Influence of Islam Upon Africa (Hardcover) – John Spencer Trimingham

Influence of Islam Upon Africa
John Spencer Trimingham

Dr. Trimingham here subjects West African Moslem society to an interdisciplinary analysis, drawing on his skills as a social scientist and as an Islamic scholar. Though his field work was done in 1952, it is supplemented by catholic and up-to-date reading. Dr. Trimingham believes that not until historical and empirical research has established an unequivocal foundation can a “more imaginative approach to the religious survey, that of intuitive understanding and deeper insight” be undertaken in the African context. The author sets out to assess both the impact of Islam on African society and the significant reciprocal manner in which the African community molds the Islam it receives. A glance at the table of contents indicates how systematically he handles his material. After an initial mise-en-scdne, in itself one of the neatest synopses of the West African geographical and social environment to hand, follow chapters on the process of religious change and Islam’s influence upon ideas of the supernatural and human per1959. ix, 262 pp., appendices, glossary, 1 map. 30s. net (in U.K. only). 642 American Anthropologist (64, 19621 sonality. Then comes an examination of institutional Islam, the background of the “old religion,” and of the influence of Islam on its social structure, life cycle, economics, and material culture, with a final chapter on the impact of Westernism.

John Spencer Trimingham (17 November 1904 – 6 March 1987) was a noted 20th-century scholar on Islam in Africa.^[1]Trimingham was born in Thorne to John William Trimingham and Alice Ventress. In Jerusalem (1932) Trimingham married Wardeh, who died in 1980.

Trimingham studied social sciences at Birmingham University, Arabic and Persian at Oxford University, and trained for the ministry of the Church of England at Wells Theological College. He served with the Church Missionary Society in the Sudan, Egypt, and West Africa (1937–53) and travelled extensively carrying out detailed studies of Islam in Africa. He first published on Arabic and on the Christian approach to Islam, later on the history of Islam in Africa and Sufi orders. Subsequently he was reader in Arabic and head of the Department of Arabic and Islamic Studies at Glasgow University (1953–64) and a visiting professor in the department of history at the American University of Beirut(1964–70). He then moved to the faculty of the Near East School of Theology in Beirut.

Triminghan died in 1987 in Lingfield.

Language: English – French – Arabic
ISBN: 9953101957
1986, Hardback, 309 pages, 17.5 x 25 cm

Book Condition: New
Publisher: Librairie du Liban