Category Archives: Bibliography

Archives, Bibliography, Databases & Database Trials, Koran, News & Current Events, Primary Sources, Quran, Reference, Salafis, Salafists, Timbuktu

Timbuktu’s Manuscripts, Archives and Patrimony Under Threat

Citizens of Timbuktu, Mali’s historic city and the legendary UNESCO World Heritage Site, are rallying to protect ancient documents dating back to the Golden Age of the 12th and 15th centuries that officials fear may be looted or trafficked under the current occupation by Tuareg groups. United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO) Director-General Irina Bokova on Tuesday (April 17th) appealed to Mali’s neighbours to help prevent any looting or destruction of Timbuktu’s centuries-old cultural heritage:  “Reports about the rebel takeover of Timbuktu’s Ahmed Baba Institute of Higher Islamic Studies and Research (IHERI-AB) and other cultural institutions are cause for great alarm.”  “These centres contain ancient documents, written or copied locally, and others written in Morocco, Andalusia or some African countries, or sent to Timbuktu by pilgrims from distant Islamic lands hundreds of years ago,” Bokova added.  These documents, she said, date back to “Timbuktu’s golden period of glory between the 12th and 15th centuries” and cover subjects “from religious studies to mathematics, medicine, astronomy, and music”.

Moussa Ag Hamta, owner of a private library, told Magharebia that the concerns of the UNESCO Director-General were shared by the residents of Timbuktu who link their history to these historical centres.

“I’m proud of the documents I own because they contain many sciences,” he said. “However, the takeover of the city by the extremist Islamic groups has put an end to the arrival of European tourists and made me hide these documents lest I should be forced to destroy or turn them in to them.”  “They consider these documents to be a heresy and believe that preserving them is some sort of worship, which contradicts the Islamic Sharia in their opinion,” he concluded.

Local resident Ibrahim Ag Nita described the scene: “Two days ago, some Ansar al-Din and al-Qaeda elements entered the Documents Centre at Ahmed Baba Institute and told the attendees that the Islamic Sharia only approves of Islamic religious books because they help boost doctrine, and that books of other sciences, such as math, astronomy and other sciences, are not useful to Muslims and must be removed.”

“After that, they took away rubber bags containing some documents and went to an unknown place,” he said.

“People here fear a repetition of what the Taliban did when it destroyed some Buddha statues as idols worshipped by people,” he added. “This is the same view that these extremists have of human heritage, as they say that this entire heritage is nothing but a heresy that must be disposed of.”

Timbuktu has been a destination for cultural tourism in recent years, as it contains between 60,000 and 100,000 manuscripts. This is in addition to mosques and shrines of the kings of Sudanese empires that inhabited the Sahara and West Africa, together with buildings dating back to several centuries.

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Mali – Ancient Books Stolen – NYTimes.com

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Even people who have never heard of Mali have usually heard of Timbuktu, or at least have heard phrases like “from here to Timbuktu.” Founded between the 5th and 11th centuries by Tuareg desert nomads, Timbuktu became a meeting point between north, south and west Africa and a melting pot of black Africans, Berber, Arab and Tuareg desert nomads. The trade of gold, salt, ivory and books made it the richest region in west Africa and it attracted scholars, engineers and architects from around Africa, growing into a major centre of Islamic culture by the 14th century. Timbuktu is home to nearly 100,000 ancient manuscripts, some dating to the 12th century, written in Arabic or Africanized versions of the Arabic alphabets, and preserved in family homes and private libraries under the care of religious scholars. However, the city is poor now, and is at the center of attacks by Tuareg rebels and al-Qaeda linked jihadists, while Mali itself is being governed by the head of a botched military coup. It’s feared that the violence will lead to the destruction of the manuscripts and Timbuktu’s great earthen architectural wonders.

Source:AFP

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More about the Timbuktu manuscripts [with different figures: “700,000 medieval African documents”] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timbuktu_Manuscripts

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The Tombouctou Manuscripts Project

The Tombouctou Manuscripts Project at the University of Cape Town (UCT) is dedicated to research various aspects of writing and reading the handwritten works of Timbuktu and beyond. Training young researchers is an integral part of its work.

