This chapter looks at a high-profile Fulbe Muslim religious leader from Mali and explores his relations with the people of the Mande. This Muslim religious leader, El-Hadj Cheikh Sidy Modibo Kane... Show moreThis chapter looks at a high-profile Fulbe Muslim religious leader from Mali and explores his relations with the people of the Mande. This Muslim religious leader, El-Hadj Cheikh Sidy Modibo Kane Diallo of Dilly, in the circle of Nara, is perhaps one of the most influential religious leaders in present-day Mali. The author examines the development of Diallo's "career" as a 'shaykh' and a 'wali' (friend of God). He shows how this career has been constructed in large part through ideological oppositions between Fulbe and Mande/Bambara, as well as through the 'shaykh's interactions with actual Bambara people, particularly his efforts to spread Islam among the country's non-Muslim ("pagan") rural Bambara population and to eradicate the widespread practice of spirit possession. As he suggests, it is in such conversion campaigns that one can see most clearly how individuals - both Fulbe and Bambara - deploy such ideological oppositions. Ultimately, however, the results of such campaigns to spread Islam remain rather ambiguous. Bibliogr., notes, ref., sum. in French. [ASC Leiden abstract] Show less
This paper examines how poor members of Fulbe society, a group of agropastoralists in the Sahel, central Mali, are surviving after two decades of environmental disaster. The focus is on the... Show moreThis paper examines how poor members of Fulbe society, a group of agropastoralists in the Sahel, central Mali, are surviving after two decades of environmental disaster. The focus is on the Jalloube of the Hayre in central Mali. Social security relations and institutions based on Islam seem to be becoming more important for these people, who are not sufficiently supported anymore by 'traditional' social security mechanisms. Islam has a long history in the Hayre, as have its institutions such as 'zakat' (the basis of the Islamic principle of charity), Koranic schools and networks of Moodibaabe (Islamic scholars). The harsh circumstances in which the Jalloube live have given new values and importance to these institutions and to social relations based on Islam: new networks based on Islam are being explored; 'zakat' has become much more an institution directed at alleviating poverty and is replacing other obligatory kinship-based gift relations; Islamic knowledge and the status related to it open up new possibilities of survival. Fieldwork for this study was carried out in 1990-1992 in the 'cercle' Douentza. Show less
