Islam

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Islam

Marie Miran-Guyon, Jean-Louis Triaud

To cite this version:

Marie Miran-Guyon, Jean-Louis Triaud. Islam. John Parker and Richard Reid. The Oxford Handbook

of Modern African History, Oxford University Press, 2013, 9780199572472. �halshs-01406101v2�

ISLAM

MARIE

MIRAN-GUYON AND

JEAN-LOUIS

TRIAUD

Islam

has

had

acenturies-longpresenceinAfrica,

both

north

and

south ofthe Sahara, before colonialencounters

added

a

new

layertothe continent's richlytextured

Muslim

history.

The

extentto

which

nineteenth-

and

twentieth-century

European domination

brought

about

meaningful

changes in

Muslim

lives

and

outlooks

—

and

not simply withinthe religious

domain—

cannot be

underestimated.Yet,atthe

same

time,

Muslim

communities

and

Islamic thought continued to evolve in their

own, enduring

ways.

Weaving

togetherlocal,

endogenous

initiatives,

on

the

one

hand,

and

global,

cosmo-politan influences

from

the

umma,

the

world

Muslim

community

in

and

out ofAfrica,

on

theother,

Muslim

actors

went

on

making

and remaking

their

own

historiesof reli-gious renewal

and

crises, expansion

and downturn.

This goes

beyond

acknowledging

the

importance

ofthe longue duree in

comprehending

Islam's colonial past or

ques-tioning theEurocentricdivisionofAfricanhistorycentred

on

the colonial

moment.

It

underlines that

Muslim

Africa's colonial trajectories concurrently

belonged

to differ-ent,

and

partly overlapping, 'regimes ofhistoricity'—

Western

imperial, Islamic,

and

African—and

thatthesevarioustrajectories

cannot

be

reduced

toa single aspect.1

As

with conceptions oftime, diversitycharacterized

Muslim

Africa'svast spaces, the

southernfrontiersof

which were

mapped

anew on

an

unprecedentedscaleinthe colonial

period

under

thetwinprocessesofmigration

and

conversion.

A

major

ecologicalfaultline runs

between

countriesnorth

and

south ofthe Sahara.Medieval

Arab

historiography por-trayed the desertasan innersea,imaginingthe

Maghrib

(the'West' inArabic,for

North

Africa

was

thenIslam's

westernmost

lands)asanisland,remote

from

the bilad al-Sudan,

'theland oftheBlacks', stretching

from

modern

SenegaltoEthiopia.

The

Maghrib

itself

was

distanced

from

the heartlandsofIslam

by

the interpositionof

Egypt

—

the gateway tothe'Orient'ofoldendays,today's

Middle

East

—

withthemetropolisof Cairoasahigh

placeof Islaminits

own

right.Butthe colonial interludedidreify this fault lineto a cer-tain extent, as British

and

Frenchpolicies

were

bent

on

keepingMediterranean

and

sub-SaharanAfricaasseparateaspossible,even

when

theirempires bridgedbothsides.This divide also translated into an

academic

split

between

specialistsofboth cultural areas,

Thisbinaryvision,however,

unduly

downplaysthe far-reachingnetworks ofscholarly

and

other contacts

which

have nurtured the intellectual

and

social life ofsub-Saharan

Muslim

leaders, students, pilgrims,

and

tradersovergenerations.

Such

networks pavedthe

way

forthe integrationofthesesocietiesintoa

broad

moral

community

ofAfrican followers

of

Muhammad,

intheSunnibranch of Islam

and

predominantlytheMaliki school oflaw, even

though

Egypt, the

Horn,

and

easternAfrica follow theShafi'imadh'hab,asinpartsof

theIndian

Ocean

world.

Under

colonialpressure,

some

oftheselong-distancenetworks

fal-tered.Yet

many

provedresilient,while otherswere transformed or

moved

in

new

directions. Islam'sfoundationalprincipleofunity of creed

and

umma

does not negatethe

breath-takingdiversityof

Muslim

Africa'svast spaces.

Unity

does not

mean

uniformity.Indeed,

physical

and

culturalecologieshave always

marked

out

porous

territories

where

local societies ceaselessly

endeavoured

to domesticate Islam'suniversal message. It is clear

that

Muslim

lifein cosmopolitan

urban

centressuch asCairo orZanzibar contrasted

stronglywiththat in aBerbervillagein

Morocco

orin asettlementof

new

convertsin coastal

West

Africa,tothe extent that the valueofthe

term

'Islam'itselfasan analytical

category has

been

questioned

by both

historians

and

social scientists.Alternate

heuris-tic phrasings include 'discursive tradition

and

Islamic religious culture', along with theirpluralforms.2_Recent

demographic

statistics (inthe absence ofaccurate onesfor

the colonialperiod) allude to thescaleofIslamic pluralism: roughlyhalfofAfricais

Muslim

and one

infour

Muslims worldwide

isAfrican.

Allthispointstothelimitsofourtaskofsynthesis, atatime

when

grandnarratives

on

IslaminAfrica

no

longerfeature intheresearch agenda. This chapter thereforeprivileges

the

Maghrib

and West

Africa,

and

British

and

French colonialsituations.

Within

those

zones it concentrates

on

Muslim

religious elites

and

self-made entrepreneurs, almost exclusivelymale,althoughthisdoes not

mean

thatordinarybelievers,in particular

women,

were

any

lessMuslim.

The

focus

on

the

modi

operandi ofcolonialstates

and

on

Muslim

experiences

where

thesymbolicreferenceof Islam playedacentralrole,moreover,isnot tosay thatreligion

was

the onlyfactor definingMuslims' personal orcollective engage-ments:

many

historical actorsdiscussedthroughoutthe chaptersofthis

book

happened

to be Muslim, although they did notalwaysactprimarilyasMuslims.

The

chapterbeginswith

areview ofpast

and

current historiographical trends

and

methodologicalissues, before delving into

major

historical

themes

inordertosketch acompositepictureofthe interac-tions

between

Islam,imperialpower,

and

religiouschangein the eraofcolonialencounter.

Studies

in

African

Islam:

Construction

of

the

Discipline

Local

Muslim

societies never failed to

produce

their

own

internal

knowledge

in

literate, oral, or material forms.

But

what

we

may

call African Islamic studies' only

ISLAM

245

this fieldofresearch,not only becausethe earlyperiod

was

foundationalforthe

disci-plinein

and

ofitselfbutbecauseit

had

a direct

impact

on

the

unequal

power

relations

that unfolded

between

the infidel colonizers

and

the

Muslim

colonized—

especially, but not only,

under French

rule. It also matters because the colonial production of

knowledge

on

African Islam has

had

a lastinglegacywithinthe discipline well past the

thresholdof independence,tothepointthatrecentresearchtrends continuetosituate themselvesincontradistinctiontoit. Returningto early elaborations in the

historiog-raphy

of IslaminAfricaisthus

more

than

an

eruditeexercise:itspeakstothe genesisof

our

currentknowledge.

Egypt

was

thefirstfocusof African Islamic studies

and

the

ten-volume

Description

de I'Egypte (1809-28) its first

major

work.

As

the scholarly by-product ofthe 1798

Bonaparte

expedition,itinauguratedadistinctive

French

traditionofexploration

and

encyclopedicoutput

under

thesacrosanctguise of'science',

soon

to

become

the

norm

in

newly conquered

lands. In contrast, the writings ofthe leading British Arabicist

scholar,

Edward

William

Lane

(1801-76),

were

far less

imbued

with

imperial-minded

Orientalism.His

work

includedtheanthropologicalbestseller

Manners

and

Customs

of

the

Modern

Egyptians(1836)

and

the reputableArabic-EnglishLexicon (1863-93).

