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Culture & Psychology

18(4) 542–558

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DOI: 10.1177/1354067X12456712

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Article

Finding a jewel: Identity and gendered space in Islamic finance

Karen Hunt Ahmed DePaul University, USA

Abstract

In this article, I explore how globalization discourses practices work together to form

the identities of female Islamic bankers working in the first stand-alone women’s Islamic

bank in Dubai, United Arab Emirates. An Islamic bank interacts with the individual by

providing a discursive and physical space in which the subject can shape and respond to

her desire to identify and engage with the debates in the global Muslim community

about morality, practice and the role of Islam in everyday life. Global financial systems

and local gender practices are embodied in these buildings in a kind of financial purdah:

building spaces become both a marketing tool and a support for globally-based eco-

nomic activity under the auspices of morality and tradition. Based upon fieldwork and

interviews with Islamic bankers, I show how normative global financial practices and

local moral gender practices work together for the advancement of both.

Keywords

Dubai, gender, globalization, identity, Islam, Islamic bank

Johara means ‘‘jewel’’ in Arabic. Johara is also the name of a bank for women: the stand-alone ladies’ branch of an Islamic bank in Dubai, United Arab Emirates (UAE). I was introduced to Johara about a month after I arrived in Dubai to begin fieldwork. A Turkish friend invited me to a promotion party for the bank that was held in the elaborate ballroom of a large and exclusive resort hotel situated on a prime piece of beach property just outside Dubai. About 300 invited guests – all ladies and mostly UAE nationals – attended this reception, where fabulous jewels were displayed in conjunction with banking information. Rather, I should say that fabulous jewels were displayed and banking was discussed for a few minutes during dinner. The real focal point of the evening was a ‘‘diamond hunt.’’ Models hired by

Corresponding author:

Karen Hunt Ahmed, 1916D Wilmette Avenue, Wilmette, IL 60091, USA.

Email: [email protected]

a local jeweler for the occasion presented to each table of ten ladies a large box filled with 30 small, blue velvet-lined boxes. Twenty-nine of the small boxes held small cubic zirconia stones: the thirtieth box held an equally-sized diamond. To the untrained eye, these stones are indistinguishable. As each lady at each table chose three stones from the box, jewelers’ assistants (women) examined the stones with a jeweler’s loupe to determine its gemological properties. One lady at each table had chosen a diamond from the box, which she got to keep along with the two zircon stones. The ‘‘losers’’ got to keep three zircon stones.

This article, like the diamond hunt, is set in the world of Islamic banking and finance. As I shall discuss, the Islamic finance industry was made possible in a globalizing world by combining Islamic moral values with normative capitalist business practices. Globally, the industry is estimated to have almost US$1 trillion dollars in assets under management, so exploring the psychological characteristics of industry participants is an increasingly important subject. In this article, I inves- tigate individual experiences of women who combine culturally-based morality with global business practices by considering the following question: How do female Islamic finance practitioners negotiate gender identity formation within the context of modern globalizing processes? I will discuss how personal identifi- cations are formed and negotiated and how Islamic banking discourse and prac- tices support the construction of personal identity in the context of gendered banking spaces. My association with Johara allowed me to explore these questions in the unique setting of an exclusively women’s Islamic bank.

Islamic finance and identity

According to Monger and Rawashdeh (2008), there are more than 300 Islamic financial institutions (IFIs) serving 1.2 billion Muslims, or one fifth of the global population. The growing industry of Islamic Banking and Finance (IBF) is the manifestation of attempts to apply Islamic law (Shari’a) and Islamic economic theory to financial dealings. Shari’a law governs financial and other business trans- actions (Walsh, 2008). Islamic law does not allow for individuals or institutions who lend or borrow money to charge or pay interest on that money, or to partici- pate in gambling or unnecessary risk-taking without the corresponding sharing of responsibility for potential losses, among other prohibitions including those against illegal consumer goods: pork, alcohol, weapons or illicit drugs. The size and the importance of IBFs (Smolarski, Schapek, & Tahir, 2006) as well as the size and importance of Islamic capital market products and services (Sadeghi, 2008) are growing. Islamic financial institutions include Islamic banks and Islamic ‘‘win- dows’’ as well as companies providing other financial services such as venture capital, private equity, mutual funds, real estate financing and Shari’a compliant insurance (Takaful) companies.

