Ousmane Oumar Kane
Professor of African and African American Studies (FAS)
On Leave
Fall 2023
Education
- BA, Institut national des langues et civilisations orientales
- Diplôme superieur d’etudes islamiques, Institut national des langues et civilisations orientales
- MPhil, PhD, Institut d’études politiques de Paris
Profile
Ousmane Kane, a scholar of Islamic studies and comparative and Islamic politics, joined Harvard Divinity School in July 2012 as the first Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal Professor of Contemporary Islamic Religion and Society at HDS. From 2002 to 2012, he was an associate professor of international and public affairs at Columbia University's School of International and Public Affairs.
He is a member of a number of professional organizations, including the African Studies Association of North America and the Council for the Development of Social and Economic Research in Africa. Kane studies the history of Islamic religious institutions and organizations since the eighteenth century, and he is engaged in documenting the intellectual history of Islam in Africa.
Kane has also focused on the phenomenon of Muslim globalization. His book Homeland Is the Arena: Religion, Transnationalism and the Integration of Senegalese Immigrants in America (Oxford University Press, 2010) looks at the community of Senegalese immigrants to the United States in New York and the importance these immigrants assign to their religious communities for the organization of their lives.
His other books include Muslim Modernity in Postcolonial Nigeria (Brill, 2003), Beyond Timbuktu: An Intellectual History of Muslim West Africa (Harvard University Press, 2016), and, most recently, Islamic Scholarship in Africa. New Directions and Global Contexts (James Currey, 2021). He has published articles in the Harvard International Review, Politique étrangère, Afrique contemporaine, African Journal of International Affairs, Cahiers d’Etudes Africaines, Islam et Sociétés au Sud du Sahara, and Religions.
Courses
View HDS courses taught by Ousmane Oumar Kane in the my.harvard Course Search.
Also view FAS courses taught by Ousmane Oumar Kane. (HDS students: for jointly offered and reading and research courses, please enroll in the HDS version of the course.)
Selected publications
- Islamic Scholarship in Africa. New Directions and Global Contexts (James Currey, 2021)
- Beyond Timbuktu: An Intellectual History of Muslim West Africa (Harvard University Press, 2016)
- The Homeland Is the Arena: Religion, Transnationalism and the Integration of Senegalese Immigrants in America (Oxford University Press, 2010)
- Muslim Modernity in Postcolonial Nigeria (Brill, 2003)
See also
- Professor Kane's personal website
- “Exploring Senegal,” student Maali Luqmam’s video about the program’s study abroad in Dakar, Senegal, “Belief, Culture and Society in Francophone Africa.”
Support
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