Ali Mazrui

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Ali Alamin Mazrui (born February 24, 1933 in Mombasa, Kenya) is a world-renowned academic and political writer on African and Islamic studies. His views are broadly similar to many other Anglophile Muslims such as India's Syed Ali Khan.

Mazrui obtained his B.A. with Distinction from Manchester University in Great Britain, his M.A. from Columbia University in New York, and his doctorate from Oxford University.

Upon completing his education at Oxford University, Mazrui joined the faculty of Makerere University (Kampala, Uganda), where he served as head of the Department of Political Science and Dean of the Faculty of Social Sciences. He served at Makerere University until 1973, when he was forced into exile by Idi Amin. In 1974, he joined the faculty of the University of Michigan as professor and later was appointed the Director of the Center for Afroamerican and African Studies (1978-198l). In 1989, he was appointed to the faculty of Binghamton University, State University of New York as the Albert Schweitzer Professor in the Humanities and the Director of the Institute of Global Cultural Studies (IGCS).

In addition to his appointments as the Albert Schweitzer Professor in the Humanities, Professor in Political Science, African Studies, Philosophy, Interpretation and Culture and the Director of the Institute of Global Cultural Studies (IGCS), Mazrui also holds three concurrent faculty appointments as Albert Luthuli Professor-at-Large in the Humanities and Development Studies at the University of Jos in Nigeria, Andrew D. White Professor-at-Large Emeritus and Senior Scholar in Africana Studies at Cornell University and Chancellor of the Jomo Kenyatta University of Agriculture and Technology, Nairobi, Kenya. In 1999, Mazrui retired as the inaugural Walter Rodney Professor at the University of Guyana, Georgetown, Guyana. Mazrui has also been a Visiting Scholar at Stanford University, The University of Chicago, Colgate University, McGill University, National University of Singapore, Oxford University, Harvard University, Bridgewater State College, Ohio State University, and at other institutions in Cairo, Australia, Leeds, Nairobi, Teheran, Denver, London, Baghdad, and Sussex amongst others.

In addition to his academic appointments, Mazrui has also served as President of the African Studies Association (USA) and as Vice-President of the International Political Science Association and has also served as Special Advisor to the World Bank. He has also served on the Board of the American Muslim Council, Washington, D.C.

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[edit] Works

Mazrui's research interests include African politics, international political culture, political Islam and North-South relations. He is author or co-author of more than twenty books. Mazrui has also published hundreds of articles in major scholastic journals and for public media. He has also served on the editorial boards of more than twenty international scholarly journals.

He first rose to prominence as a critic of some of the accepted orthodoxies of African intellectuals in the 1960s and 1970s. He was opposed to African socialism and all strains of Marxism. He argued that communism was a Western import just as unsuited for the African condition as the earlier colonial attempts to install European type governments. He argued that a revised liberalism could help the continent and described himself as a proponent of a unique ideology of African liberalism.

At the same time he was a prominent critic of the current world order. He believed the current capitalist system was deeply exploitative of Africa, and that the West rarely if ever lived up to their liberal ideals. He has opposed Western interventions in the developing world, such as the Iraq War. He has also long been a critic of Israel's policies, being one of the first to try and link the treatment of Palestinians with South Africa's apartheid.

Especially in recent years, Mazrui has also become a well known commentator on Islam and Islamism. While utterly rejecting violence and terrorism Mazrui has praised some of the anti-imperialist sentiment that plays an important role in modern Islamic fundamentalism. He has also argued that sharia law is not incompatible with democracy and supported its introduction in some parts of northern Nigeria.

In addition to his written work, Dr. Mazrui was also the creator of the television series The Africans: A Triple Heritage, which was jointly produced by the BBC and the Public Broadcasting Service (WETA, Washington) in association with the Nigerian Television Authority. A book by the same title was jointly published by BBC Publications and Little, Brown and Company.

[edit] Controversy

In 2002, the neoconservative website Campus Watch listed Professor Mazrui as a left-wing extremist after several students complained that a guest lecture he gave at Binghamton University was anti-semitic. Mazrui had previously written a paper titled "The State of Israel as Cause for Anti-Semitism". He is also on the board of the Association of Muslim Social Services whose North American spokesman is Kamran Bokhari who was also the spokesman for the now-disbanded UK Islamist group al-Muhajiroun.

In 2003, Mazrui was detained and questioned by the Department of Homeland Security after returning to the United States from Africa. Mazrui admitted to officials that he tried to meet with a radical Islamist leader, but was unsuccessful. Officials concluded that no crime had been committed, but his critics pointed to this as evidence of ties to terrorist activity.[1]

Since that time, Mazrui has been reported to Homeland Security and the US State Department as one who should have his visa rescinded due to profiting from corruption. Mazrui is the Chancellor of Jomo Kenyatta University of Agriculture and Technology (JKUAT) in Kenya, a Kenyan national university that, in 2003, expropriated the assets of an American company conducting a joint venture with it. Critics maintain that Mazrui has sat by benefiting from the proceeds of that expropriation, while collecting speaking fees from American universities as he travels around the USA.

[edit] Current Positions

  • Director, Institute of Global Cultural Studies, State University of New York at Binghamton , Binghamton , New York , U.S.A.
  • Albert Schweitzer Professor in the Humanities, State University of New York at Binghamton , Binghamton , New York , U.S.A.
  • Professor of Political Science,African Studies and Philosophy,Interpretation and Culture, State University of New York at Binghamton , New York , U.S.A.
  • Chancellor, Jomo Kenyatta University of Agriculture and Technology, Nairobi , Kenya
  • Albert Luthuli Professor-at-Large, University of Jos , Jos , Nigeria
  • Senior Scholar in Africana Studies and Andrew D. White Professor-at-Large Emeritus, Cornell University , Ithaca , New York , U.S.A.