Sauvegarde et Valorisation des Manuscrits pour la Défense de la Culture Islamique

NEWS:

– TF1 News (12 avril 2012) : http://lci.tf1.fr/filnews/monde/nord-mali-les-islamistes-controlent-le-plus-grand-centre-de-manuscrits-7129513.html

– Jeune Afrique (11 avril 2012) :http://www.jeuneafrique.com/Article/ARTJAWEB20120411115235/culture-rebelle-tombouctou-manuscritmali-d-importants-manuscrits-anciens-de-tombouctou-sauves-de-la-destruction.html

– Rue89 (Le Nouvel observateur) (10 avril 2012) http://www.rue89.com/2012/04/10/tombouctou-un-tresor-culturel-de-lhumanite-en-peril-231031

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Tuareg rebellion (2012) – Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Interest in ancient books could restore Timbuktu

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/01/04/AR2010010403161.html?hpid=artslot

By Karin Brulliard
Washington Post Foreign Service
Tuesday, January 5, 2010; A07

TIMBUKTU, MALI — From a dented metal trunk, Abdoul Wahim Abdarahim Tahar pulled out something sure to make a preservationist’s heart race — or break: a leather-bound book written by hand in the 14th century, containing key verses of the prophet Muhammad, and crumbling at the edge of each yellowed page.

“Every time I touch it, it falls apart,” he said, paging through the book. “Little by little.”

But Tahar saw promise in the brittle volume — for himself, his family and this legendary but now tumbledown town. He is not the only one. A sort of ancient-book fever has gripped Timbuktu in recent years, and residents hope to lure the world to a place known as the end of the Earth by establishing libraries for visitors to see their centuries-old collections of manuscripts.

In a West African town where nomads and traders eke out livings, a revival of world attention to hundreds of thousands of privately held manuscripts — which survived fire, rain, sand and termites — represents an economic opportunity. But researchers and residents say the restoration of the books, most written in Arabic on fragile paper or lambskin, is also vital to showcasing Timbuktu’s — and, by extension, sub-Saharan Africa’s — more glorious past as a vibrant hub of scholarship.

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[MORE] … http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/01/04/AR2010010403161.html?hpid=artslot

 

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On Apr 10, 2012, at 9:42 PM, “Jennifer Yanco” <1989.wara@gmail.com> wrote:

I am writing to alert you to the situation in Mali, which is increasingly volatile. The conflict has spread to Timbuktu, home of thousands of manuscripts documenting the rich heritage of West Africa through the ages.

I write as a member of the scholarly community, which is concerned for the safety of this cultural and intellectual heritage housed in the many libraries and private collections in Timbuktu. I know that this will be of concern to your institution. Our West African colleagues, Drs. Habib Sy and Ibrahima Lo prepared a petition, urging the parties to the conflict to be mindful of the value of the heritage in these manuscripts and to spare them. We were sent a copy of the petition and were able to make an online petition, which you can now find on the WARA website home page (www.bu.edu/wara) and at the link copied below.

We are pleased to be able to work in solidarity with our West African colleagues on this and hope that you will be able to post the link to the petition or otherwise pass it along to your colleagues. A major treasure of the world is at stake.

http://bit.ly/TIMBUKTU
thanking you in advance for joining this effort.

Jennifer

—

 

Jennifer J. Yanco, PhD

US Director

West African Research Association

232 Bay State Road

Boston, MA  02215

617-353-8902

www.bu.edu/wara

• Arab Awakening, Archives, Bibliography, eBooks, Freedom of the Press. Arab Countries, News & Current Events, Translated News from the Middle East

World Book and Copyright Day Celebrations in Arab Countries

23 April is a symbolic date for world literature, since 23 April 1616 was the date of death of Cervantes, Shakespeare and Inca Garcilaso de la Vega. 23 April is also the date of birth or death of other prominent authors such as Maurice Druon, K.Laxness, Vladimir Nabokov, Josep Pla and Manuel Mejía Vallejo.This year, Tunis lit the candle for UNESCO’s World Book Day.

The theme of this year’s book day is translation. Since 1979, UNESCO member states have logged more than 2 million translations in their translation index, which is available online.

Five days before the annual UNESCO-sponsored World Book and Copyright Day, hundreds of Tunisian readers took over iconic Habib Bourguiba Avenue with an event called “L’avenue taqra” or “The avenue reads.” Children and adults sat in cafes, on steps, and on the sidewalks to read a variety of books. As the day wore on, many held candles in order to continue reading into the night.

