I am political sociologist working on mobilized religion in Muslim majority countries. Having grown up in Zevenaar, the Netherlands, I completed my bachelors in Nijmegen (2006), masters in Amsterdam (2008) and Phd at the European University Institute in Florence, Italy (2013). I subsequently held a three-year postdoc at the Department of Comparative Politics of the University of Bergen, Norway (2014-2017). During these years, I also learned Arabic in Damascus, Cairo and Tunis and was a visiting researcher at Princeton University in New Jersey, USA. From October 2013 until August 2014 I resided in Istanbul to learn Turkish. I currently hold a three year lecturer position at the department of sociology at the University of Cambridge.

For all those wondering: “Teije” is pronounced as “tire” without the last “r” sound. And my first name is Teije Hidde, my surname is Donker. I am Dutch, the first name is Frysian.

In my research, I am interested in how mobilized religion and state-society relations intersect in the greater Middle East. In my latest work I explore this topic by applying concepts from social movement studies to analyze interactions between formal political parties and Islamist movements, specifically concerning mobilization vis-à-vis public institutions in Syria and Tunisia. Currently I am broadening my geographic focus to include Turkey.

For more information see my research interests and CV.