IRCICA and the Arewa House, Ahmadu Bello University, Kaduna, Nigeria jointly organized the international conference on “Islamic History and Civilization in West Africa”, on 19-20 October 2018, in Abuja, Nigeria. The opening ceremony of the conference was attended by members of government and academia. H.E. President Muhammadu Buhari, President of the Federal Republic of Nigeria, was represented by the Minister of Education, Hon. Alhaji Adamu Adamu, who read the President’s address. The papers presented during the conference traced the history regarding the spread of Islam in West Africa starting from the first century of Islam. In his remarks as moderator of the opening session, Dr. Usman Bugaje, Convener of the Arewa Research and Development Project, pointed to some salient issues regarding studies in this field, such as: the need to attach due importance to the civilizational dimension of Islam, that much of history is alive, but scholars and policy-makers often neglect to bring this into reality; and, the contributions of women to scholarship need to be given some prominence.
The book contains fourteen papers by scholars and researchers from Gambia, Nigeria and Turkey. They provide detailed information and specialized analyses on the history and culture of local Muslim communities starting from the time of their first contact with Islam up until the present day. Those interested in the history of West Africa will find this book highly informative.