[edit] Membership of Organizations

  • Current Fellow, African Academy of Sciences
  • Current Member, Pan-African Advisory Council to UNICEF (The United Nations' Childrens Fund)
  • Current Vice-President, World Congress of Black Intellectuals
  • Current Member, United Nations Commission on Transnational Corporations
  • Current Distinguished Visiting Professor, The Ohio State University, Columbus, Ohio , U.S.A. (Spring)
  • Current Member, Bank's Council of African Advisors, The World Bank (Washington, D.C.)
  • Current Vice-President, International African Institute, London
  • Current Member of the Advisory Board of Directors of the Detroit Chapter, AFRICARE

[edit] Books

  • THE AFRICAN PREDICAMENT AND THE AMERICAN EXPERIENCE: A TALE OF TWO EDENS ( Westport, CT and London: Praeger,2004)
  • BLACK REPARATIONS IN THE ERA OF GLOBALIZATION [with Alamin Mazrui ( Binghamton : The Institute of Global Cultural Studies,2002)
  • THE TITAN OF TANZANIA: JULIUS K. NYERERE’S LEGACY ( Binghamton : The Institute of Global Cultural Studies,2002)
  • POLITICAL CULTURE OF LANGUAGE: SWAHILI, SOCIETY AND THE STATE [with Alamin M. Mazrui] ( Binghamton : The Institute of Global Cultural Studies,1999)
  • THE AFRICAN DIASPORA: AFRICAN ORIGINS AND NEW WORLD IDENTITIES [co-editors Isidore Okpewho and Carole Boyce Davies] ( Bloomington : Indiana University Press,1999).
  • THE POWER OF BABEL : LANGUAGE AND GOVERNANCE IN THE AFRICAN EXPERIENCE [with Alamin M. Mazrui] ( Oxford and Chicago : James Currey and University of Chicago Press,1998).
  • SWAHILI, STATE AND SOCIETY: THE POLITICAL ECONOMY OF AN AFRICAN LANGUAGE [with Alamin M. Mazrui] ( Nairobi : East African Educational Publishers,1995).
  • AFRICA SINCE 1935: VOL. VIII OF UNESCO GENERAL HISTORY OF AFRICA [Editor, Asst. Ed. C. Wondji] (London: Heinemann and Berkeley: University of California Press, 1993).

[edit] Media

  • Main African Consultant and on-screen respondent, Programme on “A History Denied” in the television series on Lost Civilizations (NBC and Time-Life, 1996), U.S.A.
  • Author of “The Bondage of Boundaries: Towards Redefining Africa”, article in the 150th anniversary issue of The Economist (London) (September) Vol. 328, No. 7828, 1993.
  • Author and Narrator, “The Africans: A Triple Heritage”, BBC and PBS television series in cooperation with Nigerian Television Authority, 1986.

[edit] Awards

  • Millennium Tribute for Outstanding Scholarship, House of Lords, Parliament Buildings, London, June 2000.
  • Special Award from the Association of Muslim Social Scientists (United Kingdom), honoring Mazrui for his contribution to the social sciences and Islamic studies, June 2000.
  • Honorary Doctorate of Letters, Nkumba University, Entebbe, Uganda, March 2000.
  • Icon of the Twentieth Century, elected by Lincoln University, Pennsylvania, 1998.
  • Appointed Walter Rodney Professor, University of Guyana , Georgetown , Guyana , 1998.
  • Icon of the Twentieth Century Award (Lincoln University , Pennsylvania) , 1998.
  • DuBois-Garvey Award for Pan-African Unity ( Morgan State University , Baltimore , Maryland ), 1998.
  • Appointed Ibn-Khaldun Professor-at-Large, School of Islamic and Social Sciences, Leesburg, Virgina 1997.
  • Distinguished Faculty Achievement Award, the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Michigan, 1988.

[edit] Trivia

Dr. Mazrui recognised among world's top 100 public intellectuals Article in Inside Binghamton University Weekly on Oct 6, 2005 Article in Pipe Dream Twice-Weekly on Oct 18, 2005 Article in The Standard Newspaper(Nairobi,Kenya) on Oct 6, 2005 Article from Institute of Global Cultural Studies Staff

[edit] References

  • 2004: Almin M. Mazrui and Willy M. Mutunga eds. Race, Gender, and Culture Conflict: Mazrui and His Critics Asmara: African World Press.

[edit] Publications

  • 1980: The African condition: a political diagnosis. London & New York: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 0-521-23265-1.
  • 1993: (ed., with Christophe Wondji as asst. ed.) Africa since 1935. London: Heinemann Educational Books; Berkeley: University of California Press. ISBN 0-520-03920-3.
  • 1995: (with Alamin M. Mazrui) Swahili state and society: the political economy of an African language. Nairobi: East African Educational Publishers; London: James Currey. ISBN 9966-46-823-4. ISBN 0-85255-729-9.
  • 1998: (with Alamin M. Mazrui) The power of Babel: language and governance in the African experience. Oxford: J. Currey; Chicago: University of Chicago Press. ISBN 0-226-51428-5.

[edit] External links

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