Paper short abstract:

This paper shows how the urban-based madrassas in Senegal pose both a threat to traditional values and a career possibility to people living in a rural village. This educational alternative is appropriated, and used to challenge and reproduce old forms of privilege in a changing social landscape.

Paper long abstract:

Literature on madrassas in Senegal tends to focus on their reformist ideologies and influence in urban centres where they are based. By contrast this paper examines their subtle influence on a rural village among the haalpulaar ethnic group. Despite being geographically removed, the madrassas' presence is apparent in local people's everyday lives. The madrassa presents an educational alternative linked to increased livelihood opportunities for example in national state structures and Arabic speaking world. However, it constitutes an ideological and practical challenge to the traditional Sufi Quranic schools of the village. Its universalist Islamic ideologies also challenge traditional haalpulaar social divisions linked to gender and 'caste'. Its existence therefore provides an attractive option for those historically excluded from local forms of religious education. This paper explores how depending on individuals' positionality in the mesh of social relationships, they appropriate, contest and reject the madrassa in complex ways. For some, it poses both an opportunity and a threat, like parents who applaud the career options it presents but are wary of its ideologies. For others, madrassas open the possibility to subvert caste hierarchies, yet counter to this runs the reality that only the richest can afford this option. Thus old and new sources of privilege and capital collide to create a new elite class. This paper argues for fine-grained ethnography that captures strategies different actors employ within this multipolar educational landscape; they take which elements they want, and leave those they do not, to reconcile their aspirations with their social positionality.