Ismaili Women’s Lifeworlds, 1890–1970

Abstract The second chapter traces the childhoods of my interlocutors and their memories of their foremothers to reconstruct their forced migration within India and from India to East Africa and East Pakistan. This older story of Ismaili migrations is often told from the perspective of empire, celebrating Ismaili men who thrived in the colonial political economy. I instead home in on the details of women’s everyday lives to show how they reinforced communal affinities while cultivating ethical sensibilities: how Puribai Velji’s Ismaili neighbors helped her start a small shop in Zanzibar in the early 1900s to make ends meet after the death of her husband; how reproductive and productive care work encircled prayer times for Sherbanu Lalani in Bukoto (Uganda) during the 1930s; and how Ismaili women grappled with the farmans of their Imam. Interlocutors recall the trauma of fleeing their homes but also the generosity of strangers and coreligionists who helped them escape.