Introduction

An examination of the founding and early settlement of Darou Mousty provides us with an excellent laboratory in which to examine how the Murid synthesis was actually acted upon by Murid leaders and disciples. In other words, how did a new community translate Amadu Bamba's reformist and Sufi ideology into their daily lives and actions, and in a sense, pursue this avenue of modernization. We must also consider how this Murid community related to the colonial administration and the modernization that was coming into rural Senegal from French rule. Darou Mousty largely reflected how relations between the French and the Murids developed over time from mutual estrangement and antagonism into an eventual mutual accommodation. Furthermore, this chapter will analyze how this process was explained and legitimized by the Murids.

It is at this point that we can also most fruitfully examine the Murid order as a “social imaginary.” In Charles Taylor's latest study, he traces the development of a “modern social imaginary.” In this context, Taylor defined a social imaginary as “the ways people imagine their social existence, how they fit together with others, how things go on between them and their fellows, the expectations that are normally met, and the deeper normative notions and images that underlie these expectations.” Taylor refers to the notion of an imaginary because he was not so much concerned with the theoretical aspect of this issue as with the ways in which common people imagine their society through images, narratives, and legends.