The Bantu Ethnic Groups in Africa consists of 300-600 different groups who speak the Bantu languages. They inhabit the region south of the Sahara Desert from Central Africa down to Southern Africa. The Bantu language group has 650 languages with different dialects of the language within the group and is a major branch of the Niger-Congo language family. Since the Bantu consists of all the different groups they are divided into zones A-S and divided into decades (groups A10, A20, etc.) and this system known as the Guthrie System became the standard for identifying Bantu languages. The Bantu originated in West Africa around 4000 years ago. They expanded within waves and slowly started dispersing to the East. After they dispersed different groups within the Bantu became recognizable such as the Nguni who occupied the eastern coastal plains and the Sotho-Tswana who inhabited the interior plateau. Later the European settlers began to arrive and conflict arose between the two because the settlers began settling on the land of the Bantu. They fought for the land and in the end the Bantu w...
When one first hears the word Vodou, immediately images of curses and little model dolls come to mind. We tend to synonymize it with words like sinister, evil and revenge. However, Vodou is nothing like what mainstream North American media has brainwashed people into believing. As best put by Patrick Bellegarde-Smith, “Vodou is far more than [a religion] it's a spiritual system” (Tippet and Bellegarde-Smith 145). Haitian Vodou is a spiritual system that syncretizes the practices of Roman Catholicism with West African spirituality. This paper will contextualize Vodou and give a brief history on what it is, explain how I came to gain an interest in Vodou and close off with an introduction to Chouk Bwa Libète a traditional Haitian Mizik Rasin—roots
Anzaldúa's main point in the essay “How to Tame a Wild Tongue” is that Language is important and part of who we are. People should not be forced to speak another langue or criticized for speaking their own language. Anzaldúa says “So if you want to hurt me, talk badly about my language. Ethnic identity is twin skin to linguistic identity - I am my language”. (pp.416) Language defines who we are. and when we are forced to change out language we are forced to change who we are.
Ness. Philip A. Grafting Old Rootstock: Studies in Culture and Religion of the Chamba, Duru, Fula, and Gbaya of Cameroun. Dallas: Summer Institute of Linguistics, Inc., 1982.
The Boli, or altar, figure from the Bamana peoples of Mali is a unique piece of art not based on what an individual knows about the figure, but rather what it doesn’t. The Boli has a secretive quality that harness energy from the community and peoples reactions to the Boli can fluctuate based on their interpretations on the object. The Boli is made of materials ranging from human bodily fluid to sticks and string. The figure is generally made to resemble an animal, typically a hippopotamus or cow, but over time with sacrificial material covering the figure it can become somewhat unclear. The Bamana peoples have an obscure relationship with the Boli for many reasons that could sprout from the materials it is made from, its uses in the society, and its extremely secretive nature.
Quapaw, Osage, and Caddo have many similarities as well as differences. For example: their religion, food acquisition, food production, and social structure. In this essay, there will be comparisons between the tribes as well as distinctive differences in each tribe. In this paper, information about these tribes will be further explored.
Although Tutsi and Hutu have been living a lifelong battle they are very similar because they speak the same language, intermarrying and even lived as neighbors (Stratus, 2006). It was much more common to see Tutsi women to be married to Hutu men than to find Hutu women married to Tutsi men, therefore a Hutu man married to a Tutsi woman gave birth to legally Hutu. Marriage between Hutu men and Tutsi women had the full benefits of Hutu citizenship to progeny and this was perceived as racially impure (Taylor, 2008).
There is a diversity of tribes that the human society was once uninformed of its existence. Until the 1970, mankind was unaware of the Korowai society existence. The Korowai also known as Kolufu are from the southwestern part of the western part of New Guinea. The Korowai tribe follows a common language, economic system, and an exceptional lifestyle. They practice rituals and have incredible architectural knowledge. In the verge of extinction the Korowai tribe continues to practice their unique culture and traditional rituals.
in the DBQ Project. 265. The. Print. The. Khumalo, Lobengula, Chief of the South African Ndebele (Matabele) Tribe, Early 1890s.
