bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025_split huggingface dataset:
The Religions of Nigeria
Authors: Meek C. K. 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphMost people are aware that Nigeria is named after the river Niger, but many may be surprised to hear that the word Niger is not derived from the Latin adjective niger meaning ‘black’, but from a Libyan and Sudanic root, meaning ‘water“or ‘river’. This word was used by the geographer Ptolemy some 1,800 years ago in the Greek form of ‘Niγɛιρ’, and it is used to-day by the tribes of lake Chad in the form of njer. But Pliny employed the form Nigris, and from very early times the land of the Niger was called Nigritia. The modern name of Nigeria was only invented forty-six years ago by Miss Flora Shaw, who became, quite appropriately, the wife of Lord Lugard, the master-builder of Nigeria. In a letter to The Times, written in 1897, Miss Shaw said, ‘It may be permissible to coin a shorter title for the agglomeration of pagan and Mahomedan States which have been brought, by the exertion of the Royal Niger Company, within the confines of a British Protectorate.’ Her suggestion that the new title should be Nigeria was at once accepted. But it did not receive official recognition until the territories of the Royal Niger Company were formally taken over by the Imperial Government in 1900, and were formed into the two administrations known as Northern Nigeria and Southern Nigeria. Fourteen years later these two administrations were amalgamated into a single Nigeria, which then became, next to India, the most populous dependency in the British Empire.
The Lingua Franca of the Middle Congo
Authors: Guthrie Malcolm 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphFrom time to time there have appeared in this journal notes on the lingua franca spoken along the central section of the River Congo. On the usual principle of discarding the prefix in referring to the names of Bantu languages, this lingua franca has been called Ngala. In this case, however, we are obliged to retain the prefix to avoid confusion, as there exists in this area more than one language whose name is derived from this stem.
Proverbial Lore and Word-Play of the Fulani
Authors: Arnott D. W. 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphThe wit and wisdom of the Fulani, as of other African peoples, are expressed most characteristically in their proverbs and riddles. Their proverbs are amply illustrated by the collections of H. Gaden and C. E. J. Whitting, and a selection of riddles appeared in a recent article in Africa by M. Dupire and the Marquis de Tressan. But there are other types of oral literature—both light and serious—which various writers have mentioned, without quoting examples. So Mlle Dupire refers to formes litteraires alambiquées and ritournelles des enfants bororo, and G. Pfeffer, in his article on ‘Prose and Poetry of the Fulbe,’ speaks of jokes and tongue-twisters. The aim of this article is to present some examples of these types of proverbial lore and word-play—epigrams, tongue-twisters, and chain-rhymes—which were recorded, along with many more riddles and proverbs, in the course of linguistic research during a recent tour of the Fula-speaking areas of West Africa, and to consider their relation to proverbs and riddles. These types of oral literature are of course by no means peculiar to the Fulani, and a number of the examples here quoted may well have parallels in other languages of West Africa or farther afield. But an examination of such pieces in one language may perhaps contribute something to the general study of this kind of lore.
The Social Context of Cewa Witch Beliefs
Authors: Marwick M. G. 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphCertain features of Cewa witch beliefs make them well suited to sociological analysis. As this type of analysis has been somewhat neglected by students of witch beliefs, Part I of this paper will be devoted to a brief review of some of the literature (mainly on Bantu) and to an attempt to formulate a serviceable hypothesis. Part II will summarize information about the Cewa essential to an understanding of Part III, in which the hypothesis will be applied to Cewa material. Part III will appear in a subsequent number of Africa.
The Use of Tax Registers to Determine the Population Distribution for Sampling Purposes
Authors: Douglas A. J. A. 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphCertain sampling problems which arose in the design of the Agricultural Survey of Basutoland in 1949-50 were solved by the use of the native tax registers, in conjunction with the rather scanty information provided by the last population census in 1946. As the situation was one which is likely to be found in a number of African Territories, it may be of interest to describe it and to discuss the methods by which our difficulties were overcome.
The Agricultural System of the Manya-Krobo of the Gold Coast
Authors: Field M. J. 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphThe Manya-Krobo are one of the eight groups comprising the Adangme-speaking peoples who inhabit the Shai Plain between the River Volta and the Accra Plain. Until about 1890 the Krobo head-quarters were on the Krobo Hill, a rocky fastness which rises abruptly like a craggy island out of the perfectly flat plain. They have now abandoned this hill and made their head-quarters in the town of Odumase near the foot.
Recent Activities of the Literature Bureau, Zaria, Northern Nigeria
Authors: East R. M. 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphThe Literature Bureau was originally started, in 1930, by the Education Department of Northern Nigeria, as a Translation Bureau. Its main function at first was to produce Hausa text-books for use in schools, but in the years before the war it was trying to lay the foundation of a more general literature for the Hausa-speaking people. In January 1939 a Hausa paper was started with the title Gaskiya Ta Fi Kwabo, and an Assistant District Officer was attached to the Bureau to supervise its publication and business side. But in 1940, owing to reduction in staff, such a man could no longer be spared, and the paper had to be run without him.