Islamic banks as institutions came into existence in the world market in the early 1970s. In the mid-20th century, a few individual Islamic banks were started in Egypt and Turkey, but they either failed on financial terms or were folded into

Ahmed 543

the national banking system and converted to conventional banks (Ayub, 2008; Kettell, 2008; Kuran, 2001, 2004; Warde, 2010). Contemporary Islamic banks were formed in the 1970s when considerable oil wealth became available in the Arabian Gulf States (Ali 2002). Muslim populations in other parts of the world – notably Indonesia, Pakistan and Malaysia – have since generated sufficient steady income growth to develop a network of Islamic financial institutions that strive to integrate themselves into the global financial system. Growing Muslim populations in the United States and Great Britain have very recently begun to contribute to the Islamic financial network both institutionally and intellectually.

Personal experiences: Interviews

Ultimately, I did not win a diamond in the diamond hunt. I was not disappointed, however, because that night I met the branch manager of Johara and subsequently interviewed 33% of the female Islamic bankers in the UAE at the time.

1 In a

business environment that is overwhelmingly dominated by men (Riphenburg, 1998; Smith, 2004), the real jewel was the depth that obtaining access to these women added to my research project. At a time when business leaders across the region are actively encouraging women’s participation in the workforce (Rehman, 2008), the women of Johara are poised to further this goal. As I learned from spending time in a stand-alone women’s Islamic bank, upholding appropriate gender relations is part and parcel of the moral orientation and Muslim identity as it is conceived of in Dubai. The ability of a work environment to uphold these values while empowering women in the workplace is not only performing a good deed: it is evidence of women’s increasing economic power in the UAE.

I interviewed three women. The first, Rania, 2 was the branch manager and is

now manager of all of the women’s branches that have opened in the UAE since the time of my fieldwork. She had been the manager since the branch opened; prior to that, she had worked at a multinational conventional bank for 12 years. The second, Miss Lutfi, is the Information Technology Manager of the branch. She had been with the bank for about a year and had no prior banking experience. Finally, I spoke with Sadia, the Office Manager of the branch. She had worked at multi- national conventional banks before moving to Johara. All three women were born and raised in Dubai.

Dubai

The present study takes place in Dubai because the Islamic banking industry grew out of the unique religious, ethnic and cultural mix of the city itself.

3 I have lived in

Dubai twice: first, for 5 years from 1991–1996 and later to do field research in 2002–2003. I also make annual trips to the region, often to teach in DePaul University’s Master’s programs in Bahrain. With its distinctive ethnic composition (approximately 65–75% of the population are expatriates; Rehman 2010), liberal business legislation and orientation, and relatively free media, Dubai is the epitome

544 Culture & Psychology 18(4)

of a global city. It is a new city, compared with the cities we generally think of as established global centers: New York, London, Frankfurt, Tokyo, and Hong Kong. For centuries, Dubai has been the center of trade activity in the Arabian Gulf, the meeting place for ocean going traders and their goods traveling between Europe, Africa, the Indian subcontinent and the Far East (Al-Fahim, 1995; Owen & Pamuk, 1998; Thesiger, 1991). Until the 1960s, after the discovery of oil in the region, Dubai consisted of no more than a few buildings on the Dubai Creek and a port on the Arabian Gulf. It grew steadily for the next three decades, but since the 1990s its growth has exploded exponentially in terms of population, business activ- ity and tourism. Residents and visitors alike regularly describe Dubai as ‘‘the Hong Kong of the Middle East,’’ linking it discursively with the network of global cities and international flows of people, capital and ideas. It seems only natural that the industry of Islamic finance – with its synthesis of global capitalism and Islamic business practices – began in Dubai.

For the purposes of this article, I concentrate on the 25% (or so) Emirati popu- lation of the city. This population is a numeric minority but maintains a strong cultural influence on area institutions. The UAE was never a British colony, despite a strong British presence and partial administration of the region. Because there was always a parallel legal and administrative system – for example, Shari’a courts and English law courts still exist side by side – the local population maintained a high degree of autonomy and control over its own institutions and identity. Dubai Islamic Bank is a local institution and, even though it is necessarily linked to the international financial system, its internal culture remains strongly Emirati.

