Subject:
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Tribes (was: National nouns (was:Americans, North Americans, Americasians))
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Newsgroups:
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lugnet.off-topic.debate
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Date:
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Sat, 1 Jun 2002 17:23:19 GMT
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Viewed:
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446 times
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In lugnet.off-topic.debate, Lindsay Frederick Braun writes:
> Yeah, it's part of the problem with the US public's perception
> of Africa and Africans. "Tribe" tends to imply unchanging, eternal
> objectness, primitivism, isolation, and unsophistication.
I'm finding this stuff fascinating. I don't associate any of those things with
tribalism, but it seems from the reading you provided that there are at least
several people who see this as a problem. I think of tribalism (or at least
what _I_ mean by that) as something we ought to be striving more for -- smaller
more communitarian civil organizations.
> "Tribalism"
> is the term given to the artificial division of African peoples from
> one another, which some have in fact internalized.
But my fairly scant ambient knowledge suggests that these divisions are not
entirely artificial. My understanding is that there are some ethnic rivalries
which are not products of European colonialism. Are you saying that's not so?
> And from last November, an interesting "public comment" from the UK
> regarding public perception of tribalism, which includes some direct
> comment from Africans and those who emigrated from Africa (look at
> those names):
>
> http://newsvote.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/talking_point/debates/african/newsid_1639
000/1639199.stm
Good stuff! One thing that seems funny to me, that I hadn't considered in this
context before, is that I think of national identity as a corrosive and
exclusionary tool to control people and other resources. I have no problem
with helping Africans to be rid fo the false implication of tribalism, but it
seems like lots of people think that eliminating tribal divisions in favor of
national divisions will help. How will that really be different?
> Most of my African colleagues and friends have a problem with the
> concept because it doesn't originate in anything they themselves
> recognized before colonialism; it's all European categorization at
> heart. That's kind of demeaning, no?
So they do assert that there were no ethnic boundaries in Africa prior to
European colonialism? That's hard to imagine. Further, I don't exactly see
how it's demeaning -- though if it is incorrect (or even just harmful) then I'd
agree that we prolly ought learn better ways to describe what does exist.
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