The Sound of Salvation: Voice, Gender, and the Sufi Mediascape in China with Guangtian Ha: Sigur Center for Asian Studies GWU-Feb 1,2022

 YouTube Video:

https://youtu.be/8b2eHL44p5s?si=ecjkcmtimkK_R3J9

In this edition of the 2022 New Books in Asian Studies series, the Sigur Center hosted a discussion of The Sound of Salvation: Voice, Gender, and the Sufi Mediascape in China with author Guangtian Ha, Assistant Professor of Religion at Haverford College. The event was moderated by Eric Schluessel, Assistant Professor of History and International Affairs at GW. The Jahriyya Sufis—a primarily Sinophone order of Naqshbandiyya Sufism in northwestern China—inhabit a unique religious soundscape. The hallmark of their spiritual practice is the “loud” (jahr) remembrance of God in liturgical rituals featuring distinctive melodic vocal chants. The first ethnography of this order in any language, The Sound of Salvation draws on nearly a decade of fieldwork to reveal the intricacies and importance of Jahriyya vocal recitation. Guangtian Ha examines how the use of voice in liturgy helps the Jahriyya to sustain their faith and the ways it has enabled them to endure political persecution over the past two and a half centuries. He situates the Jahriyya in a global multilingual network of Sufis and shows how their characteristic soundscapes result from transcultural interactions among Middle Eastern, Central Asian, and Chinese Muslim communities. Ha argues that the resilience of Jahriyya Sufism stems from the diversity and multiplicity of liturgical practice, which he shows to be rooted in notions of Sufi sainthood. He considers the movement of Jahriyya vocal recitation to new media forms and foregrounds the gendered opposition of male voices and female silence that structures the group’s rituals. Spanning diverse disciplines—including anthropology, ethnomusicology, Islamic studies, sound studies, and media studies—and using Arabic, Persian, and Chinese sources, The Sound of Salvation offers new perspectives on the importance of sound to religious practice, the role of gender in Chinese Islam, and the links connecting Chinese Muslims to the broader Islamic world.

Amazon:The Sound of Salvation: Voice, Gender, and the Sufi Mediascape in China:Guangtian Ha

https://www.amazon.com/Sound-Salvation-Mediascape-Weatherhead-University/dp/023119806X

Winner, 2023 Clifford Geertz Prize in Anthropology of Religion, Society for the Anthropology of Religion

The Jahriyya Sufis―a primarily Sinophone order of Naqshbandiyya Sufism in northwestern China―inhabit a unique religious soundscape. The hallmark of their spiritual practice is the “loud” (jahr) remembrance of God in liturgical rituals featuring distinctive melodic vocal chants.
The first ethnography of this order in any language, The Sound of Salvation draws on nearly a decade of fieldwork to reveal the intricacies and importance of Jahriyya vocal recitation. Guangtian Ha examines how the use of voice in liturgy helps the Jahriyya to sustain their faith and the ways it has enabled them to endure political persecution over the past two and a half centuries. He situates the Jahriyya in a global multilingual network of Sufis and shows how their characteristic soundscapes result from transcultural interactions among Middle Eastern, Central Asian, and Chinese Muslim communities. Ha argues that the resilience of Jahriyya Sufism stems from the diversity and multiplicity of liturgical practice, which he shows to be rooted in notions of Sufi sainthood. He considers the movement of Jahriyya vocal recitation to new media forms and foregrounds the gendered opposition of male voices and female silence that structures the group’s rituals.
Spanning diverse disciplines―including anthropology, ethnomusicology, Islamic studies, sound studies, and media studies―and using Arabic, Persian, and Chinese sources, The Sound of Salvation offers new perspectives on the importance of sound to religious practice, the role of gender in Chinese Islam, and the links connecting Chinese Muslims to the broader Islamic world.
Review:
A stunning piece of work. The study of Islam in China has been crying out for works that do justice to the specificities of local traditions while maintaining a productive conversation with the wider field of Islamic studies. This book bridges that divide in a way that few pieces of scholarship have been able to up until now. It is an immensely valuable ethnography in its own right, but also one that is theoretically provocative and that offers scholars outside the immediate field of Islam in China a vantage point from which to rethink their views of Sufi practices and related forms of ritual. -- David Brophy, author of Uyghur Nation: Reform and Revolution on the Russia-China Frontier

