In this first full-scale ethnographic study of Yemeni tribal poetry, Steven Caton reveals an astonishingly rich folkloric system where poetry is both a creation

"Caton's study joins a brilliant ethnography of tribal poetic tradition with a discussion of central issues in anthropological thought."—Dale F. Eickelman, Da

"Caton's study joins a brilliant ethnography of tribal poetic tradition with a discussion of central issues in anthropological thought."--Dale F. Eickelman, Dar

In 1979, Steven C. Caton went to a remote area of Yemen to do fieldwork on the famous oral poetry of its tribes. Soon he was embroiled in a dangerous local conf

An analysis of Islamist cultural politics through the ethnography of a thriving, grassroots women's piety movement in the mosques of Cairo, Egypt. Unlike those