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Muslim Societies in African History
David Robinson
Michigan State University
2004

0521826276 Hardback

Published by:
Cambridge University Press

Synopsis:
Examining a series of processes (Islamization, Arabization, Africanization) and case studies from North, West and East Africa, this book gives snapshots of Muslim societies in Africa over the last millennium. In contrast to traditions which suggest that Islam did not take root in Africa, author David Robinson shows the complex struggles of Muslims in the Muslim state of Morocco and in the Hausaland region of Nigeria. He portrays the ways in which Islam was practiced in the ‘pagan’ societies of Ashanti (Ghana) and Buganda (Uganda) and in the ostensibly Christian state of Ethiopia - beginning with the first emigration of Muslims from Mecca in 615 CE, well before the foundational hijra to Medina in 622. He concludes with chapters on the Mahdi and Khalifa of the Sudan and the Murid Sufi movement that originated in Senegal, and reflections in the wake of the events of September 11, 2001.

Contents:
Part I. Introduction: the Foundations: 1. Muhammad and the birth of Islam; 2. The basic institutions of the faith; Part II. Explorations in the Islamic Identities of Africa: 3. The Islamization of Africa; 4. The Africanization of Islam; 5. Muslim identity and the Slave Trades; 6. Western views of Africa and Islam; Part III. Extended Case Studies: Muslim Societies in Old Nation-States of Africa: 7. Morocco: Muslims in a Muslim nation; 8. Ethiopia Muslims in a Christian Nation; Part IV. Muslim Societies in Pre-Colonial Africa: 9. Asante and Kumasi: a Muslim minority in a sea of Paganism; 10. Sokoto and Hausaland: Jihad within the Dar al-Islam; Part V. Muslim Societies in Colonial Africa: 11. Buganda: religious competition for the Kingdom; 12. The Mahdi and competing imperialisms; 13. The Muridiyya: a Sufi Brotherhood under French Colonial rule; Conclusion.