The study of Islam in Africa in the age of empire

Dr. Benjamin F. Soares, a researcher at the African Studies Centre, Leiden, is an anthropologist whose interests centre around religion and modernity in Africa. He is the author of a forthcoming book, Islam and Modernity in a West African Town, and co-editor of a forthcoming collection of essays, Muslims, Transnationalism, and the Public Sphere in Europe.

The theoretical and methodological issues for research on Islam and Muslim societies are particularly thorny given dominant Western notions of Islam as monolithic. This is most manifest in ideas of Islamic fundamentalism, not to mention resistance by some Muslims to having their religion studied.

The speaker will critically assess some of the key trends in colonial and postcolonial scholarship about Islam and Muslim societies in Africa. Pointing to some of the limitations of existing scholarship, a number of important areas for scholarly attention on Islam in Africa will be identified – Islam in comparative context, transnationalism and Islam, and the public sphere and Islam. These areas of study will not be unproblematic in the present age of empire.