Islam in the African-American Experience, Second Edition

Description

"[Sure to become] a classic in the field. Highly recommended." ―Library Journal

"... full of surprises and intrigues and written in a beautiful style.... a breath of fresh air on the African-Islamic-American connection." ―Journal of the American Academy of Religion

The involvement of black Americans with Islam reaches back to the earliest days of the African presence in North America. Part I of the book explores these roots in the Middle East, West Africa, and antebellum America. Part II tells the story of the "Prophets of the City"―the leaders of the new urban-based African American Muslim movements in the 20th century. Turner places the study of Islam in the context of the racial, ethical, and political relations that influenced the reception of successive presentations of Islam, including the West African Islam of slaves, the Ahmadiyya Movement from India, the orthodox Sunni practice of later immigrants, and the Nation of Islam. This second edition features a new introduction, which discusses developments since the earlier edition, including Islam in a post-9/11 America.

Visible in the names of athletes such as Mohammed Ali and Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, African American Islam is known of, but is little known. In an exhaustive history beginning with the Islamic tradition in West Africa more than a thousand years ago and tracing its transmission to the New World through slaves and, later, Indian missionaries, Richard Brent Turner documents the historical and political circumstances that fueled Islam s growth among African Americans. These circumstances still inform the activities of its two most prominent American leaders, Warith Deen Mohammed and Louis Farrakhan. Despite the residual academic language in this reworked doctoral thesis, the rigorous documentation and illuminating commentary will likely make this book the standard text on the subject for some time to come.