The Modern Evolution of African Populations in the Belgian Congo
Authors: Maquet Jacques J. 
Published: April 2006

Since the end of the war, the changes undergone by African society in the Belgian Congo have been a recurrent theme in colonial journals published in Belgium and in the Congo. We shall attempt to give here a brief survey of the present situation and of the problems which arise out of it, as they appear in some of these articles.We have to start with this question: what are the different social or cultural categories into which the eleven million Africans living in the Belgian Congo can be divided? The main cleavage, which presents itself to any observer, is based on the character—tribal or otherwise—of the political institutions to which the individual is subject.
Marriage Rites among the Aku (Yoruba) of Freetown
Authors: Bassir Olumbe 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphIn the latter half of the eighteenth century, as a result of the British Government's anti-slavery legislation, negroes began to arrive in England in increasing numbers. Although there is no evidence of the operation of an anti-negro colour bar in England in those days it soon appeared desirable to repatriate them. Since it was not possible to return each ex-slave to his own original home, or that of his ancestors, the British Government negotiated with local chiefs the purchase of twenty square miles of coastland in the Sierra Leone peninsula, and in 1787 landed there the first batch of 400 freed slaves accompanied by 9 officials and (according to the records) a number of English prostitutes. Not many of this first group survived, owing to climatic conditions, but a second group of 1,131 Negroes arrived from Nova Scotia in 1792.
Patterns of Authority in West Africa
Authors: Brown Paula 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphThe development of large centralized states in West Africa has long been recognized. The complexity of organization of the few well-known kingdoms, but not their differences in size and structure, is constantly emphasized in the literature. The number and variety of West African groups which have not developed states have, on the other hand, frequently been underestimated. In a comparative review by Professors Fortes and Evans-Pritchard two types of political system, centralized and segmentary, have been described for Africa as a whole, with examples of each in West Africa. A survey of West African societies suggests, however, that finer distinctions are possible and that not all these societies can be placed in one or other of these two categories. In particular, this classification omits consideration of ‘stateless’ societies in which associations, rather than a segmentary lineage system, regulate political relations; and it fails to distinguish different types of authority and political structure in states.
L'Évolution du Schéma Initiatique chez les Femmes Oubi (Région de Taï, Côte d'Ivoire)
Authors: Holas B. 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphSituation générale du ProblèmeL'exemple des Oubi que nous avons choisi pour la présente étude n'est que l'illustration d'un problème plus général qui décidera du proche avenir des économies traditionnelles dans les forêts de l'ouest éburnéen.En accueillant la culture des plantes industrielles: caféier et cacaoyer, comme une forme nouvelle de leurs activités, les petites unités ethniques de cette zone—jusqu'ici matériellement autonomes—doivent faire appel à toutes leurs ressources morales, afin que leur intégration dans un système économique plus vaste, se réalise sans trop de dommages. Les marchés mondiaux du café et du cacao n'étant pas pour l'instant en cause, le problème immédiat reste en général circonscrit dans le cadre de l'Union Française, plus précisément dans des relations Côte d'Ivoire-métropole.
Le Sens des Masques dans l'Initiation chez les Guerzé de la Guinée Française
Authors: Mengrelis Thanos 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphL'importance de l'initiation chez les peuples africains a été soulignée par tous les auteurs qui ont étudié leur vie sociale et religieuse. Dr. Harley, pour le Libéria, en a fait une description qui reste un de nos meilleurs documents sur la question. Nous nous proposons, dans cet article, d'exposer quelques observations que nous avons pu faire, sur le même sujet, chez les habitants de la région forestière de la Guinée Française, et notamment du cercle de N'Zérékoré, au cours d''un séjour de plusieurs années.
The Mande Creation Myth
Authors: Dieterlen Germaine 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphIn the course of the investigations carried out by the Missions Griaule in French West Africa during several decades, our attention has been drawn to the fact that numerous populations in the French Sudan and Upper Volta claimed to be descended from a common stock located in Mande. Mande is the traditional centre of the ancient Keita empire (called by the Arabs the Mali empire), which was founded in the thirteenth century by Soundiata Keita. The cultural centre of this area today is Kangaba, which the inhabitants call Kaba. A list of the peoples in West Africa who claim to have come from Mande has been drawn up and published.