Business practices under Islamic law

The existence of Islamic finance institutions solves a difficult problem for the Muslim desiring to participate in international finance while adhering to Islamic law, or Shari’a.

4 The Islamic finance industry intends to improve upon global

financial institutions and practices by maintaining their positive features and cleansing them of negative features (Al Saud, 2000; Ayub, 2008; Maurer 2002a, 2002b; Tripp, 2006).

5 Islamic banks strive, in the words of a prominent Islamic

bank’s vision statement, to uphold ‘‘deep-rooted traditions in the new world’’ (Dubai Islamic Bank brochure). Islamic finance professionals I interviewed claim that an Islamic bank is a conventional bank without its immorality. The framework used to determine morality is based on Islamic text and tradition, yet the institu- tional framework is, on the surface at least and to the untrained eye, indistinguish- able from the capitalist financial structure.

For Muslims, piety lies not only in inner feelings, but even more strongly in outward practices (cf. Mahmood, 2001, 2005; Kuran, 2004; Mawdudi, 1980). Therefore the opportunity to act in accordance with his or her religious beliefs in a financial setting is an opportunity to uphold pious practices as well as to assert a Muslim identity in the presence of competing ideologies. As we shall see in the following section, how a person thinks about his or her participation in any activity

Ahmed 545

is vital to the construction and maintenance of self-identity. I find that an Islamic financial institution and its practices provide an exemplary location at which to explore the moral underpinnings of an Islamic banker’s personal and collective identity formation.

Morality, institutions and self-identity

When we situate Islamic banking within discussions of globalization, it becomes possible to consider how the identities of individuals involved in an institution shape and are shaped by the culture of that institution. Arjun Appadurai theorizes that in a globalizing world, ‘‘things’’ – objects, persons, images, discourses, and cap- ital – are in constant motion. As a result, relations between these things take on varied and changing forms in relation to each other, but also in relation to ‘‘institutional structures in different regions, nations, or societies’’ (Appadurai, 2000, p. 5).

Globalization has been linked to the formation of Islamic finance (cf. Askari, Iqbal, & Mirakhor, 2010; Warde, 2010). The concept of space has long been explored as a locus of identity formation, especially in globalization studies (cf. Anderson, 1991; Gupta and Ferguson, 1997 to name only a few). Current research directly links culture, identity and space (cf. Low, 2006; Sparkes, Brown, & Partington, 2010). It has been shown that children construct ethnic boundaries in a school’s space (de Haan and Leander, 2011) and how space and gender are mutually constituted along the lines of existing societal structures (Low, 2006). This linkage of space and identity within the institution of Islamic finance affirms the idea presented in this article that the industry acts as a culture broker (Mazzarella, 2004), making a place to shape ideas about culture, gender, and identity even as its participants shape the institution.

Under conditions of modernity, construction of self-identity becomes an ongoing and dialogic process, which sociologist Anthony Giddens calls the ‘‘reflex- ive project of the self’’ (1991, p. 5). This reflexive project involves continuously revising personal biographical narratives, as new lifestyle choices become known. Exposure to alternative lifestyles often poses moral or existential dilemmas for the modern self. It becomes necessary to negotiate relations among people vis-à-vis the differences (Shweder, Minow, & Markus, 2002). In the past, close-knit commu- nities may have provided guidance in solving these dilemmas, for example, through initiation rituals or familial involvement in marriage choices; however, the erosion of the modern community has left the individual alone to contemplate moral issues without the support of community traditions.

There are many ways people have found to mediate and negotiate those differ- ences: one response to the existential uncertainty is for an individual to draw closer to a collective perceived as able to reaffirm this self-identity (Kinnvall, 2004). Historically, this cultural collective has been linked to geography. Because globa- lizing migrations have made it necessary to delink identity processes from terri- tories, we recognize that politics is often focused on specific locations, identities,

546 Culture & Psychology 18(4)

and issues (Lyons & Mandaville, 2010). For example, Hermans (2001) challenges us to conceive of self and culture in terms of multiple dialogical process. Bell and Das describe how the dialogic self evolves under conditions in which a young woman has multiple ethnic and cultural identifications (Bell & Das, 2011). These authors point to the importance of what they call ‘‘macro organizers’’ in the dia- logic identity formation. One such macro organizer – the institution – may become important in this context as a central organizing mechanism for lifestyle choices that support identity formation. This mutual constitution of the self is of particular interest in the case of Islamic finance and gender. As I will discuss in this article, I believe that identity is formed for many individual Islamic financiers in the gen- dered space of a stand-alone women’s branch of an Islamic bank.