There is a diversity of tribes that the human society was once uninformed of its existence. Until the 1970, mankind was unaware of the Korowai society existence. The Korowai also known as Kolufu are from the southwestern part of the western part of New Guinea. The Korowai tribe follows a common language, economic system, and an exceptional lifestyle. They practice ritual cannibalism and have incredible architecture knowledge. In the verge of extinction the Korowai continue to practice their unique culture which makes them different from other societies.
In 1958, their population was approximately 40,000. The pursuant gatherers of Mbuti people are separated into several subgroups. They lived within their individual region, where they have their own languages and engage in their hunting practices. Each Mbuti subgroup uses a language of a nearest person and they do not have a text method. Their sizes are usually small and average; they also have naturally brown skin and churlish hairs. Mbuti persons exist in bands of 15 to 60. They live in hot, sticky and plentiful precipitation forest which is sprinkled with lakes and rivers. It also has a wealthy variety of flowers and animals. The Mbuti have exte...
As the Europeans started to invade Africa and split up the land, they paid no attention to the already existing natural boundaries. Over time, villages with different cultures had set these boundaries. The Europeans ignored these invisible borders as they invaded. This caused soci...
... Cambridge Encyclopedia of Africa. Ed. Roland Oliver. 1. New York: Trewin Copplestone Books Limited, 1984. Print.
“Prior to the arrival of the German and Belgian colonizers, the social aries between the Hutus and Tutsis were fluid (White 472).” During pre-colonial society, the ownership of cattle was the most significant factor of ethnic association between the Hutus and Tutsis. “Any man with more than ten head of cattle was to be permanently classified as Tutsi, and any man with fewer than ten cattle as Hutu or Twa (Hintjens 253).” The Hutus had a fondness for farming and the Tutsi were occasionally known for cattle breeding. The aboriginal group of Rwanda were the Twa. They were the hunter-gatherer party that made up 1% of the population and were commonly placed as the minority (Hintjens 252). Regarding the social group classification, the boundaries were not permanent. Hutu and Twa were appointed as ‘lords of the land’ yet the Tutsi controlled the cattle of the land. The system was flexible and either group could...
The earliest inhabitants of the present-day Democratic Republic of the Congo are most likely Pygmies, who lived in the north and northeast portions of the forest that occupied the land. Towards the end of the first millennium B.C., a small group of Bantu-speaking people entered from the northwest (from the areas that are now called Nigeria and Cameroon). They established their home in the savanna regions of the south, and they arrived with profound knowledge of iron technology and agriculture. Their skill with iron technology and agriculture helped propel them to migrate to other parts of the Congo and Africa. With their expansion also came the development of new, related languages. Beginning approximately A.D. 700, the Bantu-speaking people worked the Copper deposits of Southern Katanga, and then traded these minerals over wide areas. The Bantu had settled into most of the Congo by about 1000, which consequently reduced the area utilized by the Pygmies. By the early parts of the second millennium, the number of Bantu occupants in the Congo were rapidly increasing and beginning to merge into states. Some of these states had governing power over vast areas and were complemented with multifaceted administrative structures. A majority of these states were governed by monarchy, and even though they had considerable authority, it was moderated by a council consisting of high civil servants and elders. Some of the most notable of these states included the Kingdom of Kongo, the Lunda Kingdom of Mwata Yamo, the Kingdom of Luba, and the Lunda Kingdom of Mwata Kazemba. The Luba and Lunda Kingdoms were somewhat intertwined, and as a result, the Luba transmitted political ideas to the Lunda. Additionally, many small Luba-Lunda sta...
On the second documentary on the Kingdoms of Africa, historian Gus Cacely-Hayford makes his way to the southern part of Africa to learn about the fierce kingdom of the Zulu Nation. He starts by saying that on January 22nd, 1879, 200 British troops were defeated by the Zulus as he was expressing how influential the Zulu nation was as they were one of the most powerful kingdoms in Africa. In the 1700’s, there was once a cattle farmer that had a vision on how to unite the neighboring chiefdoms and transformed it into a great empire, and his name was Shaka.