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Periodical article | Leiden University catalogue | WorldCat |
Title: | A Complex Relationship: Mozambique and the Comoro Islands in the 19th and 20th Centuries |
Author: | Alpers, Edward A. |
Year: | 2001 |
Periodical: | Cahiers d'études africaines |
Volume: | 41 |
Issue: | 161 |
Pages: | 73-95 |
Language: | English |
Geographic terms: | Mozambique Comoros East Africa |
Subjects: | Islam migration mercantile history History and Exploration Economics and Trade colonialism Inter-African Relations |
External link: | https://doi.org/10.4000/etudesafricaines.67 |
Abstract: | The Comoros have historically played a vital role in the commercial and religious history of the southwest Indian Ocean and as a human bridge between the African continent and Madagascar. This paper examines three aspects of this relationship as it pertains to Mozambique. The first topic examines the web of trading and political connections between the Comoros, Madagascar and Mozambique. Although the slave trade attracted most attention from European observers, this was not the only trade carried on between the Comoros and Mozambique in the 19th century; the complex exchange of foodstuffs was equally part of the same regional network. The second aspect of this relationship focuses on the African diaspora in the Indian Ocean world. The author examines how displaced African populations were absorbed into their host societies, the ways in which they maintained and transformed their own cultural identities, and the influences that they carried with them into these new historical situations in the Comoros. The third element of this relationship concerns the history of Islam in northern Mozambique in the 19th and 20th century, which is intimately tied to the Comoros. Bibliogr., notes, ref., sum. in English and French. |