Because women are active in the workforce and in consumer life in Dubai, it is reasonable to presume that work forms a major part of a woman’s identity. Indeed, research has shown that work is a ‘‘pervasive life domain and a salient source of meaning and self-definition for most individuals’’ (Dutton et al., 2010, p. 265). Ben-Ner and colleagues (2006) find that work provides a powerful source of an individual’s identity formation, including religion and gender affinities in the workplace. Cultural psychology finds that humans have a strong need for positive self-evaluation (Heine, Lehman, Markus, & Kitayama, 1999). Dutton and her colleagues examine identity at work and posit a four-part typology of positive identity formation in the workplace (virtue, evaluative, developmental, and structural; Dutton, Roberts, & Rednar, 2010). The structure of Islamic finan- cial institutions supports employee identification with its virtuous nature. In other words, because work has such a strong influence on personal identity, it makes sense that IBF draws together many facets of an individual’s identity (religious, gender, virtue, cosmopolitan, etc.) and reinforces that identity in an institutional setting.

Islamic financiers represent their own personal identities as Muslims who have spent considerable time as part of the international capitalist financial establish- ment. The identities of Islamic finance professionals are inseparable from their participation in the institutional network of the Islamic finance industry. Business practices within the industry reflect its practitioners’ cosmopolitan per- spectives (cf. Hannerz, 1990; 1996), even as their embodied experiences remain chiefly local.

I interviewed Sadia, the office manager, who welcomes her job as an opportunity to practice her faith in everyday activities in the workplace. She affirms:

You feel more comfortable, it’s my point of view, in an Islamic place since we are

Muslims. In an Islamic place . . . whatever thing which is going in this bank it is per

Shari’a. And you feel like whatever money you are earning, it is like halal. [A102:2]

Sadia was born and raised in Dubai, but her mother is Indian and her father Emirati. Several times during informal conversations with me after the interview, she referred to her mixed culture and family life as being influential to her desire

Ahmed 547

and ability to combine financial practices with Islamic beliefs. Her personal identity is clearly linked with her professional choices.

Recent scholarship in Islamic finance has acknowledged the connection between the institution of Islamic finance and Islamist identity politics (cf. Henry and Wilson 2004; Kuran 2004; Mandaville 2004; Smith 2004). Smith (2004) maintains that a strong Islamic financial institution can indeed have an effect on identity in public life by addressing non-financial concerns. In this way, the institution medi- ates between global financial practices and local Muslim self-identifications. Mediation is any process ‘‘by which a given social dispensation produces and reproduces itself in and through a particular set of media’’ (Mazzarella, 2004, p. 346). IBF provides a physical and psychological space in which Muslims can construct their identities simultaneously as individual citizens of diverse societies and also as members of the global Muslim community, or umma, without sacrifi- cing one for the other.

Smith provides the example of Kuwait Finance House (KFH; an Islamic bank), to illustrate an institution that uses marketing practices to mediate between cultural experiences. KFH takes public steps to foster a religious environment by organizing communal prayer in the office, showing a hiring preference for men who have demonstrated their devotion to Islam and by conducting non-banking business in a recognizably Islamic manner

6 (Smith, 2004). Yet KFH is an international bank

that relies on international markets for its business. As institutional practices play a role in the construction of self-identity, it makes sense that the physical space in which these practices are carried out contributes to this process. In the next section, I will show how space is used to mediate between global processes and local practices.

