Beyond Timbuktu: An Intellectual History of Muslim West Africa

295 Pages·2016·15.13 MB·English

by  Ousmane Oumar Kane

Beyond Timbuktu

B e y o n d T i m B u k T u
An Intellectual History of Muslim West Africa
Ousm a n e Ou m a r K a n e
j
Harvard University Press
Cambridge, Massachusetts
London, England
2016
Copyright © 2016 by the President and Fellows of Harvard College
All rights reserved
Printed in the United States of America
First printing
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Kane, Ousmane, author.
Title: Beyond Timbuktu : an intellectual history of
Muslim West Africa / Ousmane Oumar Kane.
Description: Cambridge, Massachusetts : Harvard University Press, 2016. |
Includes bibliographical references and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2015050589 | ISBN 9780674050822
Subjects: LCSH: Islamic learning and scholarship—Africa, West—
History. | Islamic learning and scholarship—Mali—Tombouctou—History. |
Education—Africa, West—History. | Education—Political aspects—Africa,
West—History. | Africa, West—Intellectual life. | Africa, West—
Civilization—Islamic influences.
Classification: LCC DT474.5 .K36 2016 | DDC 966.0088/297—dc23
LC record available at http://lccn.loc.gov/2015050589
In loving memory of my grandfather,
Shaykh al-Islam Al-Hajj Ibrahim Niasse

Contents
Note on Transliteration . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .ix
Prologue ..................................................1
1. Timbuktu Studies: The Geopolitics of the Sources ................21
2. The Growth and Political Economy of Islamic Scholarship in the
Bilad al-Sudan ............................................41
3. The Rise of Clerical Lineages in the Sahara and the
Bilad al-Sudan ............................................60
4. Curriculum and Knowledge Transmission.......................75
5. Shaping an Islamic Space of Meaning: The Discursive Tradition .....96
6. Islamic Education and the Colonial Encounter ..................119
7. Modern Islamic Institutions of Higher Learning.................140
8. Islam in the Post-colonial Public Sphere .......................160
9. Arabophones Triumphant: Timbuktu under Islamic Rule..........178
Epilogue ................................................200
Notes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .211
Glossary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .255
Acknowledgments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .269
Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .271

Note on Transliteration
This book uses materials in several foreign languages, including Wolof, Pulaar,
Hausa, and Arabic. I have opted for as simplified a transliteration of words and
names as possible. I have omitted most diacritics as well as elongating Arabic
vowels. The Arabic consonant ‘ayn has been transliterated as ‘ (as in Shari‘a).
Exceptions to the rule include when it appears in a name without ‘ayn (as The
College of Sharia and Islamic Studies Thika) and when mentioning West
African Muslim names best known in their European form (for example,
Uthman Dan Fodio, Umar Tall, Abdullahi Dan Fodio). I have transcribed
these names with ‘ayn only when they so appear in a citation. I have used the
‘ayn, however, in transcribing Arab authors whose name are best known in
Arabic form (for example, ‘Umar Rida Kahhala, ‘Ali Harazim, Ibn ‘Ata Allah).
The initial and final hamza have been omitted and the median hamza is trans-
literated as ’. For the plural of certain Arabic words, especially when it comes to
ideologies, such as Wahhabis or Salafis, or Sufis, I have opted to use the English
plural s, in keeping with general English usage. For other Arabic plurals, such
as ulama, I have opted to use the Arabic plural because that is how they are
most commonly used in English writing.