Contact Information
3092B Foreign Languages Building
707 S. Mathews Avenue
Urbana, IL 61801
M/C 166
Office Hours
Biography
I am a specialist in Islamic thought and practice. I have worked on many aspects of Islam, from the time of the Prophet to the contemporary period; I have conducted textual studies and have done fieldwork. I did two major fieldwork projects in Egypt, one on Muslim women's religious lives in contemporary Egypt (1980-81) and another on Sufism in modern Egypt (1987-89). Then I studied Swahili and spent two summers in Zanzibar, where I became aware that two distinct strands of Arabian Islam had impacted the Swahili coast: the Sultanate of Oman and the Hadramawt region of Yemen. I spent the 2000-2001 academic year in Oman and the Hadramawt, and became particularly interested in the Ibadi sect of Islam, an ancient and small sect that is neither Sunni nor Shiite and is practiced in Oman and small pockets of North Africa. I have since written the first English-language study of Ibadi theology and have become a specialist in Ibadism in the modern period, especially in Oman and Zanzibar.
Research Interests
Islamic thought and practice, Muslim sects, medieval and contemporary Islamic thought and movements, Sufism, Islamic gender ideology, Muslim women’s religious lives, Islam in Oman, Yemen, Egypt and East Africa
Research Description
Current Research Project: Islamic Sectarianism Reconsidered: Ibadi Islam in the Modern Age
Education
Arabic and Islamic Studies, Ph.D., The University of Chicago
Arabic and Islamic Studies, M.A., The University of Chicago
Anthropology, B.A., University of Pennsylvania
Grants
Fulbright Research Fellowships, 2000-2001; 1987-1988
Carnegie Scholarship, 2009-2010
National Endowment for the Humanities fellowship, 1991-1992
Awards and Honors
Carnegie Scholarship, 2009-2010
Alumni Discretionary Award for Service to the University of Illinois, 2008
University Scholar, University of Illinois, October 1996
Faculty Fellow, Center for Advanced Study, 2003
Courses Taught
REL 260/SAME 260, Mystics and Saints in Islam
REL 481/SAME 481, Muslim Ethics in the Global Age
RLST 403/ANTH 403/GLBL 403/GWS 403/HIST 434/SAME 403, Women in Muslim Societies
RLST 482, Muslim-Christian Interactions
REL 514/SAME 514, Islamic Theology
REL 214/SAME 214, Introduction to Islam
REL 408/PS 408/SAME 408, Islam and Politics in the Middle East
Additional Campus Affiliations
Professor Emerita, Religion
External Links
Honors & Awards
Carnegie Scholarship, 2009-2010
Alumni Discretionary Award for Service to the University of Illinois, 2008
University Scholar, University of Illinois, October 1996
Faculty Fellow, Center for Advanced Study, 2003
Highlighted Publications
Hoffman, V. J. (2012). The Essentials of Ibadi Islam. Syracuse University Press. https://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctt1j5d7rj
Hoffman, V. J. (Ed.) (2019). Making the New Middle East: Politics, Culture, and Human Rights. (Contemporary Issues in the Middle East). Syracuse University Press. https://doi.org/10.2307/j.ctv14h4pr
Recent Publications
Hoffman, V. J. (2023). Religion, Ethnicity and Identity in the Zanzibar Sultanate. In Muslim Cultures of the Indian Ocean: Diversity and Pluralism, Past and Present (pp. 73-90). Edinburgh University Press.
Hoffman, V. J. (2020). A Sufism for our time: The Egyptian society for spiritual and cultural research. In L. Ridgeon (Ed.), Routledge Handbook on Sufism (pp. 474-486). Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781315175348-35
Hoffman, V. J., & Bin ali bin ameir al-Shueili, S. (2020). Ibāḍī Tafsīr Literature. In M. A. Haleem, & M. Shah (Eds.), The Oxford Handbook of Qur'anic Studies (pp. 733-745). Article 49 Oxford University Press. https://doi.org/10.1093/oxfordhb/9780199698646.013.63
Hoffman, V. J. (2020). Review: C. Aillet's (ed.) L'ibadisme dans les sociétés de l'islam médiéval: Modèles et interactions. Islam and Christian-Muslim Relations, 31(3), 349-351. https://doi.org/10.1080/09596410.2020.1802910
Hoffman, V. J. (2019). Gender Norms in the Muslim Middle East. In V. J. Hoffman (Ed.), Making the New Middle East: Politics, Culture, and Human Rights (pp. 285-317). (Contemporary Issues in the Middle East). Syracuse University Press. https://doi.org/10.2307/j.ctv14h4pr.14