This beautifully written book takes us into the unknown sonic world of China’s contemporary Sufi Muslims. Guangtian Ha's deep understanding of these people and their very possibly doomed tradition comes over on every page. This is a marvelous ethnography, rendered with subtlety, sophistication, and panache. -- Caroline Humphrey, coauthor of A Monastery in Time: The Making of Mongolian Buddhism

This is a substantial, unpretentious, and compelling ethnographic study focused on Jahriyya liturgical recitation in northwest China. Marked by expository clarity and absence of jargon, it is a wide-ranging and thoughtful, even wise, book that evidences the author’s impressive linguistic, historical, ethnographic, and theoretical sophistication. Whether exploring technical issues of multilanguage terminology, gender discrimination, or musicality and textual content of recitation, Ha always keeps larger questions about methodology and historical context, as well as the Jahriyya tradition (and its severely threatened survival), admirably in focus. -- William A. Graham, author of Beyond the Written Word: Oral Aspects of Scripture in the History of Religion

Sensitive and illuminating work. ― Inner Asia

Offers new perspectives on the importance of sound to religious practice, the role of gender in Chinese Islam, and the links connecting Chinese Muslims to the broader Islamic world. ― Reading Religion

This volume undeniably offers a rare and fascinating insight into Sufism in China. ― Religious Studies Review

A nuanced, sophisticated and provocative work that is a welcome contribution to the field of Chinese Islamic Studies. ― Journal of Religious History

Thanks to Ha’s elaborate and precise prose, which is peppered with sardonic humor, the book sustains readers’ attention throughout the pages. ― Journal of Asian Studies

This is a fascinating book that would deserve to be widely read no matter when it had been published. In the present moment, it is an essential tribute to the multiplicity of Sufism in China. ― Journal of the American Academy of Religion
About the Author:
Guangtian Ha is assistant professor of religion at Haverford College. He is coeditor of Ethnographies of Islam in China (2020) and The Contest of the Fruits (2021).

Amazon:Ethnographies of Islam in China Rachel Harris (Editor, Contributor), Guangtian Ha (Editor, Contributor)

https://www.amazon.com/Ethnographies-Islam-China-Rachel-Harris/dp/0824883349

In the late 1970s Islam regained its force by generating novel forms of piety and forging new paths in politics throughout the world, including China. The Islamic revival in China, which came to fruition in the 2000s and the 2010s, prompted increases in government suppression but also intriguing resonances with the broader Muslim world―from influential theoretical and political contestations over Muslim women’s status, the popularization of mass media and the appearance of new patterns of consumption, to increases in transnational Muslim migration. Although China does not belong to the “Islamic world” as it is conventionally understood, China’s Muslims have strengthened and expanded their global connections and impact. Such significant shifts in Chinese Muslim life have received scant scholarly attention until now. With contributions from a wide variety of scholars―all sharing a commitment to the value of the ethnographic approach―this volume provides the first comprehensive account of China’s Islamic revival since the 1980s as the country struggled to recover from the wreckage of the Cultural Revolution.
The authors show the multifarious nature of China’s Islam revival, which defies any reductive portrayal that paints it as a unified development motivated by a common ideology, and demonstrate how it was embedded in China’s broader economic transition. Most importantly, they trace the historical genealogies and sociopolitical conditions that undergird the crackdown on Muslim life across China, confronting head-on the difficulties of working with Muslims―Uyghur Muslims in particular―at a time of intense religious oppression, intellectual censorship, and intrusive surveillance technology. With chapters on both Hui and Uyghur Muslims, this book also traverses boundaries that often separate studies of these two groups, and illustrates with great clarity the value of disciplinary and methodological border-crossing. As such, Ethnographies of Islam in China is essential reading for those interested in Islam’s complexity in contemporary China and its broader relevance to the Muslim world and the changing nature of Chinese society seen through the prism of religion.

