Divorcing Traditions is an ethnography of Islamic legal expertise and practices in India, a secular state in which Muslims are a significant minority and where Islamic judgments are not legally binding. Katherine Lemons argues that an analysis of divorce in accordance with Islamic strictures is critical to the understanding of Indian secularism.Lemons analyzes four marital dispute adjudication forums run by Muslim jurists or lay Muslims to...

Islamic Divorce in the 21st Century shows the wide range of Muslim experiences in marital disputes and in seeking Islamic divorces. For Muslims, having the ability to divorce in accordance with Islamic law is of paramount importance. However, Muslim experiences of divorce practice differ tremendously. The chapters in this volume discuss Islamic divorce from West Africa to Southeast Asia, and each story explores aspects of the everyday realities of disputing and divorcing Muslim co...

Anthropological field studies of nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) in their unique cultural and political contexts.Cultures of Doing Good: Anthropologists and NGOs serves as a foundational text to advance a growing subfield of social science inquiry: the anthropology of nongovernmental organizations (NGOs). Thorough introductory chapters provide a short history of NGO anthropology, address how the study of NGOs contributes to anthropology more broadly, ...

Islam and the Institution of Marriage: Legal and Sociological Approaches is a study of Muslim marriage in modernity. The question of marriage and intimate relationships is an important site of internal contestation, as the collection demonstrates. It demands both fidelity to the tradition and its historical modes of thought and relevance to contemporary conditions. The collection of essays that make up the study engages these important and difficult questions from the perspectives...

A psychological thriller set in the Luberon, a French region that evokes holidays in magnificent pool-adorned villas. For those who live there year-round, it often means stifling poverty and boredom. Sixteen-year-old Céline and her sister Jo, fifteen, dream of escaping to somewhere far from their daily routine, far from their surly, alcoholic father and uncaring mother, both struggling to make ends meet. That summer Celine falls pregnant, devastating news that reopens deep family wounds. T...

Set in Marseilles, this is the story of Vanda, a beautiful woman in her thirties, arms covered in tattoos, skin so dark that some take her for a North African. Vanda dreamt of being an artist; she became a cleaner in a psychiatric hospital. Devoted to her six-year-old son Noé, she lives with him in a derelict shed by the beach. "You and me against the rest of the world," as she says. But when Noé's father Simon shows up after a seven-year absence, threatening the delicate balance of their ...

Praise for Ernesto Mallo's Needle in a Haystack:"A vivid and compelling picture of a society riven by corruption, social breakdown, and casual brutality. A pacy, intense, and thought-provoking read."— Guardian"Martin Cruz Smith and Philip Kerr fans will be rewarded."— Publishers Weekly"A gritty, painful portrait of a dystopian culture spinning further and further out of control. A compelling, blood-stained document of tyranny and brutality...

When it’s pouring with rain, Gogo decides to pass the time by making some pancakes. But she soon discovers that the family has run out of three important ingredients: flour, eggs and milk. Without those, you can’t make pancakes. But clever Gogo has an idea. She sends Lungi and Sipho to a different neighbour to borrow what they need, and to take each of them a gift of lemons from the family’s lemon tree in return. And so, due to the kindness of the neighbours, Gogo and the eager children ar...

Lost Sci-Fi Books 361 thru 380 delivers another unforgettable collection of twenty classic stories where science fiction, horror, fantasy, mystery, and literary imagination collide. These are the stories that challenged readers, inspired generations of writers, and proved that the Golden Age of speculative fiction had room for every kind of extraordinary idea.Journey from impossible scientific discoveries to terrifying supernatural encounters. Explore paradoxes tha...