Assan Sarr

Dr. Assan Sarr is a historian of West Africa’s Senegambia region with a focus on the 19th and early 20th centuries. His first book, Islam, Power and Dependency in the Gambia River Basin: The Politics of Land Control, 1790-1940 (published by the University of Rochester Press in 2016) examines the impact of Islamization, the development of peanut production, and the imposition of colonial rule on people living along the middle and lower Gambia River. It shows how these waves of changes sweeping the region after 1850 altered local political and social arrangements, with important implications for the ability of elites to control land.

Dr. Sarr’s second book, Umarian Tijaniyya in Southern Senegambia: Fulɓe Itinerant Scholars and the Expansion of Islam in West Africa, c. 1803-1996, will be published by Michigan State University Press. This book deals with the development of a network of itinerant Fulɓe clerics who forged Fulɓe solidarity under the banner of Islam. It also discusses the role of little-known clerics and their disciples who expanded the Umarian branch of the Tijaniyya sect into remote parts of southern Senegambia by creating a series of villages as educational centers during a very tumultuous period in the region’s history. These clerics were Cherno Muhammadu Jallow (c. 1803-1883), Cherno Omar Jallow (c. 1862-1940) and Cherno Muhammadu Baba Jallow (c. 1890-1996). Its major argument is that many Fulɓe Firdu and Laobe were only drawn into Islam fairly late.

Dr. Sarr has held a range of administrative positions. He served as Director of Graduate Studies in the Department of History at Ohio University, Interim CIS Director and Director of African Studies at Ohio University. Starting January 2026, Dr. Sarr will assume the role of Director of the Center for African Studies at the University of Pittsburgh.

Because of his passion for building institutional partnerships and promoting global engagement, Dr. Sarr has spearheaded the development of many institutional linkages with African universities and research centers. He has also served as a Visiting Scholar at the University of The Gambia, Michigan State University, the Merian Institute for Advanced Studies in Africa (MIASA) at the University of Ghana, the Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology where, among other responsibilities, he taught courses in African History and supervised research of graduate students.  

Dr. Sarr welcomes inquiries from prospective graduate students seeking to pursue a PhD. in West African History. In addition to supervising graduate students in African History and African Studies, Dr. Sarr has taught a variety of graduate and undergraduate courses at Ohio University. His courses included Women in African History, the Atlantic Slave Trade and Muslim Societies in African History.