Release date for HCTIUSv2

A portion of the research materials collected for HCTIUSv2 

After over 8 years or research, and numerous discussions of the project in this blog and other places, I am pleased to announce that my study of African American Islam before 1975 finally has a release date: October 19, 2017.

A History of Conversion to Islam in the United States, Volume 2: The African American Islamic Renaissance, 1920-1975 (publisher website/GoogleBooks preview) is the second book in my 3-volume A History of Conversion to Islam in the United States (HCTIUS) project. While volume 1 looked at the small early white American Muslim community, volume 2 focuses on the significantly larger African American Muslim community, and as such HCTIUSv2, at an estimated 720 pages, is twice as long as HCTIUSv1 (360 pages). For those who have read my PhD dissertation, HCTIUSv2 uses that as a foundational core, but the book both refines and goes far beyond it in terms of scope and research.

Here is the book's summary from the publisher's website:

In A History of Conversion to Islam in the United States, Volume 2: The African American Islamic Renaissance, 1920-1975 Patrick D. Bowen offers an in-depth account of African American Islam as it developed in the United States during the fifty-five years that followed World War I. Having been shaped by a wide variety of intellectual and social influences, the ‘African American Islamic Renaissance’ appears here as a movement that was characterized by both great complexity and diversity.
Drawing from a wide variety of sources—including dozens of FBI files, rare books and periodicals, little-known archives and interviews, and even folktale collections—Patrick D. Bowen disentangles the myriad social and religious factors that produced this unprecedented period of religious transformation.

HCTIUSv2 not only synthesizes nearly every single piece of scholarship on African American Islam before 1975--including my own articles as well as recent cutting edge research on the background of Noble Drew Ali by Abdat and W.D. Fard by Arian--it also brings to light a great deal of information that has never previously been discussed in academic writings. Some of the new topics covered include

-Noble Drew Ali's religious activities before he started the Moorish Science Temple of America

-Some of the specific books that W.D. Fard used when creating the Nation of Islam doctrines

-Some of the non-book-based sources of the teachings of the MSTA and the NOI

-FBI files of pre-1975 Muslims and Muslim groups, including Muhammad Yusuf Khan (the ousted Ahmadi leader), C.M. Bey (founder of the Clock of Destiny), Wilfred Little (Malcolm's brother), Talib Dawud, Federation of Islamic Associations, Mosque of Islamic Brotherhood, Islamic Party of North America, Uniting Islamic Society of America, Addeynu-Allahe Universal Arabic Association, New Libya 

-The important Islamic connections in the development of the modern movement for Reparations for slavery

-Small Islamic communities and Muslim figures that have not previously been documented

-Details concerning the organizational growth of NOI temples in the 1950s and 1960s

-Various forgotten Muslim poets

For those interested in pre-ordering the book, I believe you can do so on the publisher's website here.

UPDATE (7/12): Pre-orders can now be made on Amazon here

UPDATE (7/24): Book cover added

UPDATE (9/14): GoogleBooks preview added

For journal and media editors interested in obtaining a review copy, contact me at pbowen303@gmail.com .

I will continue to provide updates--as well as sneak peeks and document releases--as the book gets closer to publication.