Ifriqiyya Colloquium

Ifriqiyya is organized as both a seminar and a discussion group. Launched in 2010 as a faculty colloquium, Ifriqiyya is dedicated to giving historical depth to the study of Africa at Columbia.  Its historical focus is the period that preceded Western domination of Africa, a time when Arabic-scripted languages and Islam were the hallmark of a growing cosmopolitan civilization in and around Africa.  Its geographical focus highlights mediating regions – such as the Indian Ocean, the Red Sea, the Mediterranean, the Sahara – through which multiple influences flowed and shaped the lives of those they connected. 

The word "Ifriqiyya" is a name that Rome gave to its southernmost province (Tunisia), that Ibn Khaldun used to refer to lands to the south, a region that Hegel characterized as Africa proper in contradistinction to European Africa (North Africa) and Asiatic Africa (Egypt, Nubia and Ethiopia). Ifriqiyya appropriately highlights the instability of the contemporary designation, Africa, and the debates around it.