Pnina werbner biography of rory

British social anthropologist (–)

Pnina Werbner (néeGluckman/Gillon; 3 December – 17 January ) was a British social anthropologist.

Her work focused on Sufi mysticism, diasporas, Muslim women and public sector unions in Botswana.^[1] She wrote extensively about the Arab Spring.^[2] Werbner was married to anthropologist Richard Werbner,^[3] and was the niece of Max Gluckman.

On cultural hybridity, Werbner argued, with particular reference to the Satanic Verses affair and other global cultural conflicts, for the need to recognise the key distinction first coined by Bakhtin between intentional and organic hybridity, in order to understand the Muslim diasporic offence while avoiding futile debates about cultural reification.

In relation to the 'failure' of multiculturalism debate, she advocated analysing multiculturalism from below, and not merely as a top-down policy.

From , Werbner studied the women's movement and the Manual Workers