ECAS 2013

In the context of political democratization and the new religious dynamics which have emerged in Africa since the 1990s, researchers have identified several phenomena: the liberalization of the media; the increased visibility of Islam; the religious uses of the media developed by some Muslim personalities. In Senegal, preachers hosted shows on different stations - ones with more general programming like the RMD and Islamic stations like Dunya FM, RDV and women preachers have been able to participate directly in Islamic activism and compete with men. Wanting that women "know their rights" in order to "contribute to development", female preachers claimed the help of certain networks of male associations. But also, some female preachers participated in international institutional networks or in government programs to take courses on the dangers of female circumcision, on the fight against AIDS, and on family planning.

In this paper based on empirical field research involved three visits to Dakar in June 2008, March 2010 and July 2011, I would like to know how female preachers participate differently in public and national debates about the Secularism, the role of religion in the development in terms of moralization of social life, about the claim of a new social identity for women. I would like to see if these forms of citizen participation propose a new model of feminism, to analyze the assets and the limits of this sort of participation. Finally, I would like to understand how men preachers have to deal with this context.

From the 1980s onwards, multiple religious associations have emerged in Burkina Faso in the midst of a generalized upheaval of religious visibility and militancy in this country as well as in most of Africa. However, fieldwork research conducted in 2010-2011 in Ouagadougou confirmed an apparent shift in the attractive role of the associative milieus among young Muslims. Religious associations seem to loose part of their attractive aura with youth as the religious field is evolving from a militant model inspired by both the Sankarist revolution (1983-1987) and the early 1990s civil society democratic movements to the benefit of an economicist paradigm stressing the role of religion in the economic development of the country, understood in conformity with neoliberal principles. Thus, proper religious practice is becoming associated not so much with social and civic involvement through militancy but more with contributing to the economy through religious development-oriented non-governmental associations (NGOs) and entrepreneurship. This new ethics of capitalism, long associated with Evangelical prosperity gospel, is being appropriated by other communities, with prominent Catholic and Islamic preachers promoting a similar espousal of free market economy, which would need in their opinion a global mentality change, especially from young people. The strength of this discourse leads religious associations to reorient their actions from customary educational, spiritual and civic activities towards an increased emphasis on economically "useful" activities, leading the way to the transformation of these associations into local development NGOs.

When considering national and transnational dynamics of Islam in contemporary Africa, we often think of new orders and movements of Da'wa. Despite their ancient history over the continent, Sufi brotherhoods also prove to be relevant contexts to observe the emergence of new practices of Islam in the religious sphere as well as in the social and political spheres. In this paper I propose to focus on a particular branch of the Tijâniyya, founded by spiritual leader Ibrahim Niasse (also called "Baye Niasse). This way (tariqa) is characterised by transnationality and was able to adapt to different social and political contexts across Africa, and more recently in Europe and the United States among diasporas. I would like to compare Senegal and Togo from an anthropological perspective where this branch is shaping differently. In Senegal it is fuelled by the conversion of an increasing number of young people avid for independence and empowerment. I will analyse the case of Hip-Hop artists as relevant examples of this trend, as well as charismatic figures also committed to social movements and political action (Y'en a marre). In Togo, where only 10% of the population are Muslims, it tends to be stigmatised by other currents of Islam in spite of the religious dialogue encouraged by state organisations. I will observe the way it participates in religious and political debate under the new regime.

Based on fieldwork data collected since 2005, this paper focuses on the significant space acquired by the Pentecostal movement in the public sphere in Uganda, a fact that becomes visible with the growing physical presence in the urban space of Kampala.

Following the approaches proposed by authors such as Bourdieu and Setha Low, it suggests that the urban space is an arena for the intersection of multiple and often antagonist economic, social and cultural forces. Far from being just a "given" environment, town is the site where culture is "spatialized" and where global and local processes take shape or are constituted by practice in the experience and daily life of public-space users.

This space thus becomes a set where to act the manichean struggle between God and the Devil, the "Christian circle" and the satanic forces embodied in places like night-clubs: a "political space".

Politics has long been thought as a dangerous sphere by Pentecostals, which maintained an "other worldly" perspective in which there was no room for engagement in "this worldly" activities. Nevertheless, during the last ten years some of the main Churches has become more and more engaged in the public sphere, through social programs, AIDS campaigns, creation of FBOs' and even with direct engagement with politics. The second section of the paper explores the moralizing attitude brought by Pentecostals in Ugandan politics.

I'll finally discuss how the engagement in social programs and in politics is re-configuring the collective identity of the young people involved in the movement.

Although internal slavery in West Africa is often associated with a past long gone, over the past decades several West African anti-slavery movements emerged. They address the problematic nature of internal slavery's continued ideological legacies (stigma based on ascribed status and slave descent) and denounce the remnants of historical slavery (monopolies of freeborn elites on land, politics and jurisdiction) that shape so-called post slavery situations to date.

The movements are based on intense forms of citizen participation and some of them explicitly focus on bringing 'development', in particular to citizens with slave status in marginalised rural areas. A second goal of most movements is to challenge existing interpretations of Islamic (Malikite) jurisdiction. To that end, in april 2012, Mauritanian activist Biram has burned several books of Islamic jurisdiction. By so doing, he spurred huge national and international protest.

Although challenging aspects of existing religious ideologies is central to the activists' mission, they are not -nor do they present themselves as- religious movements. Mainly focussing on very recent anti-slavery movements that emerged in Mali (2012) and Mauritania (2008), the paper proposes answers to why these movements and the development work they engage in, was initiated by secularised elites rather than by critical religious scholars who organised themselves in religious (counter-)movements.

Data are based on postdoctoral research (2011-2012) with movement activists in Mali and Niger, as well as with Mauritanian activists in the West African diaspora in Paris.

In this paper, we address recent developments in strategies used by religious NGOs that focus on the welfare of children in Côte d'Ivoire. While children's evangelization is not central to the literature on religion and development, since the 2002 political and military conflict in Côte d'Ivoire, actions geared to children and their salvation have significantly grown with the creation of Christian and Muslim NGOs dedicated to them. At the crossroad of national and transnational networks, a number of religious NGOs have developed extensive programs that weave together humanitarian aid and proselytizing activities. The apparent tension between these two realms of social actions raises, on the one hand, the issue of the dynamic roles of religious NGOs in the reconstruction of an Ivorian public space. On the other hand, it points out potential diverging notions of "development" between international donors, local governments and actors of religious NGOs. The paper is based on ethnographic field research conducted in the city of Abidjan in 2011 and 2012. On the basis of extended case studies on Christian and Muslim NGOs, we propose first to highlight common elements to their children-oriented strategies. In the second place, we will show how doctrinal standpoints, social and political networks as well as economic resources account for divergences in their actions and programs. The analysis will draw attention on how both Christian and Muslim NGOs base their programs on education and the construction of schooling facilities, while Christian NGOs also appeal to a subtle juxtaposition of gift, play and evangelization.