ABOUT THIS BOOK

On July 9, 2011, South Sudan celebrated its independence as the world's newest nation, an occasion that the country's Christian leaders claimed had been foretold in the Book of Isaiah. The Bible provided a foundation through which the South Sudanese could distinguish themselves from the Arab and Muslim Sudanese to the north and understand themselves as a spiritual community now freed from their oppressors. Less than three years later, however, new conflicts emerged along ethnic lines within South Sudan, belying the liberation theology that had supposedly reached its climactic conclusion with independence. In Chosen Peoples, Christopher Tounsel investigates the centrality of Christian worldviews to the ideological construction of South Sudan and the inability of shared religion to prevent conflict. Exploring the creation of a colonial-era mission school to halt Islam's spread up the Nile, the centrality of biblical language in South Sudanese propaganda during the Second Civil War (1983--2005), and postindependence transformations of religious thought in the face of ethnic warfare, Tounsel highlights the potential and limitations of deploying race and Christian theology to unify South Sudan.

AUTHOR BIOGRAPHY

Christopher Tounsel is Catherine Shultz Rein Early Career Professor in the College of the Liberal Arts and Assistant Professor of History and African Studies at Pennsylvania State University.

REVIEWS

“Christopher Tounsel makes a major contribution to the study of South Sudanese political thought. He has drawn on the literature of Black liberation theology in Africa as well as the Americas, giving the South Sudanese a place in the theoretical literature that has excluded them up to now. Chosen Peoples presents unique material that has the potential to shift the way we understand the history of Sudan and South Sudan and the role of religion in politics more generally.”

-- Douglas H. Johnson, author of South Sudan: A New History for a New Nation

“Chosen Peoples is a remarkable achievement, revealing unexplored chapters of South Sudanese history and placing them into a novel analytic frame that will impact how we think about postcolonial liberation for many years to come. In this brave book, Christopher Tounsel does not shy away from asking difficult questions of his material, the reward being that he opens considerable space for thinking anew about the mutual construction of race and religion in the two Sudans and beyond.”

-- Noah Salomon, author of For Love of the Prophet: An Ethnography of Sudan’s Islamic State

"In a study that will resonate with anyone familiar with the political language of medieval Christian Europe or the 19th-century United States, Tounsel shows how biblical and religious language utterly permeated political rhetoric and self-fashioning in South Sudan. . . . Chosen Peoples is richly instructive for understanding the influence of the Bible in societies where it represents a powerful and challenging new presence."

-- Philip Jenkins Christian Century

"Tounsel helps to draw new attention to South Sudan. He unpacks the influence of Christianity on the politics of identity in the country. Rather than providing a comprehensive history of the political and social influences of Christian churches in South Sudan, Tounsel focuses on specific institutions at different points in history that highlight the diverse ways in which Christianity shaped South Sudanese identities."

-- Timothy Longman Sociology of Religion

"[Chosen Peoples] is an important text that touches on a new moment in the development of African Christian political thought—a moment when Black Africans drew from discourses of liberation theology to fight for liberation from other Black Africans."

-- David Ngong Reading Religion

"An important contribution to scholarship . . . Chosen Peoples offers critical insight into the complex ways in which categories of religion, race and ethnicity work in different contexts, and also raises serious questions about the limitations of Christianity - and possibly religion more generally - as a basis of nation building and as a means of promoting national cohesion and collective identity."

-- Adriaan van Klinken Religion

"Chosen Peoples offers novel insights into South Sudan’s religious and political history. By prioritizing political theologies as a question of historical inquiry, it makes an important intervention in both South Sudan’s emerging historiography and in the broader trajectories of African intellectual history."

-- Jonathon L. Earle Journal of African History

"This book provides a vivid history of South Sudan. It gives a very clear and concise account of events from the beginning of the civil wars to the aftermath of the Comprehensive Peace Agreement, and the efforts by the people of South Sudan to liberate itself from the North."

-- Lawrencia Baaba Okai African Studies Quarterly

"Chosen Peoples is essential reading for all those seeking to understand Sudan’s and South Sudan’s traumatic journey over the last 100 years in its social, political, and spiritual dimensions."

-- Andrew Wheeler Sudan Studies

"Christopher Tounsel’s new book is a creative, substantive, and important look at the role of religion in the creation of the world’s youngest nation-state, South Sudan. . . . Tounsel’s prose is beautiful, but its sources really set the book apart."

-- Nathaniel Homewood Religious Studies Review

"The crisp style of writing, the arguments, and the engaging discussions in the various chapters make this book a must-read for scholars, students, and individuals interested not only in African studies and history but also in the application of religious thought in political situations."

-- Kwaku Nti Journal of Global South Studies

"Chosen Peoples is a fascinating and engaging book. . . . The book is excellent reading for scholars of Sudan, and of religion, politics, and race regardless of context."

-- Henni Alava Journal of Religion in Africa

TABLE OF CONTENTS

SPLM/SPLA Update

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