Religious Humanitarianism in Jordan and Uganda: Basit Kareem Iqbal and China Scherz
Channel: Simpson Center
Date: 2021-05-11

Professors Basit Kareem Iqbal and China Scherz discuss religious humanitarianism in Zaatari Refugee Camp in Jordan and at the Franciscan Nuns' Mercy House in Kiganda, Uganda. Recorded from live webinar February 18, 2021. Abstracts, bios, & chapter markings below. 

Part of the Mellon Sawyer Seminar speaker series "Humanitarianisms: Migrations & Care through the Global South." Made possible by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation & supported by the Simpson Center for the Humanities.  

*Learn more about the series:* 
✔ https://www.humanitarianisms.org/​ 

*Clickable Chapter Markers*

00:00 Introduction to series
03:15 Introduction to speakers & discussant
04:40 Basit Kareem Iqbal: “Ambivalence and Askesis in Zaatari Refugee Camp”
5:30 Humanitarianism as historical field of power and knowledge
7:01 Zaatari camp as ethical project of Islamic pedagogy
10:31 Going beyond bread: Giving religious knowledge as form of aid provisioning
11:18 The Syrian crisis as divine tribulation, raising questions of capacity and interference
14:27 Derrida and the passage from ethics to politics 
15:40 Abu Bakr: a story of askesis
18:37 Concluding remarks: An alternative  humanitarianism braiding the present and the afterlife together 
20:27 China Scherz: “Seeking the Wounds of the Gift: Recipient Agency in Catholic Charity and Kiganda Patronage” 
21:19 Reframing independence and self-reliance through patron-client relationships as  primary ethical compass 
21:54 Hope Child: A sustainable, community-based development project as alternative to traditional charity 
26:17 Mercy House: A case of congruence rather than conflict 
26:50 Franciscan Sisters: an ethical assemblage of  charity, “omutima omuyambi” and patronage
30:45 Challenging dependency theory and gift-giving as forms of symbolic violence 
32:47 Concluding remarks: Tearing down the wall and building a community
34:57 Discussion w. Danny Hoffman
55:17 Q&A moderated by Cristian Capotescu

Produced & edited by Simpson Center for the Humanities Program & Events Manager Caitlin Palo; assistance from Simpson Center Communications Manager C.R. Grimmer.

Full Webinar Credits: 
Co-Convened by Professors Arzoo Osanloo (Law, Societies, & Justice; Director, Middle East Center, UW) & Cabeiri Robinson (International Studies, Comparative Religions, & South Asian Studies, UW) & 
Discussant: Danny Hoffman (Bartley-Dobb Professor for the Study and Prevention of Violence in the Jackson School of International Studies and Chair of the UW African Studies Program)
Moderator: Gözde Burcu Ege (Mellon Sawyer Doctoral Fellow)
Chapter Markings: Mediha P. Sorma (Mellon Sawyer Doctoral Fellow)
Poster & Background Graphic Design: Ana Karina Luna 
Intro/Outro Music:  Lobo Loco, “Night at Sahara Dune” on Diversity of Life. CC BY-NC-ND 4.0. 
Video Production & Editing by Caitlin Palo 
Video Consultant: C.R. Grimmer


*Description of Basit Iqbal's and China Scherz's prepared remarks*

Basit Iqbal, “Ambivalence and Askesis in Zaatari Refugee Camp”

As he recounted the conditions of his life, an Islamic pedagogue in Zaatari refugee camp distinguished between the registers of divine tribulation and affliction, between the duties and capacities of the subject. This paper draws on the anthropology of humanitarianism and literature on political theology in order to understand his ethical project.

China Scherz, “Seeking the Wounds of the Gift: Recipient Agency in Catholic Charity and Kiganda Patronage”

It is often claimed that gifts of charity contain hidden dangers for those who receive them. This lecture challenges such a reading by exploring instances of beneficiary agency in the context of charitable exchange. These instances of asking, giving, and receiving complicate arguments about charity and humanitarianism which see charitable gifts as inevitably harmful. 

*Speaker bios*
Basit Kareem Iqbal is Assistant Professor of Anthropology at McMaster University. He studies displacement, refuge, and theodicy in the wake of the Syrian uprising.

China Scherz is Associate Professor of Anthropology at the University of Virginia. She is the author of Having People, Having Heart: Charity, Sustainable Development, and Problems of Dependence in Uganda (University of Chicago Press, 2014).  She specializes in medical anthropology, the anthropology of ethics, and the anthropology of religion.

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