After the 1830 conquest, Algeria

became

the

French

laboratoryfor

Muslim

policies

and

Islamological' theories, similar to the roleplayed

by

India

and

later

Sudan

and

NigeriafortheBritish.Algiers

was

a

key

sitefortheproduction ofIslamologicalstudies, geographical

and

historicalworks,

and

translations

from

medieval

Maghribi

scholars

such asthe

famous

Ibn

Khaldun

(d. 1406).

The French

devoted particularattention to the translation oftreatises in Islamiclaw, soessential to colonialjurisdiction. This

projectfocused

on

the

key

kutub orauthoritativeIslamic 'books'

used

inthe

Maghrib

(but authoritative in sub-Saharan Africa too)

from

as early as the eleventh century; so important

were

these

books

for local societiesthat they

were

—

and

often

remain

essentialreadingsin

advanced Quranic

education.

Prominent

among

thesekutub

were

the

Mukhtar

(published 1848-57),aconcise

handbook

authored

by

Khalilb. Ishaq(d.

1374),

and

the Risala (1914), atreatiseinMaliki

Law

by

Ibn

Abi

Zayd

al-Qayrawani(d.

996).

With

the exception of Maliki-oriented Nigeria, the British

drew

more

atten-tionto theShafi'i

and

Hanafi legalsystems oftheirEastAfrican

and Middle

Eastern empires. Thisintense colonialliteraryproduction

had

a

major impact throughout

the

twentiethcenturyin thatit

induced

aspecificallytext-basedrepresentationofAfrican

Islam,

encompassing

allofitshistory,geography, customs,

and

institutions.

This strong Orientalisttrendto

some

extent continued south ofthe Sahara in the

first three decades ofthe twentieth century.

Sub-Saharan

Africa

became

more

ofa research

ground

forethnologists

and

linguists

who

put oralityfirst

and saw

Islamas

aliento

what

they

imagined

to

be

the pristine 'authenticity'of African society.3

Only

a

few

scholarslookedto localmanuscriptswritten inArabic orinvernacularlanguages transcribedin the Arabic script

(known

as ajami). Nonetheless, these pioneers

were

noteworthy.

Among

them

were

the

Maurice

Delafosse,

Octave

Houdas, Henri Gaden,

and

Herbert Palmer; the

well-known

Orientalist Louis

Massignon

also

worked

for a

Primus

interpares

was

Delafosse(1870-1926),

one

ofthe

founding

fathersof African

studies in France. Trained as a linguist, ethnologist,

and

historian,

he

served as the

Director ofPolitical Affairs for the

government

of

French

West

Africa

and worked

togetherwithhisprofessor(andlaterfather-in-law), the Arabicist

Houdas,

whose

career

had

begun

in Algiers.

Between

1898

and

1901, eitheralone orwithDelafosse,

Houdas

edited

both

inArabic

and

in

French

translation the three

famous

historicalchronicles written in theseventeenth

and

eighteenthcenturies

by Sudanese

intellectuals

from

the

Niger bend: the Ta'rikh al-Sudan, the Ta'rikh al-Fattash,

and

the Tadhkiratal-Nisidn.4 These

works

would

play a centralroleinthewritingofthe historyofthe great'Sudanese Empires' and,

made

availablein print to amajority

non-Arabophone

African

reader-ship, inpublic

memory

and

the self-fashioningofidentities,inpostcolonial Mali.This

ongoing

processisa

reminder

thatcolonialencounter servedtointertwineAfrican

and

European

destinies in oftenunforeseen ways,linking the precolonial pastto the post-colonial present.

Herbert

Richmond

Palmer

(1877-1958)

was

Delafosse's distinguished British

counterpart.

A

Cambridge

graduate, he spenttwenty-six years in

Northern

Nigeria,

becoming

itslieutenant-governoratthe

end

ofhisstay.Colonial

Northern

Nigeria

was

unique

in

many

ways.

West

Africa's

most

densely populated

Muslim

area, itbore the legacyofthe 1804jihadof

'Uthman

dan

Fodiothatgave risetothe Sokoto Caliphate,

sub-SaharanAfrica'sprincipalshari'a-mindedIslamicstate. Defeated

by

Britishforces in 1903,the caliphate

was

largelyincorporatedintothe protectorateof

Northern

Nigeria

under

thegovernorship ofSirFrederick

Lugard

(1900-1906),laterto

become

Nigeria's governor general (1914-19).

Born

in India, with service in

Sudan

and

East Africa,

Lugard

isacentralfigureofBritishimperialisminAfrica.

He

isbest

known

asthe archi-tectofindirectrule, as

expounded

inhismanifestoThe

Dual Mandate

inBritishTropical Africa (1922).

Northern

Nigeria witnessedthe

emergence

of

what

Murray

Last called the 'ColonialCaliphate':ahybrid

arrangement

in

which

Islamicinstitutions

and

lead-ing rullead-ing families

were

keptinplace

under

discreet Britishcontrol.5

Northern

Nigeria alsohouses

one

ofSudanicAfrica'srichestbodies of Arabic

and

ajamiwritten sources,

mostly about Sokoto. This

was

the peculiarpolitical

and

intellectualcontext in

which

Palmer was

able to write extensively

on

Muslim

states

and

societies,

making

use of manuscripts collected

throughout

the region.6_{Notwithstanding}

latercritiques, these

documents

too,

most

importantlythe

Kano

Chronicle,

became

reference

works

for later generations ofscholars

and

Africanactorsalike.

French

and

British translationendeavours receded

by

thelate 1920s, although they

resumed

on

asmallerscaleinthe nationalistperiodattheinitiativeofAbdullahi

Smith

(1920-84), a British-Nigerian professor at the University of Zaria

and

a convert to

Islam.

Smith launched

asystematic exploitation of Sokoto manuscripts,

promoting

at

the

same

time a richhistorical 'mine'

and

the caliphate's politicalpositionwithinthe

new

and

turbulent federationofNigeria.7

Albeit

no

longeracentralendeavour,the con-cernto catalogue, preserve,

and

translate

Muslim

Africa's

primary

sources hasnot

been

relegated to thepast, as

demonstrated by

the series ofregional

volumes

edited

by Rex

O'Fahey and John Hunwick.

8

Concomitantly

to the textual

approach

based

on

scholarly translations, African

Islamic studies further

developed

with the writings ofcolonialofficials in charge of

monitoring

Muslim

societies. Collectively, these writings

were

more

'discourses'

on

Islam, often ideological innatureintheirarticulationofthe colonialperception of Islam

(sometimes

mere

Eurocentric fantasies or paranoia) atthe expense oflocal develop-ments. Nonetheless,these writingsplayeda

major

role

both

incolonialpolitics

and

in shapingthefield'shistoriography

on

an enduring

basis.

The French

stand outin this respect.

Two

main

themes

emerge

from

this literature:

the confrerieor

'brotherhood

theme

(tariqa inArabic)

and

the concept of Islam noir

or'BlackIslam'.

The former

was born

inAlgeria. Inthe faceofhalf acentury of

armed

resistance to

French

conquest, specifically the lengthy struggle led

by

Abd

al-Qadir,

shaykh oftheQadiriyya

brotherhood

inwestern Algeria

between

1832

and

1847,

French

army

officersdevelopedthe influentialtheory ofa'brotherhood plot'.Thisfellwithin broaderfearsaboutthedanger

posed by

Islam,asif

brotherhoods

were

in a

way

coex-tensive with Islamitself.

More

than the British

—

even

though

they too foughtIslamic leaders

and

organizations inNigeria, the Sudan,

and

Somalia

—

the

French were

con-vincedthat Islam

was

a

dangerous

transnationalreligion. This persuasion

was

inpart

built

upon

the anticlericalism ofthe Third Republic

and

civic officials'

deep

distrust

of'clerical' or 'feudal'

Muslim

hierarchies: Islamic

brotherhoods

were

viewed

as the

Orientalequivalentofnineteenth-century

European

revolutionarysecretsocieties.

