For more than two centuries Muslims have helped shape the religious, cultural, commercial, and political landscapes of the colony, protectorate, and independent nation-state of Sierra Leone. Today, Muslims constitute more than half of the four and a half a million residents of Sierra Leone, and they continue to be significant contributors in the affairs of the country. It was in recognition of the historical and contemporary importance of Muslims that the Sierra Leone Studies Association(USA) sponsored a conference entitled, "Islam, Culture, Commerce, and Politics in Sierra Leone" in 1994 at Howard University, Washington, D.C. to study their varied contributions to Sierra Leone society from the pre-independence period to the present. This edited collection of essays, by leading specialists, is the result of this conference. Although the religious and commercial activities of Muslims in Sierra Leone have been examined in several studies, there still does not exist a single, comprehensive text about their role in cultural, commercial, political and religious affairs from the pre-independence period to the 1990's. This volume, which includes new data and perspectives, is designed to advance scholarship toward that more comprehensive account of Muslims in Sierra Leone.s

The first comprehensive book on the participation of Muslim Fula business elites in the post-independence politics of Sierra Leone

Sierra Leone’s unique history, especially in the development and consolidation of British colonialism in West Africa, has made it an important site of historical investigation since the 1950s. Much of the scholarship produced in subsequent decades has focused on the “Krio,” descendants of freed slaves from the West Indies, North America, England, and other areas of West Africa, who settled Freetown, beginning in the late eighteenth century. Two foundational and enduring assumptions have characterized this historiography: the concepts of “Creole” and “Krio” are virtually interchangeable; and the community to which these terms apply was and is largely self-contained, Christian, and English in worldview. In a bold challenge to the long-standing historiography on Sierra Leone, Gibril Cole carefully disentangles “Krio” from “Creole,” revealing the diversity and permeability of a community that included many who, in fact, were not Christian. In Cole’s persuasive and engaging analysis, Muslim settlers take center stage as critical actors in the dynamic growth of Freetown’s Krio society. The Krio of West Africa represents the results of some of the first sustained historical research to be undertaken since the end of Sierra Leone’s brutal civil war. It speaks clearly and powerfully not only to those with an interest in the specific history of Sierra Leone, but to histories of Islam in West Africa, the British empire, the Black Atlantic, the Yoruban diaspora, and the slave trade and its aftermath.

The work had its origins as a presentation of Sahara und Sudan, the monumental travelogue of Gustav Nachtigal, a German physician who travelled in various African countries between 1869 and 1874. His references to slavery form a thread running through this book.

Sierra Leone is a country located in West Africa, bordered to the north and northeast by Guinea, to the southeast by Liberia, and to the west and southwest by the Atlantic Ocean. The country has a tropical climate characterized by two seasons: the dry season from November to April, and the wet season from May to October. The official language is English, although Krio, a Creole language, is widely spoken. Sierra Leone has a diverse population made up of Temne, Mende, Limba, and Krio peoples, among others. Sierra Leone gained independence from Britain in 1961 and experienced a period of political instability and civil war, which lasted from 1991 to 2002. The civil war was fought between government forces and the Revolutionary United Front (RUF), a rebel group that aimed to overthrow the government. The conflict was characterized by violent attacks on civilians, including chopping off limbs, sexual violence, and the use of child soldiers. Since the end of the war, Sierra Leone has made progress in democratization and economic development, although it still faces challenges such as poverty, corruption, and high youth unemployment rates.