Description
In the late nineteenth century, as a consequence of imperial conquest and a mobility revolution, Russia became a crossroads of the hajj, the annual Muslim pilgrimage to Mecca. The first book in any language on the hajj under tsarist and Soviet rule, Russian Hajj tells the story of how tsarist officials struggled to control and co-opt Russia's mass hajj traffic, seeing it as not only a liability but also an opportunity. To support the hajj as a matter of state surveillance and control was controversial, given the preeminent position of the Orthodox Church. But nor could the hajj be ignored, or banned, due to Russia's policy of toleration of Islam. As a cross-border, migratory phenomenon, the hajj stoked officials' fears of infectious disease, Islamic revolt, and interethnic conflict, but Eileen Kane innovatively argues that it also generated new thinking within the government about the utility of the empire's Muslims and their global networks.
Author: Eileen Kane
Publisher: Cornell University Press
Published: 05/15/2020
Pages: 258
Binding Type: Paperback
Weight: 0.84lbs
Size: 9.00h x 6.00w x 0.58d
ISBN13: 9781501748509
ISBN10: 1501748505
BISAC Categories:
- Religion | Islam | History
- History | Russia | General
- History | Modern | 19th Century
About the Author
Eileen Kane is Associate Professor of History at Connecticut College.