In Algeria, theadministration established aprocessofsystematicdatacollection in an efforttodistinguish friendly

from

hostilebrotherhoods.

The

Tijaniyya,

which

had

been

Abd

al-Qadir'sfoe

and

whose

shaykh,a

grandson

ofits

founder

Ahmad

al-Tijani,

married

a

French

woman

in 1870, progressivelyappeared asthe

model

ofthe

good

brotherhood,

meaning

one

which

could

work

withthe

French

forthelattersinterests.

In Cyrenaica in western Libya, in contrast, the Sanusiyya,

whose

founder

was from

Algeria

and which was open

to fleeingemigrants

from

Algeria,

became

the epitome ofthe 'bad'brotherhood,

meaning

one

so drasticallyhostileto the

French

that it

had

to

be

suppressed.9

The brotherhood

theme

subsequently crossed the Sahara. Alfred

Le

Chatelier, a soldier

and

scholar

who

became

a professorattheCollegedeFrance,isatelling

example

ofthisprocess.

Although

LeChatelier

worked

primarily

on

Morocco, he

publishedthe

firstsurvey of IslaminSenegal

and

the

French

Sudan

(now

Mali), L'IslamdansI'Afrique

occidentale (1899).Hispreface explains

how

hetravelledsouth oftheSaharainthe1880s insearchof brotherhoods, butfinding

few

tracesof

them

concluded

thatthe anxieties

ofthe Algiersschool

were

misplaced.Yet the

French

administration neverceased cata-loguing

and monitoring brotherhoods

(asitalsocatalogued 'races', 'tribes',

and

'ethnic

groups'), despite thefactthat

mass brotherhood

organizations

which

aroseatthe

dawn

ofthetwentieth

century—

intheSenegalese contextatleast— neveractuallythreatened

the colonial regime.

As

situations

and

interests

changed

over time

and

space, so did the specific actors

classified

under

the categoriesof good' or'bad' Muslims. In

French

West

Africa, the

jihadist al-Hajj'Umar,

whose

militarized state-building project

had

clashed withthatof

the French.

By

the earlytwentiethcentury, thatperception

was

beginning tochange,

due

in large part to theeffortsof

more

'accommodationist'

Muslim

culturalbrokers.

By

the 1950s,

young

graduates returning to

French

West

Africa

from Arab

universities,

referredto as'Wahhabi',

became

the

new

'bad'Muslims, while'traditionalist'Sufis

were

promoted

tothe

rank

of good'ones.

But

the

Manichaean

visionitselfpersisted,

remain-ing in place well past decolonization

under

the

new

binary of 'moderate'/'tolerant'

Muslims

versus 'radical'/'extremist' Islamists.10

_The

single

most prominent

theme

in recentscholarship

on

African Islamisthe attempttodeconstructsuch brazenly

ideo-logicalfabrications

and

tosuggest

more

nuanced

interpretationsof

complex

realities.

It

was

Delafosse

who

in the 1910s can

be

credited with coining the concept of 'maraboutisme'; that is, the notionthat

marabouts

(the

French

label for all types of

Muslim

clerics but especially the leaders of brotherhoods),

were

the pivotal figures

behind

thestructuringof

West

African

Muslim

communities.

The French

colonialstate

went

on

to

bestow

such

an

inflated

prominence

upon

this

Muslim

elite(provided, that

is,thatit

was

ofthe 'good' type) thatitcan

be

arguedthe figureofthe

grand

marabout

was

inlargepart a colonial invention.This too

proved

to

be

an astoundingly

enduring

colonial legacy, with the grands

marabouts—

despite the recent challenge to their authority in

some

regions

from

more

radical clerics—

remaining

influential leaders

within

many

West

African

Muslim

societies.

Although

less

prominent

in British colonial discourse, the

brotherhoods

were

not entirely ignored. C.

Armine

Willis, for instance, depicted

Sudanese

Islam

through

the sole

prism

ofits brotherhoods, his dispassionate reportage standing in contrast

to theconspiracytheories thatcharacterized

French

accounts.11

The

concept of Islam noir, however,

was

the exclusive elaboration of

French

imperialism. It

was

meant

to cutoffsub-Saharan Islam

from

itssupposedlysubversive

Arab

connections,atatime

when

Arab

nationalism

was

on

theriseinthe

Middle

East.

According

to

French

col-onial theory, 'BlackIslam'

was

heavilyinfluenced

by

traditionalanimistpractices

and

was

therefore a milder, lessradicalversion ofthe faith than that

found

elsewhere in the Islamic world. Thatthis perception contradicted the

brotherhood

theory of

bad

marabouts

did not

seem

tobother the colonial state,

which even

attempted, without

great success,toinducereligioussyncretismin

some

areas.YettheconceptofIslamnoir

has alsopersisted,continuingto

pervade

not only

French

views ofAfrica

and

its

own

Muslim

citizensbutpaternalistic

Western

publicopinionatlarge.

The

main

propagator oftheconcept of Islamnoir

was

theprolificPaul Marty.

An

offi-cialatthe

Bureau

of

Muslim

AffairsinDakar,

Marty

gatheredintelligencereportsabout

Muslims and

Islam

from

the four corners of

French

West

Africa.

Over

the course of eighteenyears,he

produced

ten publications

on Muslim

societiesineach ofthe

feder-ation'scolonies,

from

Les

Mourides

d'Amadou

Bamba

(1913)toL'Islamet lestribusdans lacolonie

du

Niger (1930-31),

which were

authoritative

works

ofreference

throughout

the colonial period.

Although

Marty's interpretive

framework

has subsequently

been

critiqued, his corpus contains a great deal ofmaterial useful to the historian,

when

seriesof

works by John

Spencer

Trimingham

(b. 1904).

Trimingham's

perspective

was

different: a

member

ofthe

Church

Missionary Society

who

worked

successively in Sudan,Ethiopia,

and West

Africa,

he

gathereda large

amount

offielddata

and between

1949

and

1971 published seven

books

on

Islam in different countries.12_His

method,

likethat of Marty,

was

later contested,buthis

books were

theonlyavailablereference

works

ofthe

kind

inEnglish beforethe 1970s,

bestowing

ascholarlystatus

on

thestudy of sub-SaharanIslam.

The

eraof decolonizationinthe 1960s

opened up

a

new

chapterforAfricanIslamic

studies, asitdidforAfricanhistorygenerally. Breakingfree

from

the colonial

strangle-hold

was

the

new

ideologicalorder ofthe day,carriedalong

by

nationalistsympathies

and

humanisticideals.

One way

out ofthe colonial

predicament

was

tofocus

anew on

precolonial Islamic history

by

means

ofArabic manuscripts,

which

located the

now

aca-demic

ratherthanadministrative expertsin

Muslim

mattersin

an

erudite,philological enclave.

Although

thepoliticalfocusofearly nationalisthistoriography

and

the predic-tion

by

the

modernization

paradigm

ofthesocialirrelevanceofreligionservedto con-fine Islamto the

margins

ofthe

new

Africanist project,pioneeringhistorianssuch as

Nehemia

Levtzionexcelled in the

re-engagement

withArabicsources.13

It

would

be

the

1979Iranian revolution, a defining

moment

intherecent historyofIslam,

which

served

topropelthefaith

and

itsfollowerstothe centreofthe scholarlystage.

In this earlyperiod, nonetheless,contributions

from

fields of inquiry as varied as anthropology, sociology,

and geography

haveto

be reckoned

with.

