Joseph Hill
I am an associate professor of Anthropology at the University of Alberta with a research focus on Islam—especially Sufi (mystical) Islam—in contemporary West Africa and globally. I am also the editor in chief of the scholarly journal Islamic Africa.
Some of the themes my research addresses include the performance of religious authority, forms of knowledge and experience, gender, and religious expressive performance (such as chant and music). I am particularly interested in how new or adapted performances of religious practice and authority succeed or fail in establishing themselves as embodying a timeless tradition. For example, I have looked at how women have come to exercise religious authority in new ways, how Hip Hop/rap music has established itself for many believers as a legitimate form of religious expression, and why other performance genres have found less acceptance.
The Fayḍa Tijāniyya
Since 2001, my field research has primarily examined a global Islamic movement, the Fayḍah Tijāniyya, or the spiritual lineage of Shaykh Ibrahim Niasse (or Ñas) within the Tijani Sufi order. In his home country of Senegal, Shaykh Ibrāhīm is better known to his disciples as “Baay” (“Father” in the Wolof language of Senegal), and his followers often call themselves “Taalibe Baay” (“Disciples of Baay”).
Geographically, my focus has primarily been the Fayḍa Tijāniyya’s place of origin, Senegal. From there, I have branched out to conduct research among members of the movement in Mauritania, other West African countries, the United States, Egypt, and the United Kingdom.
Current Research Projects
Currently, my research and writing most actively focuses on two primary areas:
- Gender and Islamic authority, especially the little-known but growing phenomenon of women Islamic leaders. (See my recent book Wrapping Authority.)
- Religious performance (especially Sufi chant and Hip Hop) and social change
I am currently working on book projects in both areas.
Supervisors: Kamari Maxine Clarke
Some of the themes my research addresses include the performance of religious authority, forms of knowledge and experience, gender, and religious expressive performance (such as chant and music). I am particularly interested in how new or adapted performances of religious practice and authority succeed or fail in establishing themselves as embodying a timeless tradition. For example, I have looked at how women have come to exercise religious authority in new ways, how Hip Hop/rap music has established itself for many believers as a legitimate form of religious expression, and why other performance genres have found less acceptance.
The Fayḍa Tijāniyya
Since 2001, my field research has primarily examined a global Islamic movement, the Fayḍah Tijāniyya, or the spiritual lineage of Shaykh Ibrahim Niasse (or Ñas) within the Tijani Sufi order. In his home country of Senegal, Shaykh Ibrāhīm is better known to his disciples as “Baay” (“Father” in the Wolof language of Senegal), and his followers often call themselves “Taalibe Baay” (“Disciples of Baay”).
Geographically, my focus has primarily been the Fayḍa Tijāniyya’s place of origin, Senegal. From there, I have branched out to conduct research among members of the movement in Mauritania, other West African countries, the United States, Egypt, and the United Kingdom.
Current Research Projects
Currently, my research and writing most actively focuses on two primary areas:
- Gender and Islamic authority, especially the little-known but growing phenomenon of women Islamic leaders. (See my recent book Wrapping Authority.)
- Religious performance (especially Sufi chant and Hip Hop) and social change
I am currently working on book projects in both areas.
Supervisors: Kamari Maxine Clarke
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Books by Joseph Hill
Addressing the dominant perceptions of Islam as a conservative practise, with stringent regulations for women in particular, Joseph Hill reveals how women integrate values typically associated with pious Muslim women into their leadership. These female leaders present spiritual guidance as a form of nurturing motherhood; they turn acts of devotional cooking into a basis of religious authority and prestige; they connect shyness, concealing clothing, and other forms of feminine “self-wrapping” to exemplary piety, hidden knowledge, and charismatic mystique. Yet like Sufi mystical discourse, their self-presentations are profoundly ambiguous, insisting simultaneously on gender distinctions and on the transcendence of gender through mystical unity with God.
Articles by Joseph Hill
Book Chapters by Joseph Hill
Dissertation by Joseph Hill
Mystical education (tarbiyyah) aims to cultivate direct experience of the unity of all things in God, revealing the hidden truth that distinctions are illusory. Hidden (bāṭin) truths coexist with the apparent (ẓāhir) truths of textual education and everyday experience. A tendency to juxtapose two apparently contradictory truths through paradox pervades many Taalibe Baay’s daily speech. Paradoxes are not simply linguistic word games but are part of practical repertoires of negotiating multiple imperatives, interests, and points of view.
