Manuscripts and Arabic-script writing in Africa
Edited by Charles C. Stewart and Ahmed Chaouki Binebine
165 x 240 mm
592 pages
Published May 2023 (Hardback)
ISBN Hardback: 978-1-7392607-0-5
Hardback
£100.00 (excluding shipping)
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Manuscripts and Arabic-script writing in Africa
One of the lesser-known secrets of the African past is the breadth of literary record dating back over four hundred years. This is a tradition founded on Arabic writing and the writing of African languages in Arabic script, the subject of this volume of essays by eminent authorities on the manuscript cultures of North and West Africa. This unique collection that charts the state of the art in this rapidly expanding field began as a conference, Arabic-script manuscripts in Africa, convened by The Islamic Manuscript Association and Bibliotheca Alexandrina's Manuscripts Center in September 2021.
The book explores the Arabic script in its widest possible usage in Africa: in Arabic texts; as a sacred Islamic script; and as a script for writing African languages. Through various contributions, the book examines the social impact of Arabic-script writing, aiming to parse the materiality of the book in African societies and to understand African manuscripts in their life cycles from creation to archival shelf.
Essays examine Arabic-script manuscripts as material objects, statements of social values, cultural affirmations, and spiritual companions. They peel back the chronological layers of `ajamī writing that has been used for instruction and cultural and political identity, and remind us of how new technologies enhance access to these manuscripts, just as they present challenges to the intellectual property they represent. Essays are organized into five parts: Manuscript Collections, Manuscript Networks, Manuscripts and Social Values, and Technical Issues; with a concluding essay that identifies the core texts in West Africa’s manuscript culture during the past 300 years.
Contents
Manuscripts and Arabic-script writing in Africa
Charles C. Stewart
Chapter 1: Introduction
The book in Africa
Ahmed Chaouki Binebine
The spread of manuscript cultures written in Arabic-script in sub-Saharan Africa
Bahija al-Chadili
Arabic-script manuscripts in African languages
Helmi Sharawy
Recovering the life stories of Africa’s manuscripts
Mary Minicka
Chapter 2: Manuscript collections
The Kairouan manuscript collection
Jonathan E. Brockopp
The Manuscripts Department, University of Dakar
Djim Othman Drame
Arabic manuscript collections at the University of Ibadan
Afis A. Oladosu and Izzudeen Adetunji
Manuscripts at the Ahmed Baba Institute in Timbuktu
Mohamed Diagayeté
Chapter 3: Manuscript networks
Islamic manuscripts and scholarly networks of the greater Senegambia
Darya Ogorodnikova
Manuscript preservation in Borno State, Nigeria
Ahmadu Hamman Girei
Printing Arabic manuscripts in the sixteenth century
Olga Verlato
Chapter 4: Manuscripts and social values
Musical manuscripts in early-modern Morocco
Carl Davila
Arabic and Pulaar manuscripts in Senegal and Mali
Samba Camara and Mohamed Mwamzandi
The social status and social values of manuscripts in Africa
Seyni Moumouni
Chapter 5: Technical issues
Standardizing West African manuscript metadata
David Calabro, Ali Diakite and Paul Naylor
Challenges of a standard orthography for the Yoruba `ajamī script
Amidu Olalekan Sanni
Challenges of Amazigh manuscripts in Morocco
Ahmed Saidy
Epilogue
Literary authority in Islamic West Africa
Charles C. Stewart
Authors' biographies
Reviews
Much curiosity has been aroused by manuscripts written in African languages using Arabic script (which is usually referred to as ʿajamī in West Africa). In this collection of essays, we find an unusual level of in-depth discussion of these kinds of manuscripts from across the continent. It may mark a shift from a topic about which we know relatively little, to a new level of detailed, empirical work that opens up a whole new field of African intellectual history.
Manuscripts which include African languages written using Arabic script (usually referred to as ʿajamī in West Africa) are relatively poorly understood. This collection of essays includes detailed accounts of different African-language writings from across the continent. It will be welcomed by scholars and students interested in Islam in Africa, and in the complicated interface between Arabic as the language of sacred knowledge (for Muslims) and African vernaculars into which this knowledge was translated. This collection pushes forward what we know about this important subject, and in doing so, helps us to better understand not only African language writing using Arabic script, but also the larger process of Islamicization across the continent.
Bruce S. Hall, Associate Professor, Department of History; Senior Research Scholar, Center for middle eastern studies, University of California Berkeley
A new continent in the intellectual knowledge of African past, where writing and orality intermingle, has been opened up by this book. It uncovers a still poorly known and scattered field of writings in African languages and the Arabic alphabet (‘ajamī script). This remarkable work is part of an effort that has been carried out for more than 30 years to find and make known African Arabic Islamic literature, notably the printed collection Arabic Literature in Africa and the digital West African Arabic Manuscript Database.
Jean-Louis Triaud, Professor Emeritus of African history, University of Provence Aix-Marseille I member of the Institut des mondes africains (IMAF), and Director of the Islam and Societies South of the Sahara journal.
Treasures of manuscript collections, African languages in Arabic script, scholarly networks of sub-Saharan past – this is just a handful of topics offered by this lavishly illuminated volume. An inspirational companion to anyone interested in manuscript cultures and (im)material heritage of Africa, the book will enlighten the reader and beautify a library.
Dmitry Bondarev, Head of West Africa research projects, Centre for the Study of Manuscript Cultures, University of Hamburg.
This work brings together research and analyses that deepen and extend one’s grasp of the whole field. It offers stimulating insights into the ‘ajamī script of Sub-Saharan Africa.
P.F. de Moraes Farias, FBA, Honorary Professor, Department of African Studies and Anthropology, University of Birmingham, UK.
The book presents a window into the rich manuscript culture of Islamic Africa, fromKairouan to Ibadan, from the Atlantic shores to the Lake Chad. The different contributions and the elegant introduction, the book will be an indispensable item in the library of both specialists of Islamic manuscripts and a general audience.
Mauro Nobili, Associate Professor, Department of History, college of Liberal Arts and Sciences, University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, USA.
About the authors
Charles C. Stewart, Professor emeritus in history at the University of Illinois at Urbana Champaign.
Ahmed Chaouki Binebine, Director of the Royal Treasury (Bibliothèque al-Hassania) – Rabat, Morocco.