Most

shareda

con-centration

on

Egypt,

Morocco

(and

even

more

restrictively,

on

societies ofthe Atlas

mountains),

and

Senegal.This

narrow

focus—

to

which

we

may

add

English-language literature

on

Northern

Nigeria—

lasted until recently,

when

dissonant voices

began

to arguethatthese areas

do

not

encompass

the

whole spectrum

of

Muslim

Africa

and

that, transnational

phenomena

notwithstanding,

one

should avoidthe extrapolation

ofanalyses

from

one

regionto another.

One

legacyofthese geographical

monopolies

remains adeficitinstudies

on

EastAfricanIslam. InlinewithE. E. Evans-Pritchard's functionalist

and

structuralist

approach

was

ErnestGellner's Saints_oftheAtlas (1969).

Among

the firstanthropologists toput 'Islam' in a

book

title

was

Clifford Geertz:his seminal Islam

Observed

(1968) discussedthefertiletensions

between

Islamictexts

and

localcontexts in a

broad

comparison

between

Moroccan

maraboutism

and

Indonesian

Sufism, at the polar

ends

ofthe

Muslim

world.

South

ofthe Sahara,

Donal

Cruise

O'Brien's The

Mourides

of Senegal (1971)

and

Paul Pelissiers LesPaysans

du

Senegal (1966)signalledan

emerging

'mourido-centrism' (i.e.focus

on

the

Muridiyya

brother-hood)

withinstudiesof SenegaleseIslam.

The

dramatic arrival of'political Islam' onto the international stage following the Iranian revolution has

had

a

huge

and complex impact on

African Islamic studies.

Never

beforehasthefieldattracted so

much

intellectual interest.Scholarlyoutput

con-tinuesto

grow

by

leaps

and bounds,

to the extent thatit

would

be

reductiveto chart

theachievements ofindividual scholarship,even

when

limitingoneselfto

works

on

the colonial period. Ifthe field'smultidisciplinary

and

international collaborativeedge is

arethe bilingualjournalsIslametsocietes

au

Sud du Sahara launched

in 1987

by

Jean-LouisTriaud

and

the

more

recentSudanic

(now

Islamic) Africa.11

'Likewise, Brill—the

Netherlands-based publishing

house

which

supervises the

ongoing

rewriting ofthe

revered

multi-volume

_{Encyclopaedia of Islam} (first edition

1922)—

recently created a

new

spaceforthefield'soutputinits

new

series'IslaminAfrica'.15

On

the downside,theanxietyassociatedwiththerise ofpoliticalIslaminIran

and

the

Arab world and

laterin

Muslim

diasporasin the

West

hasattimes threatenedto

return the disciplinetoits early colonial

concern

withthe

monitoring

ofradicalizing externalinfluences

on

thelocal,grassroots

forms

ofthefaith.This

was

especiallytruefor

the

Maghrib and

Egypt,

where an

avalanche of

contemporary

politicalscience almost buriedhistorical research

on

Islamin earlierperiods.

Sub-Saharan

Africa

was

gener-allysparedthisfate,althoughstudiesof Islamthereinthe 1980s

and

1990s didshare a biastowardsthefaithssocio-politicalaspects.Recently, callshave

been

made

tocease neglecting theintellectual, spiritual,material,

and

economic dimensions

ofthe

Muslim

Africanexperience.

New

studiesaddressing

Muslim

architecture,visualarts,music,or

creativeliteratureare

among

thosestartingtofillthe

gap—

which

may

wellinturnfuela counter-critiqueof

an

all-out 'culturalturn'.16

Inreality, theshift inthe historiographyof African Islam

was

more

thanthe

mere

by-product ofthefaith's

worldwide

resurgence.It

was

partofthe

major

intra-

and

trans-disciplinary'turns' ofthe time: the

postmodern,

the postcolonial, the subaltern, and,

especially,thedebategenerated

by

Edward

Said's

book

Orientalism(1978). Full discus-sionoftheseintellectualcurrentslies

beyond

thescope ofthissurvey,butitiscrucialat leasttonotethe

ways

in

which

they contributedtotherenewal oftheepistemology

and

methodology

of AfricanIslamicstudies.

The

most

important

advance

is the injunctiontoavoid the reification or

essential-ization ofIslamic experience across time

and

space.

As

already noted, the use ofthe

concept 'Islam itselfisnot unproblematic;

Muslim

actors continuetouse

and

cherish

it,ofcourse,butin

ways

and

forreasonsthat

need

carefullyto

be

deconstructedinsitu.

New

studiesinsist

on

Islam'sdazzlingdiversity,withmultiple interpretations coexisting in

any

givencontext.

Though

prone

to

dogmatic

dispute orgenuineconflict,

hegemonic

interpretations of Islam

may

exert reciprocal influences

on

one

another

and

thushave overlapping

and

shiftingboundaries.So,

we

need

toreconsiderour entrenchedvisions

ofa mysticalSufiversionof Islamincontradistinctiontoa

Wahhabi,

Salafi,orreformist one.

As

Roman

Loimeier argues with regardtotheconcept oftheSufi

brotherhood

or tariqa(but the

same

argument

would

holdtruefor'Wahhabi'

movements

too),it

may

well

be

a

mere

'essentialistabstraction,anidealizationofrealities,since a tariqashould

more

properly be

viewed

as a

spectrum

ofpotentially

competing

branches

and

net-works

loyal to

prominent

familiesofscholarsor charismaticpersonalities(saints)

who

themselves

embody

amultitude ofSufi teachings'.17

Even

more

broadly,Islam

cannot

be

abstracted

from

the all-encompassing

environment

in

which

Muslim

societiesevolve.

Muslim

dynamics, moreover, havetobe studied

through

theirmultifaceted interactions

with

both

Christianity

and

indigenous Africanbelief

systems—

and

notsimplyinterms ofconversion.18

Internalpluralityextendsto justabouteverything:

from

ritualpractices

and

religious

imaginariestothe micro-politicalstrategies ofagonistic

Muslim

actors.

The impact

of

these strandsof Islam

on

different socialgroupsvaries widely, yetallare

worthy

of

aca-demic

inquiry: thelearned

and

thepowerful, butalsoordinary

Muslims and

subalterns

such as slaves,

women,

and even

children. In fact,

most

studies

on

African Islam

now

takepainstoincludeatleast

some

discussionof

women's

roles(while the

academic

pro-fessionhas

become

much

more open

to

women).

Intune withrecent

gender

theory, a

new

focus

on Muslim

masculinitiesis alsoemerging,as inthemilieu ofthe tirailleurs

senegalaisor othercolonial conscripts.19

The

question

whether

thelatestcutting-edge

research is

commensurate

with Muslims'

own

preoccupations or arises

more from

postmodern Western

anxieties is

open

to debate.

But

the

new

celebration of

Muslim

complexityis

welcome

indeed.

Elaborating

on

the

concept

of'agency' so central to subaltern studies, the

new

scholarship

on

African Islam's interface _{with colonialism further maintains that}

Muslims, both

individually

and

collectively,

remained

to_{varying degrees masters of}

their

own

destinies rather

than

passivevictims. Itgoes

without

sayingthat colonial

oppression

was no

fiction.

But

colonialism

was

rarely

powerful

orcoherent

enough

toprevent

Muslims from

manoeuvring through

itscontradictions

and

shortcomings.

Muslims

were

thus able to takeinitiatives fortheir

own

benefit—

ortothe

disadvan-tageoflocalrivals.

These

goals

were

often

pursued openly

via a

working

understand-ing—and

sometimes

misunderstanding—

with the colonial state,

which

has

been

labelled

'accommodation' by

David

Robinson

and

others.20

_More

subtle, discreet,

and

subversive tactics

were

also

employed,

often

unbeknownst

to colonial rulers

and

therefore often

more

resistanttohistoricalreconstruction. Accordingly, today's priorityisto rewrite the colonial past

from

the

indigenous

perspective, as

opposed

to thatof thecolonialstate.

Recent

studies

tend

to relegatethe colonialapparatusto the

background:

afaintpresence notquite

meaningless

butcertainlynotcentral to

Muslims'

dailylives.

