archive.blogs.harvard.edu/lawrencebarchok

Aminata Sow Fall’s “The Beggar’s Strike” highlights conflicts within the intersection of Islamic institutions and beliefs and the different spheres of life –politics, marriage & family etc, of the Senegalese people. On this final piece, I look at Islam in Senegal, and how piety is viewed from a religious and cultural context. The piece is a picture of a beggar, with a placard written “DONATONS 4 PRAYERS”. In the Senegalese society, the rich people give charity as a form of sacrifice to the beggars in exchange for prayers and wishes for long life, prosperity and pilgrimages from the beggars. At a beggars’ protest; “And no more prayers for their welfare till we’ve received a good fat donation!”1. This form of sacrifice is considered “pious”. What is even more interesting, is that the existence of the poor and the rich, with their respective “roles” is justified from a religious and cultural perspective.