Sufi Remembrance Practices in the Meditation Marketplace of a Mobile App
Document Type
Book Chapter
Publication Date
10-11-2019
Department 1
Religious Studies
Abstract
This chapter explores religion on mobile meditation apps through a focus on Sufi guided ‘meditation’ practices found on the mobile app Insight Timer. Sijapati offers an account of digital presentations of religious practices and considers how representations of religious practices as ‘meditation’ may expand app users’ encounters with religion into a marketplace model. Both the presence and the content of Sufi meditation practices on the app raise fruitful points for consideration of how religious identity, practice, religiosity/spiritualism, and community are intertwined in the digital age and through mobile apps in particular. Examining Sufi practices on this app within the context of a particular Sufi order, and in the context of competing ‘meditation’ practices on the app, she discusses how these app ‘meditations’ facilitate outsider engagement with Sufism, in part through the elision of Sufi and Islamic identity markers.
DOI
10.1007/978-3-030-26376-8_2
ISBN/ISSN
978-3-030-26376-8
Recommended Citation
Sijamata, Megan Adamson. “Sufi Remembrance Practices in a Meditation Marketplace of Mobile Apps,” in Anthropological Perspectives on the Religious Uses of Mobile Apps, edited by Jacqueline H. Fewkes, 19-41. London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2019.
Required Publisher's Statement
This chapter is available on the publisher's website.