Scholarly Communities and the Social Value of Knowledge

Part I of the book provides the framework and contexts for appreciating the significance of local history-writing. Chapter 1 deals with the different professional and elite groups who were the principal producers of history in the early Islamic world. Many works were produced by those loosely known as religious scholars ( ʿulamāʾ , sing. ʿālim ), but other professional groups such as government chancery officials and administrators ( kuttāb , sing. kātib ) are considered as well, as are those who can be very loosely labelled litterateurs ( udabāʾ , sing. adīb ). The chapter investigates how these groups thought about themselves as communities and how they derived social authority as elites. It is frequently assumed that these groups used history-writing as one way of underpinning their authority, but it is less frequently examined explicitly how such authority operated. Since this book absolutely agrees with the now well-established principal that history-writing supported the position and authority of relevant groups, it is important to establish in what precise ways this worked and what the opportunities to exercise authority were to those groups whose members produced local histories.