Promotional Information

Steve Howard departed for the Sudan in the early 1980s as an American graduate student beginning a three-year journey in which he would join and live with the Republican Brotherhood, the Sufi Muslim group led by the visionary Mahmoud Mohamed Taha.

About the Author

Steve Howard is a professor of media studies and African studies and the director of the Ohio University Center for International Studies. A sociologist by training, he has studied and worked all over the African continent. He directed Ohio University’s African Studies Program for twenty-five years and has published several scholarly articles about the Republican Brotherhood Movement.

Reviews

“It was amazing timing then for this insightful American-trained social scientist to observe a modernist nonviolent Islamic movement at the peak of its dynamic campaign. It is even more amazing timing now for this rigorous and incisive study of Islamic modernity to be available to scholars, students, and the public at large. This profound assessment of a fascinating expression of Islam as experienced by African Muslims can contribute to defusing the current global crisis of Islam and modernity. The book is also a pleasure to read.”

“There is much to learn in this memoir, especially given the normalization of extreme Islamophobia in the Western world. The answer to Islamic extremism does not lie in Western belligerence and fear, but within Islam itself. Howard reminds us all of the importance of re-centering these conversations within the communities of people who live this diverse and complex faith.”
*Focus on the Horn*

“Howard’s account (Modern Muslims) is an excellent tool for undergraduate teaching. It goes a long way in detaching mid-twentieth-century Islamic revival movements … from their characterization as inherently violent. Instead, Howard demonstrates the intellectual vigour exposed by dedicated Muslims trying to argue for the intellectual coherence and applicability of their faith in a world they believed to be epistemologically dominated by Western rationalism.”
*Africa*

“Steve Howard has produced an ethnography of a modern Muslim movement in the contemporary Sudan that is original, informative, and beautifully conceived. It is a unique (and uniquely informative), accessible, and moving journey of discovery that makes a major contribution to our understanding of Islam in the Sudan and in the contemporary world.”