The invitation to the April 18th event in Tunis explained that everyone would bring their own books or magazines to cafés or other public places where they would sit and read silently together for an hour.”  Nas Décaméron, an artistic and literary group based at Ibn Khaldoun Cultural Centre in Tunis called for the initiative. It also organises a salon every week to discuss a world novel. The group’s Kamel Riyahi headed the “Read” initiative.  According to a 2010 Tunisian reading survey, more than 20% of respondents hadn’t read a book in their entire life and of those who did read, 60% read fewer than five books per year.

In Cairo, Shorouk Bookstores is offering the best WB & CD discount, at 20%, but other stores (BookSpot), chains (Alef), and government entities (GEBO) are also offering money-off deals. The Cervantes Institute in Dokki (Cairo) today offers readings of Cervantes’ “Don Quixote” in its original Spanish and in Arabic translation. The novel will be read continuously from noon until 7:45 pm.

In Sharjah or Dubai, the children’s reading festival opened today. Moroccans are going to read books before the parliament. The theme is: “Culture in the face of absurdity.” If you’re in Lebanon, Antoine Bookstore is having an exhibition of Spanish books and books about Spain in collaboration with Cervantes Institute in Downtown Beirut.

Bibliography, Islam, Koran, Quran

Disposing of Copies of the Koran (al-Muṣḥaf = الـمـصـحـف)

Handling and disposal of sacred texts or other religious items can be a problematic issue for the ‘layperson’ (and sometimes a matter of life and death if the text is ‘desecrated’!). In the Muslim tradition, the Koran (Quran) is considered the literal and sacred word of God, the direct link to the divine, the source of the faith, and it is the most important symbol of their religion. But Muslims don’t worship the text of the Koran itself. So, how do Muslims respectfully dispose of a text of the Koran that is no longer usable?

 

Here are a few opinions and interpretations:

  • The proper way to dispose of the Quran is to first soak it in some water for a few days, and then bury it. So the ink comes off.
  • Two methods of disposing an unusable Qur’an and Islamic literature:

(1) Wrapping them in a piece of cloth or something pure and burying them respectfully in a place where people normally do not walk upon.

(2) Fastening the items to something heavy such as a stone and placing it respectfully in flowing river.

  • Other scholars have mentioned three ways of doing that:

(1) Burning, i.e., burning old copies of the Mus-haf in a careful and respectful  manner, in a clean and safe place, whilst ensuring that the words are consumed by the fire and the pages are changed. (It must be done thoroughly until there is nothing left but ashes)

(2) Burying, for which a place that is clean and safe from tampering should be chosen. A deep hole should be dug in which it is thought most likely that the buried copies will disappear for a long time. They may be buried in a clean, pure place where they will not be subject to mishandling in the future, to the best of one’s knowledge.

(3) Shredding. This may be the easiest way nowadays. There are machines into which one inserts papers and they shred them into tiny pieces, so that they are no longer regarded as words of the Qur’aan or even legible letters. This is clean and safe and does not involve a lot of effort, as is the case with burning or burying.

BOTTOM LINE: Burning the Koran is permissible if done respectfully!

RELATED:

Archives, Bibliography, News & Current Events, Primary Sources, Reference, Uncategorized, Yemen

Yemen 2011 Stability Survey

Yemen.svgYemen

Foreign Policy Research Institute (FPRI)

In April 2011, FPRI posted the most extensive survey done to date of Yemen’s population. Conducted by Glevum Associates, a firm run by FPRI Senior Fellow Andrew Garfield, the survey indicated a disquieting level of support for Al Qaeda among Yemen’s populous as well as a profound resistance to US intervention in the country.

In response to the enormous interest in the survey, and rising tensions in the country, FPRI brought together a group of experts to discuss the survey as well as recent developments, including the reported shift in US policy toward a public role in easing Yemen’s President out of office despite his cooperation in fighting Al Qaeda.

Audio

Of Related interest

About the Panelists

Andrew Garfield is a Senior Fellow at the Foreign Policy Reseearch Institute and founder of Glevum Associates, which conducts extensive face-to-face social science research in several countries on behalf of the Department of Defense and other clients. He is former European Director of the Terrorism Research Center, Deputy Director of International Policy Institute (IPI) at King’s College London, and Senior Director of Influence and Insight for the Lincoln Group. Mr. Garfield is also a former senior British military then civilian intelligence officer and former senior policy advisor at the UK Ministry of Defense. While serving in the UK Defense Intelligence Staff he led two major studies that reviewed key aspects of that organization’s approach to post-Cold War intelligence analysis and recommended radical changes to policy and organization that were subsequently implemented in full. After moving into academia with King’s College London, he devised and successfully led three major projects for the U.S. Department of Defense focusing on the terrorist threat; likely adversary asymmetric warfare strategies; and the development of U.S. strategic influence operations and cultural intelligence.

