Revival Ritual and the Mobilization of Late-modern Islamic Selves

Abstract This article examines the impetus that ritually patterned emotion can impart to Islamic movements in late modern settings, focusing on a new type of revival activity that has become sensationally popular over the last decade in Southeast Asia: mass prayer rallies featuring long braces of rousing sung prayers (salawat) and litanies (zikir). While much of the literature on social movements has sought to explain mobilization by identifying cognitively framed interests underlying participation, this article recognizes the complex interplays of ideation and affect and moves the analysis of emotion beyond the mere identification of cultural categories through which emotion is expressed. Contrasting the novel renderings of salawat prayers in the new rally settings to traditional usages, and to the motivational impulsion of another highly popular revival ritual practice, Qur’an memorization as analyzed by Gade, the article models an extension of emotion studies that attends to the psychophysiological shaping of affect through bodily ritual performance as it interacts with the particularities of cultural shaping and social context. Further, it identifies the distinctive ways in which the mass prayer rallies cater to the participation proclivities typical of Muslims and others caught up in the individualizing currents of highly fluid late-modern societies.