The shifting space of senegalese mosques

Abstract

Since its humble beginnings in Medina, the mosque has acted as a focal point for the Muslim community. Its polyvalent role as a place that combined dwelling, prayer, tribimal, garrison, and commercial activity in the Medinan period is often evoked by so-called revivalist movements. According to such a discourse, the mosque does not discriminate against race, ethnicity, or gender rather placing the emphasis on belief in the puritanical tenets of Islam, in contrast to Sufi groups whose mosques are often tariqa specific. But in architectural terms, the message of this particular discourse is not always as clearly advertised from the point of view of the building. This may well be symptomatic of what Villalón has observed regarding the distinctions between Sufi, Reformist, and Islamist groups: "Sufism remains the dominant form of devotion, but its dynamic forms and manifestations are adapting in ways that have blurred, if not completely erased, the distinctions between ‘traditional’ Sufi and Islamist groups."1.