Gendered space in Islam

The typical image of an Arab woman is of a veiled female cut off from society, without access to economic resources. A contrary, and more realistic and palatable image for most Muslims in the 21st century, is that of the Prophet Mohammed’s wife, Khadija, who was a businesswoman and his boss. Khadija’s place in society as a businesswoman is a practice, Ahmed (1992) argues, that was typical for the time (7th century). Though a woman’s place in society has undergone many changes over the past 14 centuries (Mernissi, 1993), there is a growing trend in Islamic religious discourse that supports a woman’s right and imperative to work (Sidani, 2005). Sidani finds that many authors position female employment as ‘‘not anti-Islamic’’ and support this stance by citing religious traditions of Muslim busi- nesswomen, like Khadija above. Though studies like Abdalla (1996) found that women in the Arabian Gulf seem to be locked into traditional, restrictive roles with regard to economic functioning, the more recent Arab Human Development Report (2002) notes that while inferior women’s education is still one of the major problems in the Arab world, strides have been made in the number of women working outside the home. The Report found that almost 19% of women in the UAE work outside the home, and (Rehman, 2008) finds that

548 Culture & Psychology 18(4)

‘‘[f]ar-sighted multinationals’’ in Dubai actively recruit GCC national women. Women’s purchasing and political power is also increasing rapidly in Dubai and almost 60% of university students in the UAE are women (Rehman, 2008).

As it strives to conduct business in an Islamic manner, IBF contributes to the idea of identity politics as embodied in institutions through the segregation of men and women in a business setting. In a study of immigrant women in Germany, Constant et al. (2006) found that immigrant women (but not men) who identify most strongly with their culture exhibit the most positive economic behavior. Though the women I interviewed in Dubai were not immigrants, the idea that it is important for a working woman to feel comfortable in her cultural environment supports the notion that the identity – in Johara’s case, cultural and religious – of the workplace reinforces the individual’s experience of her own identity develop- ment. Therefore, if IBF can provide a place in which a woman’s cultural and religious identity may be validated, it stands to reason that working will be a positive experience for women.

Many banks in the Gulf (conventional and Islamic) have ladies’ windows like KFH, yet they are an unobtrusive part of the banking experience. Smith finds that KFH has a great effect on identity by making gender separation relatively visible in public life, asserting that while ‘‘. . . integrating women into the work force and economy, KFH simultaneously promotes gender segregation within society’’ (Smith, 2004, p.181). Johara takes the KFH model of business practice one step further by providing a separate building for women’s banking.

Textual justification

The Arabic term for ‘‘mixing’’ is al-ikhtilat and it has been used to refer to the mixing of sexes and the mixing (in financial circles) of riba and non-riba monies,

7

which is another prohibition in Islam. There is disputed textual support for gender segregation in Islam. Journalist and author Asra Nomani

8 contends that there is no

support for the practice of public gender segregation in the Qur’an at all, not even for segregation during prayers.

9 In all of my annotated Qur’an reference books,

I could find no passages specifically prohibiting the mixing of men and women in public except by virtue of the veil. Indirect support for segregation is derived from the well known ‘‘hijab verse’’ in the Qur’an (33:53). This verse is widely interpreted to refer only to the Prophet Mohammed’s wives although when it is taken together with a later verse from the same Sura (chapter), it appears to extend an idea of segregation to all women when they leave the house by advocating the donning of the veil, or hijab (Stowasser, 1994):

And when ye ask (his ladies) for anything ye want, ask them from before a screen: that

makes for greater purity for your hearts and for theirs . . .. (Sura, 33:53)

O Prophet! Tell thy wives and daughters, and the believing women, that they

should cast their outer garments over their persons (when out of doors): that

Ahmed 549

is most convenient, that they should be known (as such) and not molested . . ..

(Sura, 33:59)

These passages appear to advocate physical separation of men and women inside the home and veiling of women as the public expression of segregation outside the home. Stowasser (1994) points out that the implication of the latter verse is that women will move around freely in society and therefore not remain segregated from males except by the veil. The veil provides symbolic segregation so that public physical segregation is not necessary. Nevertheless, the passage is sufficiently ambiguous so that some interpretations of it support separation of women and men as a moral directive in public as well as in private. However, modern capit- alist influences have produced the desire for women to work outside the home (Haddad, 1998), both for personal fulfillment and to contribute to household income (Stowasser, 1994) so the question of gender mixing is a salient one in Dubai society.

