This article contextualizes an emerging issue in critical ethnography, specifically, the problem of establishing rapport and negotiating boundaries for a partial insider in a non-Western setting. A description of the author’s experiences while conducting fieldwork among upper-middle-class Muslim families in Cairo, Egypt, highlights the fact that an ethnographer’s notions of self intersect with those of the people studied in multiple ways. In particular, the formulation of knowledge and its interpretation are affected. Further, it is illustrated that the constantly shifting, ambiguous boundaries between people become an important part of the research process.

This study examines the central role of marriage among upper-middle-class Muslim Egyptians in Cairo, Egypt. It is based on ethnographic fieldwork carried out over a total of 20 months by the author between 1988 and 1996. Using religious and legal sources as well as semistructured interviews and participant observation among two generations of 20 households, this study indicates that marriage continues to occupy a significant place in the life course of both upper-middle-class Muslim men and women. This article indicates that societal norms, as well as family structure and expectations, influence the prevalence of marriage as a necessary rite of passage for achieving adulthood among this class of Egyptians. Furthermore, this article describes the actual customs, beliefs, and practices associated with Muslim Egyptian marriages to counteract the Western bias that often obscures studies of this area of the world.

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The following article represents my testimony in a federal court case held in October 1994 in Philadelphia, PA. At the point when I was asked to participate in the case, the defendant had already been found guilty but was asking for leniency in sentencing under a clause in the law that allows for the consideration of cultural factors. I, in my capacity as a cultural anthropologist with an expertise in the Middle East, was called on as an expert witness to testify on the possible consequences of a father's incarceration on the lives of his daughters. This paper illustrates how anthropologists can contribute to legal proceedings that incorporate a cultural defense.

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