Nana Asma’u

Nana Asma'u (fully: Nana Asma'u bint Shehu Usman dan Fodiyo, * 1793, † 1864) was an African poet and teacher. Her father Usman dan Fodio established the Sokoto Caliphate. Even today, she is worshiped in northern Nigeria. Nana Asma'u is viewed by some as an example of independence and education, which are possible for Islamic women, by others as a forerunner of modern feminism in Africa.

Life

Nana Asma'u was born about eleven years before the Fulani Jihad and bears her name Asma bint Abi honor of Bakr, a companion of the Prophet Mohammed. The daughter of inspired by Sufism Caliphate founder and half-sister of his successor survived most personalities of the founding generation, which made them an important source of information for future leaders. After 1805, the family members of the Caliph came to be highly Look what the women included. Although Nana Asma'u remained the most famous, also played her sisters Miriam and Fatima and the women of the Caliph, Aisha and Hawwa, important literary and political roles in the new state. Like her father, she was trained in the study of the Koran and laid much emphasis on general education. As a representative of Qadiriyyah School of Sufism attended Dan Fodio and his followers for the dissemination of knowledge, particularly the Sunnah. They were of the opinion that learning without teaching is sterile and empty. So Nana Asma'u devoted particularly to the formation of Muslim women and was a prolific writer.

The writer and consultant

Because she was well acquainted with the classics of the Arab world and of antiquity and four languages ​​(Arabic, Fulfulde, Hausa and Tamacheq ) fluently, enjoyed Nana Asma'u public reputation as a leading scholar of the most influential Muslim state in West Africa, which extended to a correspondence led. She was witness to the most battles of the Fulani jihad and processed their experiences in the prose narrative " Wakal Gewaye " ( " The Journey" ). Because the Sokoto Caliphate was not only an earthly kingdom, but began as a cultural and religious reform movement, the writings of its leaders had a special place in which later generations were able to measure their company. It was her brother's advisor when he took over the Caliphate ( and could not or would not prevent him valuable Hausa chronicles destroyed ), has proven to instructions written to governors and debated with the scholars of foreign princes.

The poet

In over 60 surviving works, she wrote over 40 years, Nana Asma'u left behind a rich treasure of poetry in Arabic, Fulfulde and Hausa, all written in Ajami ( Arabic script ). Many of these are historical accounts, but they also include elegies, dirges and didactic poems that help women and men taught in the basic principles of the caliphate.

Women's education

Other of their surviving works relating to Islamic education: for most of her adult life she was responsible for religious education of women. Beginning in 1830 she put together a group of teachers ( Jajis ), who traveled through the Caliphate and women taught in their homes. Each of these Jajis used the Nana Asma'us writings and other Sufi authors and writers, who learned it by heart, to teach a corps studied women who were called yan- taru ( which gathering, the sisterhood ). Each teacher gave Nana a Asma'u Malfa - the traditional headgear of the animistic Bori priestesses in Gobir, which was tied with a red turban. So the Jajis became symbols of the new state, the new social order and Islamic learning outside the women's community. Some of the education project began as a way to integrate the newly conquered territories Animistinnen caught in the Muslim ruling class, later it closed, however, the poor and the farmers, which then migrated as teachers by the expanding caliphate.

The heritage in the present

Nana Asma'us legacy lies not only in her literary work and in the definition of the values ​​of Sokoto. Today in northern Nigeria often Islamic women's organizations, schools and meeting halls are named after her. She won again a high importance in the debate on the role of women in Islam, as their heritage of Islamic scholars and immigrants was brought to Europe. The re-publication and translation of their works has also thrown on the purely literary value of their prose and poetry a new light.