ABSTRACT
The following essay is not primarily focused on the Alevi, but on some questions related to the intersection of urban and religious studies.1 Since urbanity is a vital issue when discussing the Alevi, whether they are understood as a social or religous group, some more general trends in Turkish society could be brought up. Moreover, this essay is an attempt to avoid the tendency to view religious communities as purely and solely religious. Faith is not the only way to explain the activities of pious people. Religion is sometimes so sharply focused that other dimensions of human life tend to fade away. My own interest in the relation between religious life and urbanity emanates from a fieldwork I have recently conducted in Istanbul among some young women in a small, independent Muslim group. Their ability to stretch given social and religous boundaries has made me realize how very direct the impact of the mega-city is on individual lives. Through negotiations within the given system, freedoms and possibilities hitherto unthinkable have been obtained. During the last decade, Islamistic women, as well as the Alevi, have gained access to social and political platforms, and thereby a new visibility in society. The young and active in Turkey have developed their own rules in the 1990s.
