<scp>CARING FOR CATS IN CAIRO</scp>: Urban Grammars of Compassion

Abstract At first sight, Cairo is a cruel and harsh city, marked by extreme inequality and offering few resources for the poor. Like other metropolises, Cairo can easily numb its residents to the suffering of others. But it is also a city in which quiet, barely noticeable acts of compassion occur every day. In this essay, I focus on forms of care and compassion that are oriented towards cats. I weave together the stories of Amina, an upper‐middle‐class woman who set up an animal shelter at the city's outskirts, and Karim, a dervish who feeds the cats at the Sayyida Zaynab mosque every day. Through the juxtaposition, I paint a broad picture of compassion, ranging from a liberal commitment to animal rights to a form of care commanded by God. I suggest that compassion can have different origins, logics and grammars—including ones that exceed the human subject.