Please join the Religious Studies Program on Thursday, February 27th for our 3rd event in the 2024 – 2025 Religion and Politics Series! Professor Benjamin Gatling (George Mason University) will deliver the lecture Being Sufi in Central Asia. This event will take place at 4pm in Room 1418 of Van Hise Hall (1220 Linden Dr. Madison Wisconsin 53706). Open to the public! Please share widely with anyone who might be interested.
Students are invited to a lunch with Professor Gatling on Friday, February 28th at noon. More information coming soon about how to RSVP.
Professor Gatling’s lecture is cosponsored by the Anonymous Fund, Anthropology, Communication Arts, Folkore (GNS+), Language Sciences, the Law School, and the Middle East Studies Program.
Abstract: Since the fall of the Soviet Union, Sufi groups in Tajikistan have faced significant changes, from growth and public celebration to repression by governing elites. In this talk, Benjamin Gatling draws on ethnographic fieldwork to examine how Tajikistan’s Sufis have adapted since 2010. It discusses how murids cope with missing pirs, closed teaching circles, and limited ritual opportunities, while highlighting resilient expressions of Sufi piety, such as pilgrimage practices and narratives.

Speaker Biography: Benjamin Gatling is a folklorist, Associate Professor in the English Department, and Director of the Interdisciplinary Studies Program (MAIS) at George Mason University. He holds a Ph.D. and M.A. from The Ohio State University and a B.A. from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. His research interests include oral narrative, performance, the ethnography of communication, Persianate oral traditions, and Islam in Central Asia. His current research considers the experiences of Afghan refugees and migrants in the U.S. He serves as Editor of Folklorica: the Journal of the Slavic, East European, and Eurasian Folklore Association and Associate Editor of the Journal of American Folklore.