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the rich history of Islam in the Americas

Date: March 28, 2003 | 24 Muharram 1424 Hijriah
Blog: veiled4allah
Subjects: history
Jonathan Edelstein has recently been doing a "world tour" in which he posts up interesting and unusual facts about each of the countries that readers of his blog are from. In his section on Brazil, Jonathan mentions a group called the Malés. These people are descended from African slaves brought to Brazil in the 1700s. They practice a syncretized form of Islam.

A substantial number of the African slaves brought to North America were also Muslims (brief summary, bibliography).

Other Muslims who came to the Americas were of Spanish or Portuguese descent. 1492 was not just the year that Columbus sailed to America, it was also the year that the Christian reconquest of Spain was completed and that 700 years of Muslim rule in the Iberian Peninsula ended. Over the next several centuries, some Moors (Muslim Spanish) traveled to the Spanish and Portuguese colonies in the Americas to escape the Spanish Inquisition. Others were brought along as laborers or slaves. Islam in Latin America has more information and references.

An interesting offshoot group are the Melungeons, who ended up in North America.

Some historians have also argued that Muslim explorers crossed the Atlantic from Andalusia (Muslim Spain) and West Africa several centuries before Columbus.
~ Posted by Al-Muhajabah, a member of the reality-based community, at 09:32 AM

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moderator Al-Munaqabah said: Total comments: 996   gold stargold stargold stargold stargold star

The Melungeons can also be studied in the context of multiracial groups in the early U.S. Best collection of links on this topic I've ever seen is this MetaFilter thread.

~ Posted at March 28, 2003 10:39 AM | Comment Permalink
Drapetomaniac said: Total comments: 1  



Nice post. I've done a couple of items on some of the context for the coming of West African Muslims to the Americas, see:
Al-Amrikiyya and Supplication for a Grant. I was intrigued by the fact that the abolitionist jihadis around Nasr al-Din may have been themselves brought to the New World as slaves.




~ Posted at March 29, 2003 12:30 AM | Comment Permalink

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