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Tbourida Women as a Social Nonmovement in Morocco
Abstract by Dr. Gwyneth Talley On Session 139  (Muslim Youth and Sports)

On Friday, November 15 at 5:00 pm

2019 Annual Meeting

Abstract
Female participation in sports, including equestrian sports, is on the rise in the Middle Eastern and North African nations. Using interviews, participant-observation, photography and film, I address how Moroccan women are increasingly becoming involved in the male-dominated equestrian sport of tbourida. With the ethnographic example of Amal and her fellow tbourida riders, I discuss how tbourida is a telling case of a male–dominated sport. I demonstrate how women became involved, why they chose to ride with women or men, exerted themselves for their position on the field, endured sexism, how the women have worked (or have not worked) together to create more teams and more invitations to festivals. In this presentation, I consider tbourida festivals spectacles within everyday life. It is a sport, a spectacle, a martial art, but for participants young and old, and for spectators of all ages from urban and rural areas. First, I will discuss Asef Bayat’s social nonmovements and how the women’s presence (physical and online) on the tbourida field works within this framework. It examines other aspects of their lives, as they reveal agency in a social nonmovement for gender equality within this equestrian sport in Morocco. I will look at women’s visibility via using social media as a tool for change leading to growing acceptance among their male counterparts and the Moroccan public recognizing and normalizing the women’s presence in tbourida. I argue that the tbourida women’s nonmovement such as visibility as a generation on the streets, in male-dominated jobs, on social media, and in the news, has allowed for more support of the female riders. Instead of being political actors in social movements that are organized (such as the aforementioned arrested protestors and activists), these tbourida women’s “act of presence” and embodiment of their principles in everyday life to be viewed as equals have instigated widespread acceptance at the local festival level, briefly at the national level, and acknowledgement through their online presence (Bayat 2013). I will also discuss the downside of social media in this social nonmovement. Finally, I will give examples of how the women in tbourida fit into Harkness and Hongsermeier’s (2015) strategies of resistance and build on an existing strategy.
Discipline
Anthropology
Geographic Area
Morocco
Sub Area
Gender/Women's Studies