Christopher Swift is an attorney and political scientist specializing in international law and contemporary armed conflict. A fellow at the University of Virginia Law School’s Center for International Security Law, he has travelled to Afghanistan, the Middle East, and the former Soviet Union to examine al-Qaeda’s relationships with indigenous Muslim insurgencies. Dr. Swift’s legal practice focuses on complex international disputes, compliance with U.S. foreign trade and investment laws, and various aspects of public and private international law. Prior to joining the University of Virginia, he served in the U.S. Treasury Department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC), where he enforced economic sanctions programs targeting terrorist syndicates, weapons proliferators, and other specially designated entities. Between 2006 and 2007, he served an international law fellow at the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom, where he examined armed conflict and sectarian violence in Iraq. He was previously affiliated with organizations including Freedom House, where he worked on Russian affairs, and the Center for Strategic & International Studies, where he served as an aide to former national security advisor Zbigniew Brzezinski. A term member of the Council on Foreign Relations,

Dr. Swift is the author of The Fighting Vanguard: Local Insurgencies in the Global Jihad, which addresses the deficiencies in, and the growing need to, distinguish between different strains of Islamic militancy. He holds an A.B. in Government and History from Dartmouth College, a M.St. in International Relations of the University of Cambridge, and a J.D. from Georgetown University. He successfully defended his Ph.D. thesis in Politics & International Studies at the University of Cambridge in October 2010.

Curtis Cobb is a sociologist who does research on attitude formation, change, and effects, on the psychology of political behavior, and on survey research methods. He is a research scientist at Glevum Associates, LLC. Cobb received his B.A. degree in psychology from the University of Southern California, an M.A. from Columbia University, and his PhD in sociology from Stanford University. Prior to graduate school, he was a policy and budget consultant to the California State Senate. He has lectured on survey methodology at universities and for corporations and has served as a survey consultant to such organizations as the National Science Foundation, American Bar Foundation, and Stanford University. He has collaborated on surveys with the Associated Press, Yahoo News, and the Los Angeles Times.

Archives, Bibliography, eBooks, Egypt, Islam, Languages & Language Tools, Literature, News & Current Events, Reference, Tunisia

Reading Adam Smith in Arabic

In The Wall Street Journal, Donald J. Kochan writes that the region needs ‘The Wealth of Nations’ now more than ever.

Never mind the tone of the piece, especially in the first par. —What else is new?!  Read more below about

Reading Adam Smith in Arabic

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The region needs ‘The Wealth of Nations’ now more than ever.

By Donald J. Kochan.  The Wall Street Journal, 17 February 2011, A17

At this time of unrest and transition in the Arab world, the United States’s capacity to communicate core values of democracy and individual liberty is a priority. Our capability to translate them into Arabic is a necessity. We need to expose the Arab world to the fundamental texts of Western political and philosophical thought. Indeed, the export of ideas may be the most valuable commodity we have to offer.

Of course we hear similar sentiments often. But our seduction by the power of the Internet has distracted us from remembering the power of books.

Twenty-five years ago, the U.S. State Department initiated a little-known but very important project, the Arabic Book Program. It primarily operates out of our embassies in Cairo and Amman, and the U.S. Consulate General’s office in Jerusalem. As the State Department explains, the objective is “translating into Arabic, publishing and distributing selected books from American writers in various areas, including economics, management sciences, politics, humanities, arts, and the environment.” … [MORE]

Arabic Book Program

“The Arabic Book Program was established in 1986 with the objective of translating, publishing, and distributing in Arabic a selection of books from U.S. authors in various areas and disciplines. The U.S. Consulate General in Jerusalem provides local Palestinian organizations with quality Arabic translations of American books through this program. These books are  offered free of charge. We currently have in stock more than 60 different titles in a variety of categories, including: democracy and governance, economic development, management, civic education, media, the U.S. financial system, American Studies, conflict resolution, international relations, political science, information technology, and more.”