European Traditions in the Study of Religion in Africa

Front Cover
Otto Harrassowitz Verlag, 2004 - Religion - 404 pages
This volume comprises case studies of five centuries of European encounters with and imaginations of Africa encompassing her triple religious heritage: African Traditional Religions, Christianity and Islam. The introductory chapters outline the challenges and present overviews; some of them also analyze the early accounts of European travelers and missionaries. The following contributions examine the lasting legacy of the European Enlightenment in employing an ambivalent language of human equality and universalism, while in actual fact consigning Africa to an inferior position. It has been difficult for western scholars to divorce themselves wholly from the perceptions thus established. However, there have been quite different approaches. This is indicated in the papers discussing the role and impact of influential European academics (scholars of religion, theologians, historians and social scientists) during the colonial and postcolonial period. Other contributions examine specific institutional centers of African religious studies in Europe. The concluding chapters critically assess European approaches and their use for the study of religion in Africa from an African perspective.
 

Contents

They became slaves of their definitions Okot pBitek 19311982 and
23
Sources in Mission Archives
39
German Koran Translations and Their Reception in North Africa
57
Thinking Alterity in Abbé
97
Wissenschaft Africa and the Cultural Process according to Johann Gottfried
117
Africa and the Origin of the Science of Religion Max Müller 18231900
141
A Polemic
161
J H Oldham 18741969 Missions and British Colonial
175
Integrative or Isolationist?
237
The Significance of Approaches to the Study of African
255
Reflections of an Editor
265
Aims and Activities
291
Institutions of the Former GDR
313
Some Remarks on the Growing Interface of Migration Studies
329
East African
365
Appendix
383

A Wise Listener to African Voices
197
Sixty Years of Engagement with Africa
217

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