YouTube Video:Naqshbandi Sufi Hadra in Linxia, China (Mostly Translated) – Sufi Dhikr – Ibn al-Faridh-Hashim Aziz -Jan 9,2023

https://youtu.be/rR8ybTcHo5s?si=IwP4Wq1uAwS48Zz4

Don't forget to a) press the CC button to enable the translation/subtitles and b) change the quality to 1080p. This gathering of Khufiyya Sufis took place after Fajr (early morning prayer), at 6:30am on the 28th March 2014, at the North Mosque in Linxia, Gansu province, China. The Khufiyya are a branch of the larger Naqshbandi tariqah (Sufi order) founded by Baha al-Din Naqshband in the 14th century. ¹ i.e. no god but the one God. Known as the tahlil or kalimah, this is the most central dhikr (litany for the remembrance of God) in Islam. It is considered to be an affirmation of absolute monotheism, and therefore the first half of the declaration of faith required to convert to Islam (the shahadah). ² The second half of the shahadah 0:00 Chants of "Laa ilaha illallah" 5:00 Chants of "Allah" 7:00 Chants of "Hu" 8:15 Antum Furudhi Wa Nafli This is an almost verbatim poem by Ibn al-Faridh with a few added verses that I can't make out. Ibn al-Faridh was a 12th-century Syrian-Egyptian poet who is often considered to be the Arab Rumi due to his prolific and profound Sufi poetry. His Khamriyyah ("Wine Ode") is considered to be his masterpiece, and at 700 verses his Nazm al-Suluk ("Path of the seeker") remains one of the longest pieces of Sufi poetry ever written.Description from the Sounding Islam Project: "These worshippers belong to the Khufiyya menhuan, one of the main branches of the Sufi orders that were introduced into this part of China in the late 17th century. The menhuan are both socio-economic and religio-political institutions which grew out of the Sufi schools established by followers of early saintly leaders. The Central Asian Sufi Naqshbandi order, founded by Bahar al’Din Naqshband (d. 1389), is represented in Linxia by two menhuan: the Jahriyya and Khufiyya. More than twenty branches of the Khufiyya order are active across China today, especially in the northwest. The Huasi branch of the Khufiyya menhuan was established by Ma Laichi, who travelled widely in Middle East, and whose tomb lies in Linxia." Thanks to Ruard Absaroka for recording the video, and the excellent Sounding Islam China project for making it available.

YouTube Video:Sufi Hadra in Guangzhou, China (Mostly Translated) – FULL – Sufi Dhikr – الذكر الصوفي في الصين: Hashim Aziz- June25,2021

https://youtu.be/x-X_hHids3o?si=DliZbcZV22U-xMJY

Remember to switch to 1080p and enable CCs/captions for the translation. ¹ Arabic language greeting used by Muslims between each other Thanks to Ibrahim and Dawoud for making out a few lines that I couldn't. Unfortunately there are still some untranslated parts, which could either be Arabic, Mandarin or Cantonese. If anyone with better ears/hardware/knowledge of Chinese than me can fill in the missing lines I would appreciate it a lot and credit you for your contributions. Hui Muslims (the largest and most mainstream ethnic group of Muslims in China) commemorate the mawlid (birth of the Prophet Muhammad) with a hadra near the tomb of Sa'd ibn Abi Waqqas, on Friday 10th February 2012. Sa'ad ibn Abi Waqqas was a beloved uncle of the Prophet who was purportedly the first to bring Islam to China in the 7th century. His tomb is located in the city of Guangzhou, Guangdong Province, China. These Sufis are likely to either belong to the Naqshbandi Khufiyya or Naqshbandi Jahriyya tariqah (Sufi order). Credit goes to Hafiz for the source videos: