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AEGIS European Conference on African Studies
11 - 14 July 2007
African Studies Centre, Leiden, The Netherlands
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Constituting Bodies of Islamic Knowledge in Sub-Saharan Africa
| Panel |
14. New Modes of Sociality in Muslim Africa
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| Paper ID | 357 |
| Author(s) |
Seesemann, Ruediger ; Ware, Butch
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| Paper |
No paper submitted
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| Abstract | This paper proposes to approach questions pertaining to the production, use, and appropriation of texts among African Muslims through an analysis of distinct knowledge practices. The title “constituting bodies of knowledge” allows for various readings that will be explored in some detail, drawing on material from field research conducted by the presenters in Senegal, Sudan, and Kenya. In the first reading we situate academic scholars of Islam as subjects of the clause and direct our attention to the ways they generate and structure knowledge about Islam in Africa. The second reading pictures African Muslims as the subjects, viewing them as active agents in the production of knowledge and the constitution of bodies of knowledge. In the third step, we take the analysis of “bodies” on another level and present examples of “corporeal” or “embodied” knowledge that we believe to be crucial for the understanding of knowledge practices in African contexts. Finally, the paper addresses the transmission of knowledge, highlighting and re-interpreting some of the recent transformations that have been interpreted by Brenner and others as a shift from the “esoteric” to the “rationalistic” paradigm. We hope that the theoretical, practical, and methodological insights developed in the paper will demonstrate the potential utility of the notion of “bodies of knowledge” in redirecting and redefining the study of Islamic thought, texts, and practices in Africa. |
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