The Transnational Dimension of the Gnawa Music and Rituality
13 January 2026. From 18:30 | Conference | Spanish | Arxiu d’Etnografia (Aula 521), Campus Catalunya URV (Av. Catalunya 35, Tarragona)
In 2019, the Gnawa music and culture of Morocco were recognized by UNESCO as Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity. In fact, this recent recognition reflected the global emergence of a ritual and musical tradition that had been marginalized and racialized well into the twentieth century. Gnawa music and possession rituals originated among enslaved and freed groups in Morocco who came from West and Central Africa. This Gnawa culture is the result of a dynamic syncretism between Sub-Saharan elements and the North African Islam of saints and brotherhoods.
After the rise of the postcolonial world and subsequent migrations to former metropoles, the Gnawa have also built new transnational spaces and networks between Europe and the Maghreb. This lecture will present this past history and present dynamics based on ethnographic and archival research conducted among Gnawa communities in northern Morocco and Barcelona.
A lecture by Josep Lluís Mateo Dieste, a Serra Húnter Associate Professor in the Department of Social and Cultural Anthropology at the Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona and a member of the AHCISP (Anthropology and History of the Construction of Social and Political Identities) research group. His work focuses on the anthropology and history of North Africa and on relations between the Maghreb and Europe in the contemporary world. He has carried out ethnographic and archival research on Moroccan communities in Catalonia and northern Morocco, developing the method of historical anthropology around the following topics: stereotypes between Moroccans and Spaniards; politics and religion during the Spanish Protectorate in Morocco (1912–1956); Spanish-Moroccan relationships; conceptions of the body and healing rituals in the Maghreb and its diaspora; and contemporary domestic slavery in Morocco.
His recent publications include Remembering the tatas. Domestic Women and Slavery in Tetouan (Brill, 2024); Coello, A., Mateo, J.L., In Praise of Historical Anthropology. Perspectives, Methods, and Applications to the Study of Power and Colonialism (Routledge, 2020); Mateo, J.L., Muriel, N., “A mi querido Abdelaziz, de tu Conchita”. Cartas entre españolas y marroquíes en el Marruecos colonial (Icaria, 2020).
Within the Aula Mediterrània 2025-2026 series.
Co-organised with the Master’s degree in Urban Anthropology, Migration and Social Intervention, URV
Speakers
Josep Lluís Mateo Dieste
Serra Húnter Associate Professor, Department of Social and Cultural Anthropology Universitat Autònoma de Barcelona
Jordi Moreras
Serra Húnter Associate Professor, Department of Anthropology, Philosophy and Social Work, and Coordinator of the Master’s Degree URVOrganised by
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