Mark Soileau is a cultural historian and anthropologist of religion specializing in the religious landscape of Turkey, with a particular focus on Sufism, rituals, saint cults, and the Alevi and Bektashi traditions. His research explores how these traditions are embedded within historical contexts and expressed through lived experience. He is the author of Humanist Mystics: Nationalism and the Commemoration of Saints in Turkey (2018), a cultural history linking the changing significance of Sufi saints to historical trends in Turkey within a framework of cultural memory. His publications include numerous articles on the cultural history, ritual practices, and textual traditions of Alevis and Bektashis. His current research centers on the manuscript tradition of the Vilayetname of Hacı Bektaş, examining how narratives of the saint's life have been copied, transmitted, and reshaped over time, alongside his work on ritual practice. He is affiliated with the Institute for Alevi Theology at the University of Hamburg.