Gender and banking in Dubai

Though gender segregation is not a legally required practice in Dubai, many Muslims would prefer that men and women do not mix in public. Public spaces are often arranged so that women and men can do business separately if they wish. Corporate private sector employment in the Arabian Gulf is typically limited to women from elite and middle-class families (Riphenburg, 1998) who can afford the domestic support

10 for household duties and for whom the workplace meets certain

social criteria including gender relations. Women and men are most often separated socially and domestically in Dubai as

well. This kind of separation happens at all socio-economic levels when genders might come into inappropriate contact with each other. Socially, parties are often explicitly for men or women (like the Johara party introduced at the beginning of this article). Weddings are women’s events: only the groom and close male relatives arrive at the end of the night. Traditional Gulf-style homes are built with distinct entrances to sitting rooms for men and women. Often household help will include maids for tending to female guests and houseboys for tending to male guests. In a domestic living environment, women (maids, nannies) normally care for children and the interior of the house and men (drivers, cooks,

11 and gardeners) care for the

exterior of the home and property. Johara’s parent company is headquartered in a very commercial looking, high-

rise white concrete building located in the central business district of Dubai. The ladies’ branch, in contrast, is located in an exclusive area of the city, near the beach. This location in a residential and shopping area makes it easy to get to for women whose daily routine is concentrated in the vicinity. The two-storied building is impressive: its concrete walls are painted yellow and the high windows are tinted a trendy color of green. The architecture, in fact, is more analogous to a large home than to a place of business. The well-appointed glass door at the top of several

550 Culture & Psychology 18(4)

stairs is also accessible by ramp for disabled patrons. The door itself is hidden from public view by a concrete wall.

There are multiple levels at which women interact with Johara. First of all, the bank building itself is theoretically open to any woman. In practice, there are certain constraints on who enters the building: a customer must have enough money to be able to do business with the bank or she will immediately feel out of place.

12 The building’s décor and air of exclusivity are designed to let people

know who is really welcome there. The social class of bank customers and women who work in the bank is often the same, but ‘‘working’’ in any environ- ment involves a more personal investment in the institution than merely being able to walk into the building, or even to put money into the institution.

13

Therefore, practices associated with daily work and the physical and emotional energy required to enact these practices makes the workplace a powerful site for the study of identity formation. For the purposes of this article, I am interested in the perspective of those women who ‘‘work in’’ the bank, although I begin with my impression of the bank as I first experienced it when I walked in as a ‘‘customer’’.

In addition to its offering of traditional banking services, the atmosphere inside the Johara building welcomes the customer and tries to make her bank visit as comfortable as possible. As a customer, I can say that banking at Johara is the pleasant experience it is designed to be. When I went to the bank for services, e.g. to open an account, I was always seen immediately: the bank had enough personnel to accommodate routine business without delay. When I arrived for scheduled inter- views, I waited on the sofas and was always offered tea or coffee. I also sat in the waiting area to observe the daily routine. Though the bank was never frantically busy with customers at any one time, it was rarely empty. Each time I was there, a steady stream of women would enter or leave the building. Ladies rarely arrived alone, and if someone was not banking she sat in the sofa area with me. The interior of the building was always quiet and peaceful, even during relatively busy times. During slower times, the tellers and customer service employees seated at the desks talked quietly amongst themselves as they worked on computers and walked papers to and from offices.

Women, including the security guard and tea servers (traditionally male profes- sions), fully staff Johara. Local UAE women traditionally wear a black abaya over their clothes and a black sheala loosely secured over their hair, and I identified all employees by their dress styles to be UAE locals. The Pakistani security guard wore navy blue pants and a loose white shirt with a blue necktie. Her hair was covered with a navy blue scarf. I know she is Pakistani because I asked her. The tea server wore a long skirt and loose, long shirt, usually in light colors such as grey and white, with a long white scarf: I did not speak to her so I do not know her nation- ality. I was told that customers were of many different backgrounds, including Christian, but I saw only Muslim customers during my observations. The majority of customers were UAE locals, but others dressed in a style that indicated that they were from Syria, Lebanon or Palestine. Most of these women wore long skirts,

Ahmed 551

shorter jackets, and either white headscarves or headscarves that coordinated with the clothing. A few women wore pants or skirt suits without hijab.