To

shed

light

on

these dailylives

and

on

semi-hidden

initiatives,theinjunctionisto

pay

close attention to

Muslim

voices.Thisrequires a

new

combing

ofcolonial (andin

some

cases,Christianmission) recordstodecipher

untapped

echoes

between

thelines;

the interpretationof neglectedwrittensourcesinArabic, ajami,

and

coloniallanguages suchasdevotionalpoetry,treatises,prayers,

fatawa

orlegalopinions, narrativesof pil-grimages

and

otherjourneys;

and

theconstruction ofacorpus oforalaccounts.

A

new

ethics of writing furtherinvites scholars, especially

non-Muslims based

in the West, todeploy

polyphonic

devices inorder toaccentuate the concert ofvariegated

indige-nous

voices.It has

been

anthropologists of Islam

who

have takenthe lead in

reflect-ing

on

many

ofthese methodologicalissues.Dale Eickelman, aspecialist of

Morocco

and

the

Arab Middle

East,

dubbed

this

new

approach

a'political

economy

ofmeaning'.21

A

notablerecentshifthas

been

the

emergence

ofarespected

Muslim

African

academic

voicein African

and

in

Western

universities, especially

among

historians. This voice,

combining

scholarlyrigour withinternal

knowledge and

respectfor religious sensibili-ties,isbeginningtoredefine thefieldin yet

uncharted

ways.

Unfolding

Histories:

African Muslims

and

Colonial

Rule

As

with other colonizedpeoples,for

most

African

Muslims

thelossof sovereignty

was

a cruelcondition.

What

was

specificto

Muslims was

thatthey

were

defeated

and

subdued

by

Christian kuffdr (infidels): the conquest

was

therefore experienced as

much

as a

spiritualasapoliticalcalamity.Ifthis reality

was

plainlyshared

by

allMuslims,reactions

to it

were

more

complex.

As

discussedabove, however,

contemporary

interpretations

were

unsubtle: colonialadministrationsaccountedfor

Muslim

actors'variedstrategies

through

the distorting

prism

ofsurveillance, oftencaricaturing

both

initialopposition

and

later

forms

ofcooperation. Conversely, nationalisthistoriography

from

the 1960s

tended

to celebrate

Muslim

warriorchiefs asresistance heroes.

Among

them

was

the

Senegal valley-born shaykh Al-Hajj

'Umar

(d. 1864), the principalpropagator ofthe Tijaniyyain

West

Africa.22

_'Umar

was an

important

and complex

figure.

He

launched

a jihad of the

sword

against'pagan populations

between

theSenegal

and

Nigerrivers,but alsoagainst arival

Muslim

power,theQadiriyya-oriented

Dina

ofMasina.Recallinghis confrontationwith expansionist

French

forces,postcolonialSenegal

mainly

celebrates the staunchresistancehero,

whom

the

French

typifiedasa

dangerous

marabout.

Both

historicalinterpretationstendtooverlooka

more

complex

reality:thefactthat'Umar, like'Abd al-QadirinAlgeria,

once

alsosigneda trucewiththeFrench.

Furthersouth

was Samori Toure

(d. 1900). Originating

from

Upper

Guinea,

Samori

createdanempire extendingtonorthern

Cote

d'lvoire.

He

proclaimed

himself

almamy

(imam), butthisdid notstop

him

from

destroyingthe

town

of

Kong,

a centreofIslamic scholarship,

and

his laterpolicyof forcedIslamizationalso

met

with strongopposition.

If

Samori

hasfeatured strongly in the resistancefighters'hallof

fame

(albeit

more

ambig-uously

on

the Ivorian sidethanin

Sekou

Toure'sGuinea),itis

owing

tohisdirect clashes

with the expanding, rival imperialism ofthe French.23

It can

be noted

that Samori's

framed

portraitcan

be

seentoday looking

down

from

the wallofthe Moroccan-style

central

mosque

in

Paris—

abuildingofhistoric interest in itself, inaugurated in 1926

and funded

inpart

by

metropolitan taxpayersto

thank

Muslim

conscripts

who

foughtin defence of FranceintheFirst

World

War.

In Sudan, the British faced

Muhammad

Ahmad

ibn

Abd

Allah, aka the

Mahdi

(d.1885)

and

inSomalia,

Muhammad

Abdallah

Hasan, akathe

'Mad Mullah

(d. 1920).24

From

1911,

when

theysetin

motion

the conquest ofthe

Ottoman

province ofLibya, the ItaliansconfrontedtheoppositionoftheCyrenaica-based Sanusiyya brotherhood.

A

peacefulmissionaryorganization in origin,the Sanusiyyaeffectively

assumed

con-trolof

much

ofeastern Libyafollowing the collapseof

Ottoman

power.

From

the turn ofthetwentiethcentury,Sanusi troops foughtagainsttheFrench,theItalians,

and

the BritishinLibya,Egypt,Algeria,

and

Niger.

The

finaldefeat

came

in1931 withthe

execu-tionofmilitary

commander

'Umar

al-Mukhtar

and

theexileofthe

brotherhoods

in 1949, theshaykh ofthe SanusI order

became

its

new

king.

King

Idris

was deposed

in 1969

by

Muammar

al-Qaddafi, a

pan-Arab and

pan-AfricanleaderwithIslamic

social-ist'tendencies

and

a

new

spiritof

non-compliance

with

Western

imperialism.

On

a smaller scale, messianic figures self-proclaimed as the

mahdi

or 'Promised

Saviour' led local

and sometimes bloody

insurrections against colonial conquest.

Muslim-led

armed

resistance against colonial

encroachment,

then,

was

realenough.

But

in

no

way

was

itpeculiarto

Muslim

societies:in

many

regions,

non-Muslim

com-munities often offered

much

tougherresistance.

Muslim

responses, moreover, varied hugely. Facingthe

unprecedented

situationofkuffdr ruleoverthe daral-Islam (abode ofIslam),

Muslim

clericsresorted to the vast resources ofIslamic casuistryto devise

canonicalsolutions:jihad;physicalemigration(or

mental

withdrawal)

on

the

model

of

the

Prophet

Muhammad's

hijraorexile to

Medina;

and

taqiyyaor dissimulationinthe faceofrepression.25

Clerical families

sometimes

dividedoverthe bestcourse ofaction to

adopt

forsafeguarding the

same

Islamic ideals. In the Senegalvalley, forinstance, the

more

conciliatory Sa'ad

Buh

was

pittedagainsthis

mujahid

brother

Ma

al-'Aynin;

meanwhile,

Agibu,al-Hajj'Umar's seventhson,stayed

and

cooperated withtheFrench, whilehiscousin

Hashimi

led his followerseastwardstowards

Mecca. The

Sanusi

and

otherAlgerianfamilies

were

similarlydivided.26

_When

_armed

jihad

was

finallydefeated,

compromise

prevailedasan alternativeoption.

Most

hijraepisodes

were

discreet

and

quiet,but

some

arewell

documented.

Muhammad

Bello

Maiwurno,

fifth

son

ofSultan

Al-Tahiru—

Sokoto's eleventh sultan

who

was

killed in action against the British in

1903—

leda massive migration towards the

Sudan

(where

he

happened

to

be

well

received

by

the

same

British).Algeria

was

thescene ofa similar

exodus

in 1911,

when

hundreds

of

Tlemcen

Muslims

fledmilitaryrecruitment

and

otherwoes.

Ulamd

alsomobilizedtheconcept of

taqiyya—

derived

from

a

Quranic

term

meaning

'fear'— to legitimatestrategiesof

accommodation.

It refers to

Muslims

facing a

major

danger, in

which

caseit

becomes

permissible to interactwith an adversary'with the

tongue, not the heart'.

