MESA Banner
Does God belong in a discotheque?: Remixing the Islamic Call to Prayer in a Tunisian Nightclub
Abstract
In April of 2017, a British DJ named Dax J remixed the Islamic call to prayer (or adhan) into a set of electronic music at a music festival in a Tunisian tourist town. Video footage from the hosting nightclub showed no reaction from attendees when the adhan was played; yet subsequent circulation of this footage on social media websites appeared to garner intense public scrutiny, leading DJ Dax J to temporarily close his twitter account and issue a public apology. Meanwhile, the regional governor of Nabeul denounced the DJ’s “attack on the sacred” and closed the nightclub where the offense had occurred. DJ Dax J was sentenced in absentia to one year in prison. In addition to interviews with plaintiffs, defendants, and festival officials and participants, my paper also relies on documentation surrounding the prosecution to reconstruct this little studied legal case. The prosecution of DJ Dax J is notable as it marks a turning point in Tunisian blasphemy cases: it is the first prosecution of a non-Muslim for blasphemy in Tunisia since 1857. The prosecution of DJ Dax J also marks the first Tunisian blasphemy prosecution since the ratification of the 2014 Tunisian constitution, which, I argue in my dissertation, successfully quelled the wave of blasphemy cases prosecuted from 2011-2013; this constitution featured a new article that both guaranteed the freedoms of religion and conscience while also prohibiting attacks against the sacred, the fruit of a novel compromise among Islamists and progressives in the constituent assembly. My paper therefore uses the case against DJ Dax J to reflect on larger questions about blasphemy prosecutions in Tunisia, including: if blasphemy is frequent in Tunisia as elsewhere, then why was this particular blasphemous act prosecuted (and not others)? What made this blasphemous act both worth prosecuting, and, prosecutable? My paper also reflects on the limits of the soundscapes the sacred call to prayer can merge into and those which it “cannot.”
Discipline
Anthropology
Geographic Area
Tunisia
Sub Area
Islamic Studies