Dorrit van Dalen has published on West Africa as a journalist, before she obtained a Ph.D. from Leiden University in 2015.

'To conclude, van Dalen’s book is an important contribution, successfully navigating between global and local contexts. Doubt, Scholarship and Society encompasses text edition and translation with a trans-disciplinary analysis combining micro and global history, anthropology, religious studies, and palaeography, which is the best way, in this reviewers opinion, to renovate African history'.Rémi Dewière, European University Institute in Reading Religionhttp://readingreligion.org/books/doubt-scholarship-and-society-17th-century-central-sudanic-africa

• AcknowledgementsA note on transliterationMap of western and northern Africa1. Preface1.One man in his environment2.Coordinates3.Intellectual history and philology4.Peripheries5.Sources and structure2. Dramatis loci1.A history of Bornu and Baghirmi as Islamic states2.The spread of Islam 3.Ethnicity, religion, slavery4.Islam and traditional religions5.Conclusion3. Muḥammad al-Wālī1.Biography2.Works 3.Reputation 4.Education5.Conclusion4. The scholar’s habitat1. Scholarship2. Religious leadership3. Intellectual environment: genres4. Intellectual environment: themes5. Conclusion5. Method and message1.Al-Sanūsi’s Ṣughra2.The Kabbe3.Between oral and scholarly text4.Tradition with a twist 5.Conclusion6. Demonising smokers 1. How tobacco conquered the Islamic lands2. Al-Wālī’s point of view3. A folktale about the devil’s piss4. From Abgar to al-Azhar5. Conclusion7. On writing1.Author and authority2.Why did al-Wālī translate the Fulani commentary?3.From orality to literacy4.Knowing and the knower5.Conclusion8. Certainties in times of choiceAnnex I.Al-adilla al-ḥisān fī bayān taḥrīm shurb al-dukhān.An edition of the Arabic text.Annex II.Valid proofs to proclaim smoking forbidden. A translation.Annex III.ʿAwsikum yā maʿshar al-ikhwān. An edition of al-Wālī’s poem.Bibliography

Dorrit van Dalen has published on West Africa as a journalist, before she obtained a Ph.D. from Leiden University in 2015.

'To conclude, van Dalen’s book is an important contribution, successfully navigating between global and local contexts. Doubt, Scholarship and Society encompasses text edition and translation with a trans-disciplinary analysis combining micro and global history, anthropology, religious studies, and palaeography, which is the best way, in this reviewers opinion, to renovate African history'.Rémi Dewière, European University Institute in Reading Religionhttp://readingreligion.org/books/doubt-scholarship-and-society-17th-century-central-sudanic-africa

• AcknowledgementsA note on transliterationMap of western and northern Africa1. Preface1.One man in his environment2.Coordinates3.Intellectual history and philology4.Peripheries5.Sources and structure2. Dramatis loci1.A history of Bornu and Baghirmi as Islamic states2.The spread of Islam 3.Ethnicity, religion, slavery4.Islam and traditional religions5.Conclusion3. Muḥammad al-Wālī1.Biography2.Works 3.Reputation 4.Education5.Conclusion4. The scholar’s habitat1. Scholarship2. Religious leadership3. Intellectual environment: genres4. Intellectual environment: themes5. Conclusion5. Method and message1.Al-Sanūsi’s Ṣughra2.The Kabbe3.Between oral and scholarly text4.Tradition with a twist 5.Conclusion6. Demonising smokers 1. How tobacco conquered the Islamic lands2. Al-Wālī’s point of view3. A folktale about the devil’s piss4. From Abgar to al-Azhar5. Conclusion7. On writing1.Author and authority2.Why did al-Wālī translate the Fulani commentary?3.From orality to literacy4.Knowing and the knower5.Conclusion8. Certainties in times of choiceAnnex I.Al-adilla al-ḥisān fī bayān taḥrīm shurb al-dukhān.An edition of the Arabic text.Annex II.Valid proofs to proclaim smoking forbidden. A translation.Annex III.ʿAwsikum yā maʿshar al-ikhwān. An edition of al-Wālī’s poem.Bibliography

Dorrit van Dalen has published on West Africa as a journalist, before she obtained a Ph.D. from Leiden University in 2015.

'To conclude, van Dalen’s book is an important contribution, successfully navigating between global and local contexts. Doubt, Scholarship and Society encompasses text edition and translation with a trans-disciplinary analysis combining micro and global history, anthropology, religious studies, and palaeography, which is the best way, in this reviewers opinion, to renovate African history'.Rémi Dewière, European University Institute in Reading Religionhttp://readingreligion.org/books/doubt-scholarship-and-society-17th-century-central-sudanic-africa

• AcknowledgementsA note on transliterationMap of western and northern Africa1. Preface1.One man in his environment2.Coordinates3.Intellectual history and philology4.Peripheries5.Sources and structure2. Dramatis loci1.A history of Bornu and Baghirmi as Islamic states2.The spread of Islam 3.Ethnicity, religion, slavery4.Islam and traditional religions5.Conclusion3. Muḥammad al-Wālī1.Biography2.Works 3.Reputation 4.Education5.Conclusion4. The scholar’s habitat1. Scholarship2. Religious leadership3. Intellectual environment: genres4. Intellectual environment: themes5. Conclusion5. Method and message1.Al-Sanūsi’s Ṣughra2.The Kabbe3.Between oral and scholarly text4.Tradition with a twist 5.Conclusion6. Demonising smokers 1. How tobacco conquered the Islamic lands2. Al-Wālī’s point of view3. A folktale about the devil’s piss4. From Abgar to al-Azhar5. Conclusion7. On writing1.Author and authority2.Why did al-Wālī translate the Fulani commentary?3.From orality to literacy4.Knowing and the knower5.Conclusion8. Certainties in times of choiceAnnex I.Al-adilla al-ḥisān fī bayān taḥrīm shurb al-dukhān.An edition of the Arabic text.Annex II.Valid proofs to proclaim smoking forbidden. A translation.Annex III.ʿAwsikum yā maʿshar al-ikhwān. An edition of al-Wālī’s poem.Bibliography