Another

legitimizingconcept

borrowed from

Islamic law

was

maslaha,

meaning

the

common

good

ofthe

community.

With

these canonical refer-encesin

mind,

individualspiritualguides

had

toadjusttheir tacticalchoices, juggling their

own

convictions with the local balance of power.

Based

upon

mutual

—

albeit

unequal—

advantage, these

compromises

offered valuable interlocutors to colonial

powers

as well as an opportunity for Islamic leaders to create or secure their

own

clienteles

through

protection

and

mediation. Inthis respect,'accommodation' should

be

analysed as a long-term process of

Muslim

reappropriation

and

renewal ofolder

forms

ofpower,pavingthe

way

forpostcolonial

forms

of

empowerment.

Where

and

when

colonial authorities

endorsed

suchpoliciesof mediation, itled to

many

different

Muslim

'pathsof

accommodation

in

French

and

Britishterritories.This

was

alsothe case in Italian-ruled Eritrea (1890-1941)

and

Ethiopia (1935-41), where,

unlike in Libya, theItaliansfavouredthe

development

of Islam

and

protectedits

insti-tutionsasacounterbalancetothe

Amhara

monarchy,

localpowers,

and

the

Orthodox

Church.

27

One

major

difference

must

nonetheless

be noted between French and

British colonialsituations. In the

French

Empire,the potential

agency

ofIslamic leaders

was

curbed

by

therequirementpubliclyto

acknowledge

subserviencetothe colonialstate— at

one

and

the

same

timeasecular republic

and

aself-proclaimed

'Muslim

power'.

Some

Muslim

leadersonly paidlipserviceto thisrequirement, while othersagreedtoit una-bashedlyasa

means

tootherends.

A

listof

accommodationist marabouts from

thefour cornersof

French

West

Africa

would

includeSa'ad

Buh

(d. 1917), Sidiyya

Shaykh

Baba

(d.1924),

Amadu

Mokhtar

Sakho, Boghe'scadi(d. 1934),

Shaykh

Fanta

Madi

Cherif of

Kankan

in

Guinea

(d. 1955),al-Hajj

Malik

Sy(d.1980),

and Seydu

Nuru

Tall(d. 1980).

A

grandson

ofAl-Hajj'Umar,thelatter

may

have appearedthe

most

obsequious of

them

all.Yet theconviction ofhis

modern-day

peersthathe renderedinvaluable servicestohis transnational Tijani

community

now

supersedesthisperception.28

Those

who

evaded

the colonialpledge ofallegiancefacedrepression,as inthe best

known

casesof

Amadu

Bamba,

founder oftheMuridiyya,in his earlypreachingcareer,

and

SheikhHamallah, founder ofthe

Hamawiyya,

a peculiar

branch

ofthe Tijaniyya,

who

diedin 1943 in exilein France.Yet neither'resistance'

nor

collaboration'—oversimplifiedbinary terms

fraughtwith value

judgements—

were

on

the

agenda

of

any

ofthese Islamic actorsas

an

end

initself.

What

mattered urgentlyfor

them

was

tosafeguardIslamicsocialtiesas

bestaspossiblegiventhe

uneasy

circumstances,

and

preserveafuturewhile waitingfor

kuffdr ruleto

come

to

an

end.

In British colonies, Islamic elitescouldhavegreater

autonomy

and

visibility. Unlike

the French, the Britishdidnot

abhor

religiousfiefdoms. Rather,they developed elec-tive affinitieswithlocal aristocracies,inthepolitical as

much

asthereligious

domain.

The

outstanding

French

exception

was Hubert

Lyautey,Morocco'sresidentgeneral

from

1912to 1925,

who

conducted an experiment

inindirectrulesimilar to that in

Northern

Nigeria

by

retaining

and

protecting establishedpolitical

and

religiousinstitutions.

In short, complexity

now

prevails inthe treatment of Muslim-colonial encounter;

nowhere and

at

no

time

was

there

an

automatic

and unique

Islamic response,

and

trajectories

must

be

contextualizedcarefully.

The

varietyof

Muslim

adaptiveresponses

to colonialconquest

and

ruleprovidesa

key

theme

for

ongoing

historical analysis.

History

From

Within:

Islamic

Thought

and

Community

Dynamics

in

Colonial

Situations

The

conventionaloutlook long heldthatthe colonialinterlude',inAfrica

and

elsewhere,

had

an

overallnegative

impact

on

the inner

workings

ofIslamicreligious culture.

The

fact that

young

cohorts of

reform-minded

Muslim

activists held discourses in the

same

vein

seemed

to corroboratethis scholarlyconclusion.

At

worst,the colonial era

amounted

toa

dark

age of disruption

and

crisis,

when

largerorsmallerdoses of western

'intellectualhorizons',relegating believersto socialmarginalityinan all-encompassing imperial political

economy.

29

Traditional

Quranic

education

based

on

rote

memoriz-ationof sacredtextsinArabic(alanguage

few

sub-Saharanpupils

were

taughttomaster)

seemed

doomed

to irrelevance.30 _{Everywhere, those}

trained in secular or Christian

schools

seemed

toholdthe

upper

hand.

Overtaken

by

events,gullible

crowds

ofdevout

Muslims were

characterizedas easy preyfor

new

entrepreneurial

marabouts

displayingtheir

newfound

material wealthas

baraka, orblessing.Admittedly,

nowhere

didthe colonial

yoke break

down

deep-rooted feelingsofbelongingto Islam orthetransmissionofthe faith.This

was

especiallytrue in

North

Africa,

where

theArabic language

added

totheshaping ofthereligiousrealm

intoaspiritualrefuge.It

was

alsothe casesouth ofthe Sahara,

where

local

communities

keptlivingtheirdailylivesclingingto their

own

rules.Yet the colonial

environment

was

seenasunpropitiousforIslamicdevelopment,tosay theleast.

Recent post-Orientalist literature, while not completely overthrowing this view,

is

more

nuanced and

positive inoutlook. It

shows

that,incontinuitywithprecolonial experience,

Muslim

leaders

and

societies never ceased to question the relevance of

Islamiclaws

and

valuestothe contextofcolonial modernity. This

emerges

from

new

studies thatseekto

understand

Muslims

on

their

own

terms.Debates

on

Islamic

dogma

and

orthodoxy,

and on

practice

and

ritualdifferences,properguidance

and

leadership,

and

means

toachieve social justicecan

be

seentohave

been

asintenseinthe colonial

period asbefore,

producing

new, fruitful responses. Colonial times

were

thus also a

period ofrenewal(tajdid)

and reform

(islah).

Over

the eighteenth

and

nineteenth centuries, the tariqa landscape

had

under-gone

major

transformationin

many

regionsofthe

Muslim

world,includingAfrica,as exemplified

by

thelegacyofthe

Moroccan

mystic

and

theologian

Ahmad

b.Idris.Idris

inspired

numerous

followers

throughout

the continent

and

as far

away

asSouth-East

Asia;

some

ofhis disciples

founded

new

brotherhoods, including the Sanusiyya

and

the

Sudanese Khatmiyya.

31

Sufithought

and

practice

tended

to restatethe centralityof shari'a(the exotericlegal code)

and

Him

(knowledge through

Islamicbooks) as

foun-dational stepstowards

tasawwuf

(mysticism orspirituality)

and

ma'arifa (inner esoteric

knowledge): a

complex

movement

towards 'aless mystical mysticism, a

more

rigor-ous orthodoxy,...ora

marrying

of

Wahhabism

witha reformist

form

ofSunsm'.32

Inan

authoritative article,

Rex

O'Fahey

and

Bernd

Radtke

debunked

thelabel 'neo-Sufism coinedtodescribethosetransformations,arguingthatthey didnotrepresent doctrinal innovation;rather,they

were

inscribedinthe historyofolderSufi renewals.33

Yet

both

agreedthat

brotherhoods

were

significantlyreshaped as they

became

more

centrally institutionalized

and

moved

from

beingexclusiveelitecirclesconfinedtoa

few

ascetics to

become more

like

mass movements.

