Hassan Asif. Digital religion, remix, infrastructure.

Now.

current work /
may 2026

MAY · 2026

I defended my PhD at the Faculty of Information, with a collaborative specialization at the Centre for South Asian Studies at the Munk School. The dissertation, Remixing Devotion: Digital Media Practices in Pakistan, follows naat and Islamic sermon media through home studios, repair markets, broadcast control rooms, and WhatsApp chains. Conferral is October 2026.

I am turning chapters into journal articles, drafting a book proposal, and teaching at UTM ICCIT. A forthcoming chapter in Mobile Media and Communication looks at how WhatsApp moves not just media but rules and resources through Pakistan's devotional media ecologies.

Recent recognition: Chancellor Jackman Graduate Fellow, Margaret Higgins Memorial Fellow, Amilcare Iannucci Graduate Fellow in the Humanities, and SSHRC Doctoral Scholar.

Writing.

selected /
full list on cv

2025article

Discostan and Hamnawa: Between erasure and preservation in South Asian digital diasporic archives

Media, Culture and Society, 47(8), 1599 to 1618.

How two small online archives keep South Asian music alive when the big platforms forget it: Discostan (Los Angeles record label) and Hamnawa (a publication on Pakistani pop).

2025essay

Hall Road, Lahore: Devotion's signal chain

HELIOTROPE. Field essay with photographs.

A walking essay through the Lahore electronics market that keeps Pakistan's religious music industry running. Shops, repair stalls, small studios.

2024article

"Blur the preacher": Media remix and digital technocultural practice in Pakistan

Journal of Religion, Media and Digital Culture, 13(3), 363 to 386.

YouTube remixers in Pakistan cut, blur, and rebuild religious sermons. What happens to a preacher's authority when his words get edited and reshared?

in pressarticle

Obfuscation as revelation: Knowledge sharing, piracy, and Islamic devotional remixing in Pakistan

Digital Humanities Quarterly. Special issue on the Global South.

Pakistani religious music producers often work with pirated software. The article argues that cracked tools are part of the craft, not a problem to fix.

Dec 2026forthcoming

Moral traffic: How WhatsApp moves media, rules, and resources in Pakistan's devotional media ecologies

Mobile Media and Communication. Special issue on messaging applications.

WhatsApp groups move audio files, religious rulings, and donations through the same channels. The article treats the group chat as real infrastructure.

Full publication list on the CV page.

Teaching.

courses /
UofT · UTM

GRAD · UofT iSchool

Reimagining Global Copyright

A graduate seminar on how copyright works around the world and how it might work better.

2024, 2025 · 25 students · four sections

UNDERGRAD · UTM ICCIT

Religion, Media and Popular Culture

An undergraduate course on how religion shows up in movies, TV, and online.

2023 · 40 students · two sections

UNDERGRAD · UTM

Human-Machine Communication

A course on how people talk to and through machines, from chatbots to algorithms.

Instructor of record · Deferred

UNDERGRAD · UTM

Digital Platforms: A Global Perspective

A course on how digital platforms work in different parts of the world.

Instructor of record · Deferred

TA work on more than a dozen courses on the CV page.

Speaking.

recent talks /
full list on cv

Nov 2025

Remixing Devotion: The Digital Audio Workstation as Sacred SpaceSacred Space: Conflicts and Convergences. Trinity College, University of Toronto.

Nov 2025

From Breath to Waveform: HCI Lessons from Editing Naat in CubaseSPIRITED '25: Conference on Spirituality, Religion, and Interactive Technology Design.

Jun 2025

Obfuscation as revelation: Piracy and Islamic devotional remixingICA 2025 Pre-Conference. Boulder, Colorado.

Jan 2025

Remixing devotion: Digital media practices in PakistanInvited talk. Jackman Humanities Institute, University of Toronto.

Jun 2024

Digital desires and distortions: Deepfake pornography in Pakistani cyberspaceGlobal Digital Intimacies Conference. University of Amsterdam.

Oct 2023

Bytes of blessings: Digital technology's influence on Pakistan's Naat culture51st Annual Conference on South Asia. University of Wisconsin-Madison.