most psychological and anthropological studies of culture and self, Gary Gregg's work directly investigates individuals, using "study of lives"-style interviews with young adults living in villages and small towns in southern Morocco. Analyzing these young adults' life-narratives, Gregg builds a theory of culture and identity that differs from prevailing psychological and anthropological models in important respects. In contrast to modernist theories of identity as unified, the life-narratives show individuals to articulate a small set of shifting identities. In contrast to post-modern theories that claim people have a kaleidoscopic multiplicity of fluid identities, the narratives show that the identities are integrated by repeated use of culturally-specific self-symbols, metaphors, and story-plots. Most importantly, the life-narratives show these young Moroccans' self-representations to be pervasively shaped by the volatile cultural struggle between Western-style "modernity" and authentic Muslim "tradition." Offering a new approach to the study of identity, the volume will be of interest to cross-cultural psychologists, anthropologists, scholars of Middle-East societies, and researchers specializing in the study of lives.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780198042358
Publisher:	Oxford University Press
Publication date:	02/15/2007
Series:	Culture, Cognition, and Behavior
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
File size:	2 MB

About the Author

Gary S. Gregg received a Ph.D. in personality psychology from the University of Michigan, and then spent five and a half years conducting fieldwork in Morocco, first on the social organization of the Imeghrane, and then a "study of lives" investigation of identity development among young adults in the Ouarzazate region. He has taught at Sarah Lawrence College, Harvard's Center for Middle Eastern Sutdies, and Kalamazoo College. He is the author of The Middle East: A Cultural Psychology (OUP, 2005) and Self-Representation.

Table of Contents

Introduction1. TheoryA Model of IdentityMoroccan Culture, Personality, and Identity2. A Cultural Geography3. Mohammed4. Hussein5. Rachida6. Khadija7. ConclusionsPersonality OrganizationSelf RepresentationPersonality in Middle Eastern SocietiesCultures and SelvesEpilogueReferences

Editorial Reviews

"Gary Gregg evocatively presents the efforts of four Moroccan young adults to construct viable identities in an economically uncertain world where neither village nor city feels like home. Grounded in Gregg's impressively diverse research skills, the book offers a theoretically nuanced model that disrupts persistent stereotypes about traditional "selves" by demonstrating how individuals negotiate and project multiple, emotionally charged identities in ways that are simultaneously culturally patterned and creatively unpredictable."—Katherine Ewing, Associate Professor, Department of Cultural Anthropology, Duke University

"A model of its kind, this volume is an outstanding work that will be of great interest to a wide array of social scientists. Using narrative methodology, this book provides indispensable insights not only to scholars specializing in Muslim societies, but also to scholars whose main interests are the study of identity and culture. Gregg provides a masterful and balanced integration of current debates about "ego-centric" versus "sociocentric" selves, and "individualistic" versus "collectivistic" societies. Gregg possesses impressive knowledge of both the anthropological and psychological literature on culture and identity, and he brings these issues to life in the context of evocative narratives of Muslim lives. I cannot think of another book that has worked through these issues with this kind of clarity and coherence." —Per F. Gjerde, Professor of Psychology, University of California, Santa Cruz

"In this dazzling integration of past and current scholarship in psychology and anthropology, Gary Gregg shows us how and why to do the study of lives. His analysis of culture and identity in Muslim Moroccan society reveals individuals as they actually live their lives in our complex, threatening, and morally challenging time. This is responsible research that deserves close reading by scholars and all concerned with the state of our world. Social science can make a contribution and does so in this book." —Suzanne C. Ouellette, Professor of Psychology, The Graduate Center, The City University of New York

""Such strengths of the book include the careful rereading of classic works...and attention to respondents' shifting use of French and Arabic. This book is an important one and should be read by all scholars interested in Muslim societies."—PsycCritiques

"In this ground breaking study, Gary Gregg combines his deep understanding of Moroccan society and his engagement with a broad swath of social science thinking to offer readers a compelling portrait of the dynamic interplay between personality and culture. He also shows how individuality is crafted in a social context and invariably shaped by the forces of tradition and modernity. Gregg's research has much interest for a diverse audience." —Paul Wink, Professor, Department of Psychology, Wellesley College

From the Publisher