This edition of Sudan: A Country Study replaces the previous edition published in 1982. Like its predecessor, the present book attempts to treat in a compact and objective manner the dominant historical, social, economic, political, and national security aspects of contemporary Sudan. Sources of information included scholarly books, journals, and monographs; official reports and documents of governments and international organizations; and foreign and domestic newspapers and periodicals. Relatively up-to-date economic data were lacking.
Chapter bibliographies appear at the end of the book; brief comments on some of the more valuable sources for further reading appear at the conclusion of each chapter. Measurements are given in the metric system; a conversion table is provided to assist those who are unfamiliar with the metric system (see table 1, Appendix). The Glossary provides brief definitions of terms that may be unfamiliar to the general reader.
The transliteration of Arabic words and phrases posed a particular problem. For many of the words--such as Muhammad, Muslim, Quran, and shaykh--the authors followed a modified version of the system adopted by the United States Board on Geographic Names and the Permanent Committee on Geographic Names for British Official Use, known as the BGN/PCGN system; the modification entails the omission of all diacritical markings and hyphens. In numerous instances, however, the names of persons or places are so well known by another spelling that to have used the BGN/PCGN system may have created confusion. The reader will find Khartoum for the city rather than Al Khartum (the latter form is used for the state by that name), Roseires Dan rather than Ar Rusayris, and the Mahdi rather than Muhammad Ahmad ibn as Sayyid Abd Allah. Place names pose another problem in the government changed the administrative divisions of Sudan in February 1991. The country was then divided into nine states, generally with names and borders similar to the historical provinces of the colonial period and early independence. Readers will thus find Bahr al Ghazal and Kurdufan, for example, referred to either as states or as provinces depending on the context.
The body of the text reflects information available as of June 1991. Certain other portions of the text, however, have been updated. The Introduction discusses significant events that have occurred since the completion of research, and the Country Profile includes updated information as available.
Data as of June 1991