John Hanson
- Associate Professor, History Department
- Director, African Studies Program
- Editor, Africa Today
Education
- Ph.D. at Michigan State University, 1989
Contact Information
| Ballantine Hall, Rm. 731 |
| (812) 855-5212 |
Background
I am a historian of Africa with research interests focusing on West Africa. My current project concerns Muslim African engagements with modernity in the twentieth century. I focus on the Ahmadiyya Muslim community, a trans-national Islamic movement with a south Asian genesis but a large following in West Africa, emphasizing the experiences of African converts in the Gold Coast (contemporary Ghana) who played leading roles as missionaries and teachers in Ahmadi schools. My first project examined the aftermath of the nineteenth century "holy war" led by al-hajj Umar Tal. I argue that Futanke (Pulaar-speaking Senegal valley Muslims) migrated to the Umarian conquered territories of Karta (in contemporary western Mali) for diverse reasons and exacerbated growing social divisions (and resistance to warfare) after Umar's death. I work with diverse sources, including oral reminiscences, Arabic correspondence and colonial documents. My teaching reflects these interests and expands to include the entire continent, the broad range of social and cultural transformations associated with the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, and questions of historical method and interpretation.
Selected Awards
- Fulbright-Hays Faculty Research Abroad Fellowship
- National Endowment for the Humanities, Texts and Translations Program
- Rockefeller Foundation Humanities Fellowship at the U.S. Library of Congress
- Trustee's Teaching Award, College of Arts and Sciences, Indiana University
Research Interests
- West African history
- Muslim communities
- Social/cultural history
Courses Recently Taught
- African civilizations
- History of Christianity and Islam in Africa
- History of Eastern Africa
- History of Western Africa
- Graduate colloquiums in African history on topics such as Muslim identities; Orality and Literacy
- Graduate seminar in African history: Colonial Encounters
Publication Highlights
Books/CD-ROMS
Friday Prayers at Wa (CD-ROM unit), in Patrick McNaughton, John Hanson, dele jegede, Ruth Stone, and N. Brian Winchester, Five Windows Into Africa (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2000).
Migration, Jihad and Muslim Authority in West Africa; the Futanke Colonies in Karta
(Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1996).
After the Jihad: The Reign of Ahmad al-Kabir in the Western Sudan, an anthology of Arabic documents, edited, translated into English and annotated by John Hanson and David Robinson (East Lansing: Michigan State University Press, 1991).
Articles
'Sub-Saharan Africa after World War One,' in Francis Robinson, ed., New Cambridge History of Islam, Volume Five, Islam in the Age of Western Domination (Michael Cook, series ed.) (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, forthcoming).
'Islam, migration and the political economy of meaning: fergo Nioro from the Senegal River valley, 1862-1890,” Journal of African History, Volume 35, no. 1 (1994), 37-60.