ABSTRACT
The introduction examines the timeline of ideas, constructs, interpretations, opinions, rulings, and jurisprudence about race. It traces different authors’ views of race from the pre-Islamic period to the twentieth century and explores key issues relating to the evolution of racial terminology and the intellectual history of race in the Middle East and North Africa. The scope of opinions on race and slavery in the region is marked by different authors’ views on a range of social and political questions. The variety of viewpoints in regions ranging from pre-Islamic Arabia to ninth-century Iraq as well as medieval and nineteenth-century North Africa provides a survey of a diverse sociocultural thought on race. The texts examined reflect the attendant debates and central theoretical concerns. The authors (Al-Farabi, Al-Tabari, Al-Jahiz, Ibn Khaldun, Ahmed Baba, Khalid Al-Nasiri, etc.) span generations delineated by both time periods and experiential differences. Their texts shed light on how ideas of race in the region continuously evolved over time and encompassed different axes of difference, including lineage, nation, language, class, tribe, and civilization.