One particularly productive paradox is the simultaneously equalizing and hierarchizing nature of Taalibe Baay knowledge-authority. Mystical education distributes charismatic experience and knowledge among lay disciples, awakening them to the unity of all beings. Yet religious knowledge comes through a soveriegn node of authority—Baay Ñas—and depends on transmission and validation through authorized channels. Taalibe Baay imaginations and practices of community simultaneously emphasize the unity of common religious experience and the concentration of authority in Baay’s official representatives.
This ethnography examines the role of informal spaces of Islamic education in extending transnational networks of religious authority and community, challenging widespread assumptions about modernity and globalization. Situating epistemic orientations in learned practical repertoires, it undermines modernist teleologies of religious “rationalization” and “secularization,” showing how practitioners cultivate multiple simultaneous approaches to rationality. Disciples engage with and disengage from the secular through cultivating spaces of religious knowledge and authority. This project globalizes religious knowledge through cultivating embodied dispositions through religious apprenticeship.
Book reviews by Joseph Hill
Why do parents of almajirai choose these schools over free modern schools? Do these schools, which emphasize rote memorization, provide useful knowledge? Is there merit to claims that these schools breed delinquency and even Boko Haram terrorism? Based on ethnographic research in Kano city and a nearby village, Hoechner's nuanced account of everyday almajiri life models how a solid anthropological approach can complicate stereotypes and clarify current issues. She shows why, for many poor rural families, these schools may be the best (albeit not a perfect) option economically and socially.
Beyond its content and analysis, Hoechner's research is groundbreaking in its innovative methodologies. For example, she had almajirai record mock radio interviews with one another. More remarkably, she produced a docudrama written, directed, filmed, and acted by almajirai themselves. The award‐winning film, Duniya Juyi Juyi (How Life Goes), provided a forum in which Hoechner was able to discuss various issues with the students. The film is available on YouTube and should be watched alongside reading the book.
Addressing the dominant perceptions of Islam as a conservative practise, with stringent regulations for women in particular, Joseph Hill reveals how women integrate values typically associated with pious Muslim women into their leadership. These female leaders present spiritual guidance as a form of nurturing motherhood; they turn acts of devotional cooking into a basis of religious authority and prestige; they connect shyness, concealing clothing, and other forms of feminine “self-wrapping” to exemplary piety, hidden knowledge, and charismatic mystique. Yet like Sufi mystical discourse, their self-presentations are profoundly ambiguous, insisting simultaneously on gender distinctions and on the transcendence of gender through mystical unity with God.
Mystical education (tarbiyyah) aims to cultivate direct experience of the unity of all things in God, revealing the hidden truth that distinctions are illusory. Hidden (bāṭin) truths coexist with the apparent (ẓāhir) truths of textual education and everyday experience. A tendency to juxtapose two apparently contradictory truths through paradox pervades many Taalibe Baay’s daily speech. Paradoxes are not simply linguistic word games but are part of practical repertoires of negotiating multiple imperatives, interests, and points of view.
One particularly productive paradox is the simultaneously equalizing and hierarchizing nature of Taalibe Baay knowledge-authority. Mystical education distributes charismatic experience and knowledge among lay disciples, awakening them to the unity of all beings. Yet religious knowledge comes through a soveriegn node of authority—Baay Ñas—and depends on transmission and validation through authorized channels. Taalibe Baay imaginations and practices of community simultaneously emphasize the unity of common religious experience and the concentration of authority in Baay’s official representatives.
This ethnography examines the role of informal spaces of Islamic education in extending transnational networks of religious authority and community, challenging widespread assumptions about modernity and globalization. Situating epistemic orientations in learned practical repertoires, it undermines modernist teleologies of religious “rationalization” and “secularization,” showing how practitioners cultivate multiple simultaneous approaches to rationality. Disciples engage with and disengage from the secular through cultivating spaces of religious knowledge and authority. This project globalizes religious knowledge through cultivating embodied dispositions through religious apprenticeship.
Why do parents of almajirai choose these schools over free modern schools? Do these schools, which emphasize rote memorization, provide useful knowledge? Is there merit to claims that these schools breed delinquency and even Boko Haram terrorism? Based on ethnographic research in Kano city and a nearby village, Hoechner's nuanced account of everyday almajiri life models how a solid anthropological approach can complicate stereotypes and clarify current issues. She shows why, for many poor rural families, these schools may be the best (albeit not a perfect) option economically and socially.
Beyond its content and analysis, Hoechner's research is groundbreaking in its innovative methodologies. For example, she had almajirai record mock radio interviews with one another. More remarkably, she produced a docudrama written, directed, filmed, and acted by almajirai themselves. The award‐winning film, Duniya Juyi Juyi (How Life Goes), provided a forum in which Hoechner was able to discuss various issues with the students. The film is available on YouTube and should be watched alongside reading the book.