Contents -- Acknowledgements -- Note on Transliteration, Personal and Place Names -- MAP -- Chapter One Introduction: The 'Ulamä' as "local intellectuals" -- Chapter Two Religious History as Social History -- Chapter Three Saints, Scholars and the Acquisition of Discursive Authority -- Chapter Four Urban Woes and Pious Remedies: Sufis, Urbanites, and Managing Social Crises in the Nineteenth Century -- Chapter Five When is Kafä'a Kifayah?-Sufi Leadership, Religious Authority and Questions of Social Inequality -- Chapter Six The Best of Guides: Sufi Poetry, theological writing and Comprehending Qädiriyya popularity in the Early Twentieth Century -- Epilogue: End of the Sufi Era -- Appendix One -- Appendix Two -- Bibliography -- Index.

Using the urban culture of southern Somalia, known as the Benaadir, this book explores the role of local 'ulama' as popular intellectuals in the early colonial period. It examines the place of religious discourse as social discourse and how religious leaders sought to guide society through a time of troubles through calls to greater piety.

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Electronic reproduction. Ann Arbor, Michigan : ProQuest Ebook Central, 2018. Available via World Wide Web. Access may be limited to ProQuest Ebook Central affiliated libraries.