Lifted Out of the Commonplace Grandeur of Modern Times: Reappraising Edward Wilmot Blyden's Views of Islam and Afrocentrism in Light of His Scholarly Black Christian Orientalism.

Although the West Indian-born West African intellectual Rev. Edward Wilmot Blyden praised the societies of Africa and the Orient, he was actually a lifelong Christian whose thought followed Orientalist templates, from his acquisition of 'Oriental' languages, to his use of Orientalist learning to evangelize Muslims, to his advocacy of Islamic education as a means of strengthening British imperialism in West Africa. While Blyden's view of Islam was far more Orientalist and far less positive than most accounts portray, it nonetheless played an important part in the formation of Afrocentrism and in Black appreciation of Islam. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]