Love Across Difference - by Lara Deeb (Paperback)

About the Book

"Lebanon may be the most complicated place in the world to be a "mixed" couple. It has no civil marriage law, fifteen personal status laws, and a political system built on sectarianism. Still, Lebanon has the most interreligious marriages per capita in the Middle East. What constitutes a mixed marriage is in flux as social norms shift, and reactions to mixed marriage reveal underlying social categories of discrimination. Through stories of Lebanese couples, Love Across Difference challenges readers to rethink categories of difference and imagine possibilities for social change. Drawing on two decades of interviews and research, Lara Deeb shows how mixed couples in Lebanon confront patriarchy, social difference, and sectarianism. In the drama that ensues as women and young men make their own marital choices, they push gender boundaries and reveal the ultimately empty nature of sect as a category of social difference. Love won't end sectarianism, but it can contribute to reducing sect's social power. Through the example of Lebanon, we can learn about our own social worlds, about the assumptions we make around social difference, and about how people react when forced to change their ideas of who can be made kin through marriage"--

Book Synopsis

Lebanon may be the most complicated place in the world to be a "mixed" couple. It has no civil marriage law, fifteen personal status laws, and a political system built on sectarianism. Still, Lebanon has the most interreligious marriages per capita in the Middle East. What constitutes a mixed marriage is in flux as social norms shift, and reactions to mixed marriage reveal underlying social categories of discrimination. Through stories of Lebanese couples, Love Across Difference challenges readers to rethink categories of difference and imagine possibilities for social change.

Drawing on two decades of interviews and research, Lara Deeb shows how mixed couples in Lebanon confront patriarchy, social difference, and sectarianism. In the drama that ensues as women and young men make their own marital choices, they push gender boundaries and reveal the ultimately empty nature of sect as a category of social difference. Love won't end sectarianism, but it can contribute to reducing sect's social power. Through the example of Lebanon, we can learn about our own social worlds, about the assumptions we make around social difference, and about how people react when forced to change their ideas of who can be made kin through marriage.

Review Quotes

"As Deeb observes, 'Marriage is an act of hope, ' and conflict related to marriage proves to be a revealing vantage point from which to understand what people hope for."--Lisa Anderson, Foreign Affairs

"Recommended."--M. L. Russell, CHOICE

"A crucial anthropology of sectarianism as a contemporary social world--inhabited, experienced, and defied by ordinary people. Lara Deeb's book is a powerful corrective to the idea of a static sectarian Lebanon and Middle East." --Ussama Makdisi, University of California, Berkeley

"Lara Deeb masterfully shows how sect 'feels real' and is maintained through macroeconomic and political dynamics and in everyday life. Love Across Difference details the complex and intersectional meaning of sect in social life, offering a nuanced analysis rooted in extensive field research across Lebanon." --Melani Cammett, Harvard University

"Through fluid storytelling, Lara Deeb's Love Across Difference graciously welcomes readers outside its discipline: her argument is eminently accessible to the generalist and utterly engrossing to seasoned readers in Middle Eastern women's studies. Readers will emerge with a more nuanced understanding of the honeycomb complexity of Lebanese society." --Mohja Kahf, author of My Lover Feeds Me Grapefruit

About the Author

Lara Deeb is Professor of Anthropology and MENA Studies at Scripps College, author of An Enchanted Modern (2006), and coauthor of Leisurely Islam (2013) and Anthropology's Politics (Stanford, 2016).