Muslim AfricaA deeper sense of Muslim Africa

Published 17 April 2017

Africa is home to nearly 30 percent of the world’s Muslims, but the role of Islam in allowing Africans to transcend parochial identities and differences has not been appreciated. “Africa has been represented in academia as well as in popular representations as a continent of warring tribes. Look at the coverage of Africa in most TV channels. It is most of the time about tribal conflicts. What I argue in my book is that large sections of West African peoples have, in the past and the present, proven their ability to transcend parochial identities and differences in a common cause and have indeed claimed their independence of thought and common destiny. More than anything else, this is embodied in a long literary tradition in the Arabic and in African languages written with the Arabic script,” says Harvard professor Ousmane Kane, author of Beyond Timbuktu: An Intellectual History of Muslim West Africa.

Ousmane Kane, the Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal Professor of Contemporary Islamic Religion and Society and professor of Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations in the Harvard University’s Faculty of Arts and Sciences, earlier this month discussed his book, Beyond Timbuktu: An Intellectual History of Muslim West Africa, at Harvard’s Center for the Study of World Religions. The talk was co-sponsored by the Islam in Africa Speaker Series.

Kane delivered the keynote address  in February at the Divinity School conference Text, Knowledge, and Practice: The Meaning of Scholarship in Muslim Africa.

Liz Mineo of the Harvard Gazette interviewed Kane to illuminate the roots and influence of Islam in Africa, which is home to nearly 30 percent of the world’s Muslims.

Gazette: What is the most common misconception the West has about African Muslims?
Kane: Black Africa has been represented in academia as well as in popular representations as a continent of warring tribes. Look at the coverage of Africa in most TV channels. It is most of the time about tribal conflicts. What I argue in my book is that large sections of West African peoples have, in the past and the present, proven their ability to transcend parochial identities and differences in a common cause and have indeed claimed their independence of thought and common destiny. More than anything else, this is embodied in a long literary tradition in the Arabic and in African languages written with the Arabic script. Unfortunately, this literary tradition has been obscured by Western discourses of the past century that tended to represent black Africa essentially as a continent of orality. In doing so, these discourses have obscured its literary tradition.

Gazette: How did Islam spread from the Arabian Peninsula to the rest of Africa?
Kane: Islam has a very long history in Africa. In fact, it was introduced in the African continent even before it spread in Arabia, let alone the neighboring countries of the Arabian Peninsula. The prophet Muhammad sent dozens of his companions to Ethiopia before the beginning of the Muslim calendar. During the first century of the Muslim calendar, Islam spread from Egypt through the Red Sea and the East African coastal areas on one hand, and from Egypt across the desert to the rest of North Africa on the other hand. It is from North Africa that it was introduced to West Africa across the Sahara.