Sufis in Afghanistan: Contemporary Navigations of Religious Authority Across Political Changes

Schmeding, A. (Invited speaker)

NIOD Institute for War, Holocaust and Genocide studies

Activity: Talk or presentation › Academic

Description

Invited Speaker in the Leiden LUCIS "What's New?" series

Period	18 Apr 2024
Held at	Leiden University Centre for the Study of Islam and Society (LUCIS), Netherlands
Degree of Recognition	International

Keywords

Sufism
Islam
civil society
Afghanistan
Central Asia
war
conflict
Leadership
anthropology
ethnography

Documents & Links

Despite its pervasive reputation as a place of religious extremes and war, Afghanistan has a complex and varied religious landscape where elements from a broad spectrum of religious belief vie for a place in society. It is also one of the birthplaces of a widely practiced variant of Islam: Sufism. Based on long-term ethnographic field research among multiple Sufi communities in different urban areas of Afghanistan, the book “Sufi Civilities” examines navigational strategies employed by Sufi leaders over the past four decades to weather periods of instability and persecution. It offers a rare on-the-ground view into how Sufi leaders react to moments of transition within a highly insecure environment, and how humanity shines through the darkness during times of turmoil. In this talk, we will explore how Sufi communities adapted to changing conditions in novel ways that crafted Sufism as a force in the civil sphere.