Queer Sufism and Performance

In this cluster, we are examining the sociocultural and political transformations of the significance of Sufist dancing before and after the Syrian Revolution. What has been traditionally regarded as an apolitical, religious ritual performed in Hadras across Sufi circles in Syria has acquired a different ideological mindset in the diaspora in Europe: many Syrian Sufist dancers’ performativity is now determinedly political, often queer and subversively ‘re-Orientalised’ as it addresses a contemporary European (and a global) audience. \nWe will be providing an interdisciplinary critique of how Syrian Sufist dancing has become a powerful performative tool with sociopolitical messages - a significant rupture with its apolitical and strictly spiritual origins.<p></p>