SCHOOLING MUSLIMS IN NATAL, identity, state and the Orient Islamic Educational Institute

457pp., illus., maps, paperback, Pietermaritzburg, 2015

A history of the Orient Islamic Educational Institute, founded in 1943, and their Orient Islamic School in Durban.

"This engrossing account of the vision and history of the Orient School in KwaZulu-Natal is illuminated by deep research and intimate experience. The book illustrates the role of education in shaping new communities out of the divisions of colonial, apartheid and post-apartheid South Africa. Vahed and Waetjen show how the Orient enabled Muslims to envision a new future around notions of resistance, collective action and a religious modernity. This is a much-needed contribution to the scholarship on education, Islam and the shaping of identity in South Africa." Gabeba Baderoon, Co-Director of the African Feminist Initiative at Pennsylvania State University and Extraordinary Professor of English at Stellenbosch University

"Goolam Vahed and Thembisa Waetjen have given us a lucid and penetrating account of schooling Muslims in KwaZulu-Natal. It links an Indian Muslim schooling tradition to broader educational movements in public life, to local and global trends, all within a clearly articulated political context. Every page and chapter brims with insights and detailed information on the story of Indians and Muslims as they navigated identity, racial politics, Islamic modernity and post-apartheid education politics. Even though the book focuses on one schooling tradition, it sheds light on other initiatives among Muslims, Indians and peoples in general in South Africa. This volume sets up a high bar, and invites scholars and academics to tell the many untold stories of education in South Africa" Abdulkader Tayob, Professor of Religious Studies and NRF Chair of Islam, African Publics and Religious Values, Unniversity of Cape Town

Goolam Vahed is an Associate Professor of History at the University of KwaZulu-Natal. His recent books include "Chatsworth: the making of a South African township", edited with Ashwin Desai, and "Crossing Space and Time in the Indian Ocean: early Indian traders in Natal, a biographical study", co-authored with Surendra Bhana.
Historian Thembisa Waetjen is currently an Honorary Research Associate in the Faculty of Arts and Design at the Durban University of Technology. She is also the author of "Workers and Warriors" and "Gender, Modernity and Indian Delights: the Women's Cultural Group of Durban, 1954-2910", co-authored with Goolam Vahed.