{"word_count": 828, "character_count": 6554}
University of Cape Town5-6 September 2013An International Conference convened by:Dr Dmitry BONDAREV (Centre for the Study of Manuscript Cultures, University of Hamburg)Dr Andrea BRIGAGLIA (CCI; Department of Religious Studies, UCT)Prof Shamil JEPPIE (Tombouctou Manuscripts Project - HUMA, UCT)Dr Mauro NOBILI (Department of Religious Studies/ Tombouctou Manuscripts Project - HUMA, UCT)&#160; The conference features contributions by leading specialists in the field of Muslim manuscript cultures in sub-Saharan Africa. The papers cover different dimensions of manuscripts (materials, technologies, practices and communities involved in the production, commercialisation, circulation, preservation, and consumption) produced in sub-Saharan Africa, either in Arabic or in local languages written in the Arabic alphabet (ajami).Africa has suffered, and still suffers, from many academic stereotypes. For a long time, it has been deprived of its past by the assumption that there was no history in Africa before the arrival of the Europeans (Hugh R.  Trevor-Roper 1963). With the struggle for independence in the 1950s-1960s, historians – both local and foreign – undertook to return to Africa its past. However, they did it by developing an approach that was almost exclusively based on orality (Vansina 1964). During the last two decades, the (re-)discovery of thousands of manuscripts in different regions of the continent has compelled scholars to abandon the equation Africa = orality and legitimately assigned to the continent the status of a civilization of written literacy. This new interest is confirmed by recent publications such as the multi-volume encyclopaedic work The Arabic Literature of Africa (John O. Hunwick et al., 1995-).Most of the existing studies mainly aim at serving literary and historical purposes, and focus only on the textual dimension of the manuscripts. However, the manuscript is not only ‘intellectual content’. In a recent essay in the collection The Trans-Saharan Book Trade: Manuscript Culture, Arabic Literacy and Intellectual History in Muslim Africa (Krätli &#38; Lydon 2011), Graziano Krätli refers to the “dual nature [of the manuscript]… container and content, medium and message, at one and the same time. This is represented by the difference between embodied and embedded knowledge, the former pertaining specifically to the content – the object of embodiment –, while the latter involves more intimately the container as a material, technological, economic and cultural object”.This conference accepts the challenge launched by Krätli, and aims at gathering contributions on the different dimensions of the manuscript, i.e. the materials, the technologies, the practices and the communities involved in the production, commercialization, circulation, preservation and consumption. In doing this, the conference follows in the path of the Tombouctou project, which has already built an extended network of collaborations  in the continent and beyond, leading to relevant publications like The meanings of Timbuktu (Shamil Jeppie &#38; Bashir Diagne 2008). The focus of the conference will be the Islamic manuscripts produced in sub-Saharan Africa, either in Arabic or in local languages written in the Arabic alphabet (‘ajami). With the term “Islamic”, the conference refers to manuscripts “that [were] the product of an intellectual tradition of Islamic learning… Such documentation, to be sure, was not always linked to religious matters. But to the extent that it was usually framed in the language, perspective and calendar of Islam, this knowledge can be qualified as ‘Islamic’ in nature” (Lydon 2004).&#160;The fee for attendance is R300. This fee covers the cost of breakfast, lunch, and refreshments on both days. If you are interested in attending, please RSVP and include your name, email, and a brief written motivation of your desire to attend to dllcat004@myuct.ac.za by August 26th, 2013Programme:  5 September 2013 08:00-08:30Breakfast08:30-09:00Greetings and introduction Panel 1: West African manuscripts: the physical make-up(Chair D. Bondarev)&#160;09:00-09:40Michaelle BIDDLEWesleyan University (Middletown)Using watermarks to date sub-Saharan Islamic manuscripts09:40-10:20Maimadu Barma MUTAI&#160;University of Maiduguri(Maiduguri)“Writing instruments in northern Nigerian manuscript culture”10:20-10:40Coffee break10:40-11:20Mauro NOBILIUniversity of Cape TownScript styles in West African manuscripts: a taxonomy11:20-12:00Mahmoud Dadab HAMMOUScholar and calligrapher(Timbuktu)The making of a calligrapher in twentieth-century Timbuktu12:00-13:30Lunch Panel 2: West African manuscripts and knowledge transmission(Chair M. Nobili) 13:30-14:10Shamil JEPPIEUniversity of Cape TownTo Be Confirmed14:10-14:50Susana MOLINS LLITERAS&#160;University of Cape TownA preliminary appraisal of marginalia found on West African Manuscripts from the Timbuktu collections14:50-15:10Coffee break15:10-15:50Salisu BALAAhmadu Bello University(Zaria)“The Arewa House manuscript collection: a historical perspective”15:50-16:30Shaheed MATHEEUniversity of JohannesburgLetters and fatwās as a source of Timbuktu's history from below: a paternity dispute&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160;&#160; Friday 6 SeptemberAjami manuscripts in Sub-Saharan Africa (1)(Chair S. Jeppie) 08:00-08:30                                                      Breakfast08:30-09:10Keer VERSTEEGHRadboud University NijmegenLanguage choice and Islamic learning in Arabic-Afrikaans09:10-09:50Anna SIIMMuseum of Anthropology and Ethnography(St. Petersburg)Afrikaans-Arabic Texts: Bigraphy and Bilinguism in Synchrony and Diachrony09:50-10:30Xavier LUFFINUniversité Libre de BruxellesThe Arabic and Swahili documents from Congo: Who were their scribes?10:30-10:50&#160;Coffee Break&#160;10:50-11:30Andreas WETTERHumboldt University, (Berlin)Islamic Literary Tradition in Wollo, North-eastern Ethiopia11:30-12:10Adrien DelmasIFAS, JohannesburgPortuguese encounters with African written cultures in the 16th century12:10-14:10Lunch Panel 4: Ajami manuscripts in Sub-Saharan Africa (2)(Chair A. Brigaglia) 14:10-14:50Rudolph WAREUniversity of WisconsinVerse and Verso: The Back of the Qur'anic Lawh in Arabic and Wolofal Literacy Training.14:50-15:30Tal TAMARICEMAF (Paris)“Bamana texts in Arabic characters: Some leaves from Mali”15:30-15:50Coffee break15:50-16:30Dmitry BONDAREVCSMCUniversity of HamburgEmergence of a dedicated ample spaced layout in annotated West African manuscripts (Kanem-Borno, Senegambia and Mali)&#160;&#160;