Thislandscape continuedtoevolve in the colonial period.

Brotherhoods

segmented

accordingtotheir

time-honoured

fissiparousnature,withthe

emergence

of

new

charis-maticshaykhs

and

devout

communities

oftalaba(sing,talib,student),butalsoalong

new

intra-Sufilines ofdivision.In Senegal,

Amadu

Bamba

Mbacke

(1853-1927)

founded

important

brotherhood

founded

in sub-Saharan Africa. Ascetic

and

erudite,

Amadu

Bamba

preachedthe'greaterjihad'orjihadal-nafsin

Quranic

terminology(as

opposed

tothelesserjihadofthesword),stressingspiritualdevotion,study,

and

disciplined

work

inaquestforpersonalpiety

and exemplary

behaviourinthisworld,

and

salvationinthe

hereafter.34Centraltothe

Muridiyyas

socio-religiousarchitecture

was

thedaraor rural

zawiya (Sufilodge),

where

Murids working

inthe

community's

peanut fieldsreceived

spiritualguidanceaspartof

khidma

orservice in the

name

oftheshaykh (andlaterof hiskhalifa or successor).

When

Murids began

moving

to

towns

afterthe

Second

World

War

and

diversifyingtheiroccupations,they

founded

dairas, the

urban

equivalentof

the dara,alsotied

by

hierarchical

networks

of

marabouts

caringfor their local religious clientele.

Confronted

by

the polluted colonial environment,

Murids endeavoured

to Islamizetheir

own

sacredspace.This includedthe

growing

settlementof

Touba

(today

Senegal's

second

largestcity),

which

afterBamba's death

became

the destination ofa yearlypilgrimage

known

astheGreatMaggal.

New

branches of the Tijaniyya also developed in

French

West

Africa.

Shaykh

Hamallah

(1883-1943)

founded

adistinctpathin

Nioro

(in

what

is

now

Mali)

known

as

the eleven-beads'

Hamawiyya,

which

the 'twelve-beads' TijaniyyaoftheAl Hajj

'Umar

line fiercely

opposed

from

the outset.35

In Senegal, thelong understudiedbut highly influential

Ibrahima

Niasse of

Kaolack

(1900-75)

launched

his

own

Tijani

community

(though not a separate tariqa) variously

known

as Niassene, Ibrahimiyya, Tarbiya

(Arabicforeducation),

and Fayda

(spiritualflood).

At

itscentre

was

the peculiar tarbiya

developed

by

Niasse: a

new

kind

ofspiritualtrainingreservedforthe initiated

which

accelerated the attainment ofma'arifa (ecstatic knowledge).

Though

Niasse himself

insisted

on

strictrulesinthetransmission ofhis tarbiya, it

soon

fuelledcontroversyas

an increasing

number

ofbelieversjoinedthe ranks ofhis

community

and

claimedto have seen

God.

While

the

Muridiyya

remained

tiedto its

Wolof

base in Senegal, the

more

cosmopolitan

Fayda expanded throughout

West

Africa

and

especially inthe

Gold

Coast

and

Nigeria,

which Shaykh

Niasseregularlyvisited

from

the early 1950s.36

_A

_few

ofthe

Fayda

muqaddam

(authorizedtransmittersof

Masses

path)

were

women.

37

_Both

Amadu

Bamba

and Ibrahima

Niasse

aimed

at spiritual tajdid(renewal)

through

edu-cation

and were

prolificwritersofreligious textsinArabic.

Straddling the precolonial

and

the colonial periods, the Salafiyya (fromthe Arabic salafor'pious forebears')inaugurated another

major

course of

change

withinIslamic

thought. Starting as an intellectual trend associated with Jamal al-Din al-

Afghani

(1838-97),

Muhammad

Abduh

(1849-1905),

and Rashid Rida

(1865-1935),

who

called

forthe renewal

and

reform of Islam in orderto resist

Western

cultural

and

scientific domination,itslatenineteenth-century African bastion

was

Egypt. All threecriticized taqlid (blind adherence to tradition)

and

some

non-Islamic practices labelled bid'a

(innovation),

which

theyassociatedwithSufiexcesses.Instead,they advocated ijtihad,

the individualeffort

based

on

theQur'an

and

Sunna, witha

view

toadaptingIslamiclaw to

modern

problems.

Salafi teachings inspired the

Muslim

Brotherhood

(Al-Ikhwan),

which began

as

schoolteacher

Hasan

al-Banna.

By

the 1940s,it claimedtohave

one

million

members

and

sympathizers,

and

had

turnedto politicalactivism.After resortingtoterrorism,it

was

severelyrepressed

and Al-Banna was

executedin1948.SayyidQutb,

who

had

joined

the

Brotherhood

in 1953

and

publishedinfluentialwritings

condemning

Nasser's

and

other

Arab

regimesasjahili(pre-Islamicidolators),

was

alsoputto deathin 1966.

The

radical

wing

ofthe Salafiyyalaterinspired

many

so-called'Islamist'groupsindifferent

partsofthe

Muslim

world.38

InAlgeria,Salafiideasinfluenced

Shaykh

Abdelhamid

Ben

Badis (1889-1940),

who

founded

the Association of

Muslim

Algerian

Ulama

in 1931.

Despiteits

impact

remaining

limited,the association

was noteworthy

fordefendingthe

Arabic language, establishing

new

Islamic schools,

and

coalescing religious, cultural,

and

nationalist sentiments. Its leader Tawfiq

al-Madani

authored the

famous

slogan

'Islamis

my

religion,Arabicis

my

language,Algeriais

my

fatherland'.39

The

reformist

wave

gained

some

ground

in the 1950s in

West

Africa, mostly in

cities

where

a

new

generationof graduates

from

al-Azhar

and

other

Arab

universities,

as well as pilgrims returning

from Mecca, began

questioning the

competence

and

legitimacyofthe old,often hereditary, religiousguard. Itswept

through

the Malinke/ Jula world, bridgingthe present-day states ofMali,

Burkina

Faso,

Cote

d'lvoire,

and

Guinea, leadingto violent clashesforthe control of

mosques

incitiessuch as

Bamako,

Bouake,

and Kankan. Shaykh

Ture (1925-2005),

who

founded

the

Muslim

Cultural

Union

in

Dakar

in 1953,

was

vigorousin his

condemnation

ofthe alleged collabora-tionwiththe colonialstateof

some

marabouts,

who

were

prompt

to

denounce

inreturn the

assumed

Arab-fomented

sedition ofthese

young

sub-Saharan

Muslims

mislead-ingly labelled 'Wahhabis'.40

InEastAfrica,the

main

reform-oriented

movement

was

led

by

theZanzibari

Shaykh al-Amin

b. All al-Mazru'i (1890-1947)

and Abdallah

Salih

al-Farsy(1912-82).41

Although

Salafis

remained

a minority, their

concern

to reform Islamic education

had

abroad,long-term

impact

on

local

Muslim

societies.

To

borrow

LouisBrenner's

terminology, classical

Quranic

schools or majlis

were

part of

an

'esoteric episteme'

where

thetransmissionof

knowledge

was

hierarchical,restricted,

and

centred

around

ateacher

whose

legitimacyderived

from

hissilsila, i.e.genealogicalchain of previous

masters.42

Reformed

Islamic schools or

madrasa—

with classrooms, timetables,

and

exercise

books

as in colonial

and

Christian

schools—

introduced

an

epistemic shift towards a 'rationalistic episteme' characterized

by

a democratization of

knowledge

though

printed

books

inArabic,

now

taughtasa foreignlanguage alongwith

some

sec-ular topics. Generalizationsaboutthe 'madrasa turn havetheir limits,however,forit

had

hybridroots

and

distinct

developments

accordingto localcontext.

