Cities are organic and living entities, developing unique characteristics as a result of the actions and ideologies of those who live within and outside of their boundaries. Another publication in the burgeoning Rochester Series on African History and the Diaspora, this work investigates the physical and metaphysical foundation and organization of Touba (est. 1887), Senegal's second largest urban centre. In Sufi City, Eric Ross paints a complex picture of an intricate relationship between Sufism – both as a philosophy and as a social action – and the dynamic urban development that has resulted in the creation of a distinctly Sufi city. Designed, constructed and administered by the Mourides, a Senegalese Sufi order, all aspects of Touba's built space, according to Ross, reflect a combination of Islamic, Sufi and West African ideologies and concepts. What makes Touba unique in urban terms is that it serves as a holy city, the ‘capital of the Mourides’, and is officially designated an ‘autonomous rural community’ by the Senegalese government, thus enhancing its independence within the modern state. Ross' main goals in writing this book are to show the influence of Sufism on the urban development of Touba and to reveal to the reader the uniqueness of the city as a spiritual project that transcends ideas of tradition and modernity.

Ross has more than 17 years of experience in the region. He holds a Master's degree in Geography and a Ph.D. in Islamic Studies, and has served as an assistant professor of Geography at Al Akhawayn University (Ifrane, Morocco) since 1998. He has conducted fieldwork in Morocco, Tunisia, Egypt, Turkey, Mauritania and Algeria, where he has done research on shrine towns in Senegal, cultural development and religion in Moroccan cities, as well as trans-Saharan trade networks. His wealth of experience and unique academic interests contribute to the organization and analysis of this book, moving from Islamic studies in chapter 1, to cultural geography in the second and third chapters and lastly returning to the organization of Touba within Islamic and indigenous African beliefs in the final chapter.

The first chapter is a philosophical investigation of the archetype of tree within Sufi phenomenology. The discussion of the cosmic tree – Tuba the tree of Paradise – in terms of Sufi cosmology and the meaning of landscape reveals the metaphysical underpinnings of the city and raises the idea that traditional spiritual views of architecture and design in some Islamic and West African societies are not so different from those that formed the foundations of Touba: ‘Part of their purpose was to reflect or express some part of a divine or cosmic reality. They were never simply utilitarian’ (p. 24). In many ways, such a city can be compared to ancient holy cities such as Jerusalem and Mecca. In contrast to these, however, Ross depicts a city of more recent composition that has arisen in a world with very different influences and ideologies. In the second chapter, Ross turns to the physical nature of Touba's urban design, with its central focus on the mosque, and argues that the design and construction represent the products of the Mouride spiritual community. If the first chapter reveals Ross' knowledge of Islamic and Sufi theology, the second emphasizes his training as a cultural geographer. He acknowledges that he may be studying buildings and trees but the focus is on their physical and metaphysical contexts within the context of a religious community and not on the buildings themselves. The third chapter moves into a historical mode by analysing the urban history of the Senegambian region and the role of Islamic institutions within that history. He traces these influences as far back as the seventh century to show that Touba represents a more recent example of autonomous Muslim centres that arose in response to their political and economic environment. Ross argues that during the colonial era the Mouride order worked with the colonial system at times, but the rise of the Mourides and the establishment of Touba must also be seen as a form of resistance to the growing power of the colonial administration. He argues that, although the colonial era contributed to the rise of modern urban networks in Senegal, the ‘emerging Sufi orders contributed greatly to the process, either by investing the nodes of colonial network or else by creating nodes of their own’ (p. 137). During the independence era, the power of the Mourides has been recognized by the government in its legal designation of the city as an autonomous rural community, a move that according to Ross ‘constitutes a rare acknowledgment by a modern territorial state of a process it does not control as well as an attempt on its part to include the dissident territory’ (p. 167). In this chapter, the author also compares the development of Touba with the rise of Senegal's other autonomous rural community, Madina Gounass, a Tijani city. By utilizing a comparative methodology of two Sufi cities, Ross is able to determine how the various urban characteristics relate to Islam and Sufism in general, and what characteristics might be attributed more to the Mourides and Tijanis in particular. In chapter 4, Ross veers only slightly away from Islam and Sufism and traces some of Touba's design characteristics to indigenous African influences. He argues that the importance of the central public square and the central locations of the mosques can be tied into the spiritual nature of Islamic cities and older royal capitals in the West African region. Ross returns to the importance of the tree – palaver trees or trees as monuments – and argues that many of the traditional spiritual, social and political contexts associated with these trees have been transferred to the public Islamic spaces within these urban centres.

One of the strengths of this book is the variety of bibliographic sources from which the author derives his narrative. Ross mines the literature for secondary and primary sources in many different languages, including Arabic, Wolof and French. Ross also relies heavily on primary source material collected while living in Touba, conducting interviews, collecting data and mapping the layout of the city. Perhaps most significant of Mouride sources are the writings of Shaykh Ahmadou Bamba Mbacke, the founder of the Mouride order, as well as Arabic hagiographies of him. Lastly, the many useful plates of urban plans and maps, some derived from already existing sources and others created by the author, provide the reader with visual images of relevant urban spaces.

One has to look hard to find fault with this work. It crosses numerous disciplinary boundaries, encompassing aspects of urban history, African and Islamic studies and cultural geography in a manner that should appeal to all those with an interest in any or all of those fields. At times, however, these ideological disciplines appear segmented into the various chapters, never truly merging the various perspectives into one. In general, the analysis focuses on the built space of Touba, the cosmology of Islam and Sufism and the development of the Mouride order. Within this analysis, Ross presents a portrait of neighbourhood development in and around Touba by focusing on Sufi ideologies and the action of urban and religious leaders in planning and development. In the focus on religious ideologies and urban leaders, however, what is often lost are the voices of other residents who live within the city and help to make it a living and organic entity. What comes across to this reviewer is a spiritually unified community who share common goals and aspirations, but certainly there are localized spaces within the city boundaries that reflect the needs and desires of residents and are at least partially unrelated to religious issues. In fairness, Ross does not claim to address these issues and perhaps this is a topic for future research. What he does do, however, is establish a new standard for the study of the metaphysical and physical design and development of Islamic and African cities.