Piety as Ethical Self-Formation: Rethinking Agency in Leila Aboulela’s Minaret

Abstract

Contemporary arguments in feminist literary criticism have increasingly challenged the belief that agency must be expressed in terms of resistance, emancipation, or secular autonomy. In this respect, the novel Minaret by Leila Aboulela proposes a powerful reworking of Muslim female subjectivity based on the practise of religion as a discipline. This article examines the novel in terms of piety as ethical self-formation and argues that it redefines agency in ways that challenge secular, liberal conceptions of self-sovereignty. The paper uses a theory-based close reading to examine Najwa’s transformation through prayer, veiling, silence, and submission as the development of cultivated capacity as described by Saba Mahmood. These embodied practices are not merely symbolic identifiers; they are means of moral self-cultivation. Situated within the context of post-secular feminist debates and diasporic literary studies, the article shows that Najwa’s submission is not oppression but a deliberate alignment, thus breaking down the binary of oppression and emancipation. This paper broadens the conceptual range of feminist literary criticism and positions piety as a multifaceted form of agency in the works of contemporary Muslim women by foregrounding habituation, embodiment, and moral intentionality.