A

case inpointis

the

Ansar-Ud-Deen

SocietyofNigeria,the oldest

and

largesteducationalassociationof

Yoruba

Muslims,

founded

in

Lagos

in 1923,

which brought

togetherinfluences

from

the

Indian

Ahmadiyya,

Protestant missions,

and

local

Yoruba

dynamics.43

Inshort,

beyond

the varietyofsectariandifferences,

Muslim

communities underwent

broadly analogous changes overthe colonial interlude.

Such change

typicallyinvolved

the revisitingofold notions ofreligioustruth

and

ignorance; finding relevant

means

guidance; therise of

new

religiousentrepreneurs

and communities

of knowledge; the

restructuringof

community

organization

and

new

means

of

communication;

arelative

empowerment

of

Muslim

youth

and

to alesserextent of

women;

and

the

emergence

ofless local

and

more

genericor standardized

ways

of'being Muslim'. Inthecontext of

French

West

Africa,

Robert

Launay and Benjamin

Soares

advance

theideaof the

emer-gence ofan 'Islamicsphere',

autonomous

from

and

evadingthe controlofthe colonial

state,

and where Muslims

debated, disagreed,and,attimes,divided

on

allthese

mat-ters.44

Whether

allofthesetransformations

meant

a

modernization

of Islamor the

mak-ingofavernacularIslamic

modernity

will

be

the subjectof

ongoing

academic

debate.

Colonial

Conversion:

Sub-Saharan

Africa's

Expanding

Islamic

Frontiers

The

eighteenth-

and

nineteenth-centuryjihads

and

the rise of

mass

Sufism resulted

in a

new

wave

ofIslamization in those regions of Sudanic Africa

where

Muslims

had

hitherto

formed

a minority. In

what

has

been

described as

one

ofthe greatest

albeit

unintended

and

paradoxical

consequences

of

European

imperial conquest, this expansion continued

on

an even

broader scale

throughout

the colonial period.

Oddly, theissueof conversiontoIslam remains poorly researcheddespitethedebate

on

African conversion to

world

religionsinitiated

by

Robin

Horton

and

Humphrey

Fisherinthe 1970s.45

_One

_reasonfor

thisis thathistoricaldataarenotreadily avail-able.

Conversion tended

notto

be

publiclyvisible

and was

agradual,

sometimes

life-long,

and

often instableprocess

which

didnot precludereversiontothe olderorfurther

change

toanotherfaith (thisholdstrueforconversiontoChristianitytoo). Ifthe

some-times alarmist vision of Christian missions

and

colonial officials of the inexorable progress ofIslam should not

be

taken at face value, the

phenomenon

was

striking nonetheless.Despite thelackofreliablereligiousstatistics,itcan

be

estimatedthatthe

Muslim

population

from

Senegalto

Cameroon

and from

Sudan

to

Mozambique

prob-ablyatleast

doubled

intheeraofcolonialencounter.

In the late nineteenth-century bilad al-Sudan, Islam tended to

be

concentrated in distincttowns, territories,

and

ethnic groups,notablytheTula

and

Hausa

tied

by

their long-distancetrading networks.

As

thecolonial

economy

developed

new

axesof

com-munication

through

plantation agriculture, the monetization of exchange,

and

new

urban

centres in theforestbelt

and

alongthe

Gulf

of Guinea,

Muslim

merchants

and

migrant workers sought to seize

new

opportunities. Clerical lineages benefited

from

the loss of

power

ofestablishedwarriorclans after colonialconquest.

Some

followed inthe paths forged

by mobile merchants

to serve aheterogeneous clientele of forced

and

voluntary labour migrants

from

allwalks oflife,

many

of

whom

left the

'micro-cosm' oftheir ancestral cults for Islam

and

the 'macrocosm' ofthe colonial world.46

movement

toIslamizetheirnative regionsin

Upper

Volta(present-day

Burkina

Faso). In eastern Africa,Islam

made

inroadsina reversedirection,

from

the Swahili coast into the hinterland. In

need

ofsocial reconstructionaftercolonialconquest,the

Yao

ofthe

Tanganyika, Nyasaland,

and

Mozambique

frontierconverted en

masse

toIslam.In

both

West

and

EastAfrica,

many

freedslaves

became

Muslim

in aquestfora

new

identity

and enhanced

social status.

Some

iconoclastic

Muslim

preachers advocating abreak withpast practiceburntfetishes,as

among

the

Baga

in

French

Guinea.47

In

Accra

inthe 1930s,

some

members

ofthe

Methodist

Church

convertedtoIslam,

many

citing

dreams

astheirinspiration. In a striking

example

of

ongoing

dialogue

between

the

two world

religions,these

new

Muslims

interpreted certainpassagesinthe Bibleas foretellingthe

riseofIslam, launchingIslamic

Sunday

schools in

which

they continuedto use their

Biblestopreachinthe

name

of

Muhammad.

48_Everywhere,

peripatetic

Muslim

healers

and

proselytizingSufishaykhs contributedto

expanding

theAfrican

Muslim

map

space.

Independence, moreover, did not represent a watershed in the history ofIslamic

societies

and

religious cultures in Africa.

As

in their response to colonial

intru-sion,

Muslims

were

neither united

nor

collectively mobilizedin nationalist struggles.

Postcolonialstate

power

fellintosecular

hands

and

Islamgenerallykept evolving

away

from

thepublic scene.

As

inthe scholarlyliterature,a

change

of course

would

come

later with the post-1979 international Islamic revival.

Meanwhile,

the diversityofAfrica's

Islamic

movements—

theSufibrotherhoods,theEgyptianIkhwan,the 'Wahhabis',

and

all the

rest—

continued to

be

reshaped

by

the dialectic

between

internal patterns of

development and

new

global contexts.

Notes

1.

As

definedbyF. Hartogin his Regimesd'historicite:Presentisme etexperiencedu temps

(Paris: Seuil,2003).

2. See, respectively, T. Asad, "The Idea of an Anthropology ofIslam', Occasional Papers (Washington,

DC:

Centerfor

Contemporary

ArabStudies, 1986),andL.Brenner,'Histories

of Religionin Africa,Journal ofReligioninAfrica,30/2 (2000).

3. R. Launay,

An

Invisible Religion? Anthropology's Avoidance of Islam in Africa', in

M.

Ntarangwi, D. Mills, and

M.

H.

M.

Babiker, eds, African Anthropologies: History, Critique,andPractice(London:

Zed

Books, 2006).

4. ForanEnglishtranslationof thefirst,seeJ.Hunwick, Timbuktu

and

theSonghayEmpire:

al-Sa'di's Ta'rikh al-Sudan

down

to 1613 and other contemporary documents (Leiden:

Brill,2003).

5.

M.

Last,"The "Colonial Caliphate" ofNorthernNigeria, inD.Robinson andJ.-L.Triaud,

eds,LeTempsdesmarabouts(Paris:Karthala,1997).

6. H.R.Palmer,SudaneseMemoirs,3vols(Lagos:

Government

Printer,1928).

7. SeeH.F.C.Smith,

A

Neglected

Theme

ofWest-AfricanHistory:TheIslamicRevolutions oftheNineteenthCentury',Journal oftheHistorical SocietyofNigeria,2/1 (1961).

8. ArabicLiterature_ofAfrica,4vols(Leiden:Brill,1994-2003).

9. SeeJ.-L.Triaud,La LegendenoiredelaSanusiyya(Paris:Editionsdela

MSH,

1995).

10. See O. Kane, 'Islamism:

What

isNew,

What

isNot? Lessonsfrom

West

Africa',African Journal ofInternationalAffairs, 11/2(2008).