Adeline Masquelier facts for kids
Adeline Marie Masquelier (born 1960) is a Professor of Anthropology at Tulane University in New Orleans, Louisiana. Anthropology is the study of human societies and cultures.
About Adeline Masquelier
Adeline Masquelier was born in 1960. She studied many different subjects in school. She started by earning degrees in biology and physics in Lyon, France, in 1978. Then, she moved to the United States. She got a degree in Zoology in 1980 and later a master's degree in Anthropology in 1984.
She continued her studies and earned her Ph.D. from the University of Chicago in 1993. Her main teacher was Jean Comaroff, a well-known expert on Africa and anthropology. Professor Masquelier has spent a lot of time doing "field work" in Niger. This means she lived among the Hausa people in a town called Dogondoutchi to learn about their culture firsthand.
Her research explores many interesting topics about people and their beliefs. She has studied spirit possession, which is when people believe spirits take control of a person's body. She also looks at changes in Islamic religion, traditional religious practices like Bori, and the special meaning of being a twin. Other topics she studies include beliefs about witchcraft, how people use and understand medicine (called medical anthropology), and how gender roles affect society.
Currently, Professor Masquelier is the executive editor of the Journal of Religion in Africa. She has held this role since January 2008. She is also researching a movement called Izala, which is an Islamic reform movement in Niger. She examines things like bridewealth (payments made for marriage), worship practices, and how people dress.
Awards and Special Grants
Professor Masquelier has received several important awards and grants to support her research. These include:
- A research fellowship from the National Institute of Mental Health (1987-1989).
- A research grant from the National Science Foundation (1988-1989).
- A grant from the Wenner-Gren Foundation for Anthropological Research (1987-1988).
- A fellowship from the American Council of Learned Societies (2004-2005).
- A fellowship from the National Endowment for the Humanities (2005-2006).
- A fellowship from the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial (2010-2011).
Books and Articles
Professor Masquelier has written many books and articles about her research. Some of her works include:
- Prayer Has Spoiled Everything: Possession, Power, and Identity in an Islamic Town in Niger (2001)
- "Behind the Dispensary's Prosperous Facade: Imagining the State in Rural Niger," published in Public Culture (2001)
- Dirt, Undress, and Difference: Critical Perspectives on the Body's Surface (2005)
- "The Scorpion's Sting: Youth, Marriage and the Struggle for Social Maturity in Niger," published in the Journal of the Royal Anthropological Institute (2005)
- "When Spirits Start Veiling: The Case of the Veiled She-Devil in a Muslim Town of Niger," published in Africa Today (2008)
- Women and Islamic Revival in a West African Town (2009)
- She also wrote about "Bodies, Politics, and African Healing: The Matter of Maladies in Tanzania" by Stacey A. Langwick (2011).
- She reviewed "Regulating Romance: Youth Love Letters, Moral Anxiety, and Intervention in Uganda's Time of AIDS" by Shanti Parikh (2015).
- Fada: Boredom and Belonging in Niger (2019)
External Links
- List of publications
