A wealth of historical writing dealing with the Maghrib (Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, and Libya) has been published during the roughly forty years since European colonial control ended in the region. This book provides a "state of the field" survey of this postcolonial Maghribi historiography.

The book contains thirteen essays by leading Maghribi and North American scholars. The first section surveys the Maghrib as a whole; the second focuses on individual countries of the Maghrib; and the third explores theoretical issues and case studies. Cutting across chronological categories, the book encompasses historiographical writing dealing with all eras, from the ancient Maghrib to the contemporary period.

This book explores a millennium of literary exchanges among the peoples of the Maghrib, or westernmost strongholds of medieval Islam. In the seventh century, Muslim expansion into the western Mediterranean initiated a new phase in the layering of heterogeneous peoples and languages in this contact zone: Arabs and Berbers, Christians and Jews, Sunnī and Shīʿa Muslims, Greeks and Latins all helped shape identities, hybrid genealogies of knowledge, and political alliances. These essays excavate the literary artefacts produced in these times of turmoil, offering new perspectives on the intellectual networks and traditions that proved instrumental in overcoming the often traumatic transitions among political and/or religious regimes.