West Africa, Qurʾānic Exegesis in

In order to fully appreciate the role of Qurʾānic exegesis, or tafsīr in Arabic, in the intellectual and social history of Islam in West Africa, it is necessary to consider its three fundamental dimensions: didactic (tafsīr as a discipline transmitted within the traditional networks of Islamic learning), public (the oral performance of tafsīr sessions, especially during the month of Ramadan), and literary (the composition of written tafsīr texts for a scholarly audience).