I asked all three of my informants about their experiences working in a stand- alone women’s Islamic bank. Two of the women specifically cited positive changes in their lives as a result of working in a segregated environment. Each woman contended that her ability to work in an environment that supported both her and her family’s ideals of gender relations had enhanced their professional and personal lives. For example, Rania’s varied career history suggests that neither she nor her family objected to her previous employment in a mixed gender envir- onment, and her personal opinion on gender relations supports her actions. In fact, she adamantly insists that gender segregation in Dubai reflects cultural values:

Culturally it is like that, whereas Islam never has prohibited women from interacting,

within decent limits is required, keeping your values and culture in mind, it has never

prevented them from meeting. You learn the roles; it is a part of life. But in here it is

the minimum interaction with male counterparts. That’s the culture . . . (A101:2)

This point of view is consistent with both Stowasser’s and Nomani’s readings of Quranic text and supports the stance that gender separation in Dubai is a local moral issue.

The ladies’ branch provided Rania with a chance to expand her career horizons by allowing her to take on challenges and responsibilities she had not been able to experience in a conventional, mixed-gender working environment. In addition, it allowed her to have more control over her time and to fulfill her role as a wife and mother to the best of her abilities in addition to her professional work. She con- trasts her former working environment with the current one:

[Before] I had to go home sometimes very late or come back from home and not be

there. It was happening in the last two or three years and I was feeling the pressure in

my head. I saw myself drifting, the kids drifting away and they were teenagers where

they needed me the most now, more than ever . . . [A101:1]

[Now] this is how it is different here, I finish, I have a particular time, my 9-to-5 job; 14

I know I go home I have my routine before the kids come home. I know before the

kids come home I’ll cook dinner . . . [A101:1]

For Rania, a separate women’s building enhanced her existing professional and personal life. Conversely, Miss Lutfi cited the issue of gender separation as primary to her decision and ability to work outside the home. Miss Lutfi is unmarried. Married or unmarried, women in Dubai have great freedom of movement in public places. It is not unusual for women in Dubai to go to university (segregated uni- versities are available and Miss Lutfi attended one); nor is it unusual for women to work in an office. Some families, however, such as Miss Lutfi’s, object to unmarried women working in offices alongside men. In fact, Miss Lutfi’s family agreed to her

552 Culture & Psychology 18(4)

working outside the home only because she was able to work in a gender segregated Islamic environment. I believe this situation is an important illustration of the ways in which a defined women’s space can contribute to the ability of women to participate in an economy.

The creation of a separate building for a women’s bank is a step toward solving the moral imperatives for women to take care of familial duties and to avoid al-ikhtilat while simultaneously fulfilling a professional role in society. Building design, location, and internal culture make it clear that it is a place for women who are valued in their society. Women who work in the building feel comfortable and privileged to be a part of an environment that values their presence. All three women expressed that it is more ‘‘comfortable’’ (socially and religiously) to work in a segregated environment because it is how they are accustomed to navigating society socially and domestically. Both men and women are able to uphold Islamic business practices while participating in a global economy that does not hold the same gender values practiced therein. Embodiment, in the form of build- ing space and physical practices and interactions, link local experiences of self to global practices, even as people embrace and alter those practices.

Conclusion: Morality for everyone?

Before we unequivocally accept that Islamic bankers have made a strictly moral decision in favor of traditional gender practices by separating the workspaces of women and men, we must look more closely at whom these practices benefit. It is true that each bank building embodies masculine and feminine images upholding local ideals of gender relations. Those same images can also be used as an adver- tising tool, which Mazzarella suggests is ‘‘uniquely capable of engaging with the embodied preferences of its audience’’ (Mazzarella, 2004, p. 98). In contesting the homogenizing processes of globalization, those images help to renegotiate local identifications and practices even as globalizing processes are renegotiated through the process of finding acceptable local images.

Johara is not for everyone, either as a work environment or as a place to bank. It is a place for women who have money. The building is opulent and its customers are clearly expected to fit in. Only financially privileged women have enough money to make the minimum required initial deposit for a checking account.

15 Only finan-

cially and socially privileged women were invited to attend the ‘‘diamond hunt’’ promotion party I described at the beginning of this chapter. Women – wealthy women – feel comfortable banking at Johara, not only because there are no men around but also because it is a beautiful, luxurious place to do business. While this bank may be a traditional, gendered space it is also a global institution that uses marketing to acquire profitable, cosmopolitan customers. Normative global finan- cial practices and local moral gender practices work together for the advancement of both. Without access to global institutions and processes, some women in Dubai would not be able to participate in the economy, or to participate at the same level, because of morally prescribed familial obligations. Those same obligations open up

Ahmed 553

a space for global institutions to expand their client and employee base to women who would not otherwise think of participating in economic activities in a mixed gender environment.

