Islam and Ethnicity in Africa and the Middle East

Aftab A. Khan
1991 American Journal of Islam and Society  
This three-day seminar, sponsored by the State University of New Yorkat Binghampton's Schweitzer Chair in Humanities, the South Asian and AfricanStudies Program, the Department of African Studies, and the African AmericanInstitute, discussed the African experience, the Middle East experience, andcrosscultural comparison.The opening presentation was made by Ali Mazrui, who holds theSchweitzer Chair in Humanities at Binghampton. He discussed the interactionof Islam and ethnic cultures in Africa
more » ... d pointed out that Islam and ethnicityare essentially contradictory concepts, one being a universalist and the othera particularist view of society. "But," according to him, "Islam has becomeethnicized and ethnicity tends to become Islarnized." The resulting tensionscan be overcome only by a strong sense of human solidarity, such as theone which the Prophet talked about when he said that nobody excels in faithunless he loves for his brother what he loves for himself ...
doi:10.35632/ajis.v8i2.2637 fatcat:t6lxpbl47jcdnbtnrvjljm6yyi