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Senegalese Sufi Orders in the Transnational Space: Moving Religious Activities from Home to Host Countries and Creating Diasporic Identities

Abdoulaye Kane, Dept. of Anthropology and Center for African Studies, University of Florida
akane@ufl.edu

This last decade witnessed the predominance of transnationalism in the study of international migration among anthropologists. The concept of transnationalism focus on movement of people, goods, ideas, images across different nation-states. More and more migrants are in a state of in-betweeness where they undertake actions and make decision that cut–across different national states boundaries (Linda Basch, 1998). Religious activities are certainly an important part of these processes of transnationalism that shape our world today.
In this paper I will examine Senegalese Sufi Orders in this new context of globalization that create the condition for migrants and members of diasporas to be connected efficiently with their home countries via the use of the new technologies of communication and transportation. The permanent flow of people, information, images, goods and ideas between home and host countries has some lasting impact on both areas that need to be studied. My primary interest is to analyze how Senegalese Sufi orders negotiate their insertion in Western cities. How do they relate to global Islam? How do they perceive their religious practices vis-à-vis their host societies? What are their transnational dimensions? What are relations with their home communities? And how do they manage to maintain those relations?
The data that I will use in this paper are taken from a fieldwork trip to Morocco and to France. I followed Senegalese pilgrims coming from both Europe and Senegal to Fez where the founder of the Tijaniyya Sufi order, Cheikh Ahmed Tijani, is buried. Then I went to France to attend an annual religious ceremony organized by the Tijaniyya disciples in France with the participation of Cheikh Mansour Barro who was invited from Senegal.