Physical building structures and spaces can and do serve as culture brokers, allowing cosmopolitan employees and customers to participate in and identify with global finance and local practices simultaneously. Individuals have embraced this institutional function and used it to advance their own careers and to reaffirm their identities as privileged, financially savvy Muslim women. Theories of global- ization and the dialogic process of work space in identity and gender formation have been explored within the context of women-only Islamic finance spaces in Dubai. Global financial systems and local gender practices are embodied in these buildings in a kind of ‘‘financial purdah’’:

16 building spaces become both a mar-

keting tool and a support for globally based economic activity under the auspices of morality and tradition. Identity is formed in a gendered space, but experienced in the context of a global financial industry.

Notes

1. In 2002, when Johara opened, it was the only stand-alone ladies’ branch in the UAE.

The branch employed 11 people: nine professionals, a tea lady and a security guard. I interviewed three of the professionals, or 33% of the bankers, at the ladies’ branch.

2. All individual’s names are pseudonyms; institutional names are used with permission. 3. Dubai Islamic Bank was begun in 1975 and is generally acknowledged as the first

Islamic bank. 4. Shari’a is the Arabic word for the kinds of laws outlined in the Qur’an and hadith, the

primary sources of law in Islam.

5. Islamic finance professionals define their industry in opposition to the capitalist banking industry, which they term ‘‘conventional banking.’’ Indeed, most of a conventional bank’s income ‘‘is in the form of interest on the claims it holds’’ (Moss, 2004). A con-

ventional bank’s primary business is to hold deposits, make loans and transfer funds in the pursuit of profit.

6. Islamic practices include providing a prayer room and encouraging prayer breaks,

striving to maintain ethical business practices, structuring financial transactions to con- form to Islamic law, maintaining gender segregation, and any other activity that falls under the jurisdiction of Islamic law.

7. http://islamic-world.net/economics/word/i.htm

8. Nomani is the Wall Street Journal reporter who organized the highly controversial desegregated prayers in New York in 2005. She is more recently known for opposing the Cordoba center in New York and for protesting gender segregation in a Washington

DC mosque: http://www.usatoday.com/news/opinion/forum/2011-07-10-muslim- women-mosques_n.htm

9. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asra_Nomani

10. ‘‘Domestic support’’ can refer to male cooks, drivers, gardeners, landscapers, etc., as well as to housemaids. Housemaids and factory workers, of course, constitute another class of women that have been explored in other venues (Sassen, 1996; Malti-Douglas, 1996; Ong, 1996). I acknowledge their role in contributing to the ability of upper class

554 Culture & Psychology 18(4)

women to work in the private sector, but it is not the project of this chapter to explore their particular conditions.

11. Arab kitchens are traditionally separate from the main house. Though some contem-

porary houses contain an inside kitchen, it is still considered to be separate from the primary living quarters. A house will often include a small kitchen in the living quarters for the family to make tea or snacks but the main cooking is done away from living

quarters. 12. Domestic workers would probably not be comfortable in the bank, nor would middle

class women who usually work as secretaries or teachers.

13. I wish to thank Jonathan Marion for pointing out the difference in personal investment implied by ‘‘working in’’ the bank versus ‘‘having access to’’ the bank.

14. Typical working hours in an international bank are 8 a.m.–1 p.m. AND 5–8 p.m. or later. Rania is using 9-to-5 as a colloquialism: Johara’s hours are 8 a.m. –2 p.m.

15. Minimum deposit is 3,000 dirhams, approximately US$800, or three to four months’ salary for a housemaid in 2003.

16. Thanks to Rick Shweder for coining this phrase.

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Author Biography

Karen Hunt Ahmed is Visiting Assistant Professor of Finance and Management at DePaul University, USA. Her research interests include culture and identity, finan- cial empowerment, Islamic finance, microfinance, globalization. She is working on an edited volume entitled Contemporary Islamic Finance: Innovations, Applications and Best Practices, to be published by Wiley & Sons.

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Lady Mary Wortley Montagu_The Turkish Embassy Letters_April 1717.pdf