About

I am a Research Fellow in the Religion and Intellectual Culture unit at Leibniz-Zentrum Moderner Orient (ZMO). My research explores how Islamic movements and Muslim intellectuals have navigated secular governance and influenced public discourse in Francophone West Africa since the 1960s. I analyse these dynamics by combining extensive fieldwork and archival research with digital humanities (DH) and artificial intelligence (AI), examining them from local case studies to region-wide patterns. My work focuses on Benin, Burkina Faso, Côte d'Ivoire and Togo, paying particular attention to universities and other educational institutions as key sites of religious mobilisation.

DH, AI, and the Islam West Africa Collection (IWAC)

Since 2023, I am developing the Islam West Africa Collection (IWAC), an open-access database comprising over 13,500 items relating to Islam across the region. I use computational methods and AI-assisted workflows to map patterns in religious mobilisation, track shifts in Islamic discourse, analyse media representations of Islam and trace the changing relationships between Muslim communities and state authorities. Data visualisation transforms these analyses into accessible narratives for scholarly and public audiences.

Books & Publications

My recent book, Religious Activism on Campuses in Togo and Benin (Madore, 2025) , examines the emergence of Christian and Muslim student associations in the 1970s and their subsequent reshaping of university life in Lomé and Abomey-Calavi, challenging the prevailing secular ideologies. I am also the author of La construction d'une sphère publique musulmane en Afrique de l'Ouest (Madore, 2016) and the co-editor of Religiosity on University Campuses in Africa (Sounaye and Madore, 2023) . In addition, I have co-edited two special journal issues: "Muslim Minorities in Africa, Part 1" (Madore and Schulz, 2021) & "Part 2" (Madore and Schulz, 2022) and "Les acteurs religieux africains à l'ère du numérique" (Millet-Mouity and Madore, 2017) . My research has been published in eleven peer-reviewed journals and six edited volumes.

Consulting

Beyond academia, I work with Communitology, to produce specialised Country of Origin Information (COI) reports for asylum and immigration cases involving Benin, Côte d'Ivoire, and Togo.

Training & Affiliations

I hold a Ph.D. in History from Université Laval and previously held a Banting Postdoctoral Fellowship at the University of Florida. Through my ongoing research and DH projects, I combine historical methods with computational techniques to advance understanding of Muslim societies in Francophone West Africa.