ISLAMIC AND WESTERN EDUCATIONAL ACCOMMODATION IN A WEST AFRICAN SOCIETY: A COHORT-COMPARISON ANALYSIS.

Theories of the global expansion of Western mass education tend to assume the replacement of indigenous educational systems. Data from two surveys of youth in an Islamic, West African city, conducted five and nineteen years after national independence, indicate a convergence in the social forces that predispose attendance in the new and old systems. Using a standard nine-variable model of educational attainment, of five variables that had significant but opposite effects on Islamic and Western schooling attendance in the first cohort, only one significant opposing effect still operated in the second. Average years of attendance increased for both Western and Islamic schooling. Hypotheses are offered to explain the apparent structural accommodation of the two systems. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]