Versuch Einer Analyse der Sozialen Struktur der Matakam
Authors: Hinderling Paul 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphAnmerkung : Nach einem Aufenthalt von nur zweieinhalb Monaten bei einer Kulturgruppe, wobei eine ethnographische Sammlung angelegt und die Gesamtkultur studiert wurde, jedoch ohne die Beherrschung der Eingeborenensprache, ist es nicht möglich, die soziale Struktui vollständig darzustellen. Es scheint dem Verfasser, daβ die vorliegende Studie einmal dadurch ihre Berechtigung hat, daβ die soziale Struktur der Matakam in ihren Hauptzügen immerhin aufgezeigt werden kann und daβ sich das System durch bemerkenswerte Einfachheit und Klarheit auszeichnet.Die Gliederung der Studie ist der sozialen Struktur angepaβt. Sie soll nicht allgemein verbindlich sein. Gröβte Klarheit der Systematik wurde erstrebt.
A Genealogical Charter
Authors: Bohannan Laura 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphThe Tiv of Northern Nigeria, who number some 800,000, believe that they are all descended from one man, Tiv, through some 14 to 17 generations of known ancestors (Fig. 1). These ancestors are constantly named in casual conversation and in discussion of serious affairs. To understand things Tiv one must know Tiv genealogies. By genealogical reference a Tiv traces ties of kinship and marriage, claims a place to live and farm, argues his case in a moot, conducts matters of magic and ritual, and decides against whom he will fight on any given occasion. Genealogies are the key to Tiv social organization. Tiv political structure is based on a lineage system: a system of segmented groups in which each segment (save the maximal) is included in a segment of a higher order but of the same kind, and each segment (save the minimal) includes segments of a lower order but of the same kind. The Tiv system has an almost one to one correlation between lineage and territorial segments. Both are called ‘those of X’, the eponymous ancestor; thus Mbaduku (those of Aduku) describes both the lineage segment (ipaven, pl. uipaven) and the discrete territory which they inhabit (tar, pl. utar).
Speculative Origins of the Fulani Language
Authors: Jeffreys M. D. W. 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphThe Fulani people extend across Africa, from Senegal to Dafur, but their origin, like the origin of the universe, is unknown. I have drawn attention to the probable origin of the name Fulani. I propose in this article to review some of the suggested origins of the Fulani language and to put forward a suggestion of my own.
Some New Shrines of the Gold Coast and their Significance
Authors: Field M. J. 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphThere is reason to believe that at one time the greater part of the Gold Coast had one simple type of social organization. Where destruction of this took place the disturbing influences spread from the North southwards. On the coastal plains are some areas which, for various reasons, were barely touched. In these areas the aboriginal type of social organization is preserved, more or less intact, to-day.
A Ritual of Kingship among the Swazi
Authors: Kuper Hilda 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphTowards the end of every year Swazi from the Swaziland Protectorate and from beyond its borders come to the capital, the home of the Indlovukati (Queen-Mother), to take part in the dominant national ceremony, the Incwala. I will analyse this in some detail from the angle of social stratification. Cook, Schoeman, and Marwick have described the Incwala, but their accounts are very incomplete, nor can I accept their interpretations.The Incwala can be abstracted from Swazi culture, in the same way as any other situation—a marriage, a court case, a business agreement, the building of a hut, &c., but it has a wider and more representative personnel, and Swazi recognize it as the most important of all national ceremonies, and the most essential event of the year. Personal joys and tragedies, the birth of a child, or the death of a loved one affect individual men and women, but the Incwala ‘is the heavy play of all the people’.
Alternate Generations among the Lele of the Kasai, South-West Congo
Authors: Douglas Mary 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphIn the last fifty years certain instances of a special privileged relation between grandparents and grandchildren have been quoted so frequently as to have become almost classic cases. The three most important are those reported for the Dieri tribe of SE. Australia (Howitt 1904), the Pentecost Islanders of Melanesia (Rivers 1914), and the Oraons of Chota Nagpur (Sarat Chandra Roy 1915). In all three cases the system of kinship terms treats grandchildren as if they were in the same generation as their grandparents, but in each report slightly different aspects of the relation between grandparents and grandchildren are emphasized. Among the Oraons it is the bantering mode of conversation between a man and his granddaughter or greatniece ‘in which the two parties habitually act the part of man and wife’ to which attention is drawn, leading to the conjecture that there was formerly a system of marriage between grandparents and grandchildren. In Pentecost Island the classing of alternate generations together in kinship terminology is ‘connected with an ancient social condition in which it was the normal occurrence for a man to marry the granddaughter of his brother’. Among the Dieri tribe the custom of marriage with a daughter's daughter of the man's own brother was reported as actually in practice.
Shall We Use the Word ‘Gurunsi’?
Authors: Zwernemann Jürgen 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphSome years ago the Rev. Fr. Nicolas discussed the problem of the term ‘Gurunsi’ in this journal. He argued that it should be abolished on the grounds that it was inadequate and furthermore derogatory to the tribes in question. He wrote (pp.170-1): ‘Tout un groupe de populations de la Volta Noire est désigné par un ethnique pluriel: Gourounsi, ou son singulier: Gourounga. . . . Et ce qui est le comble de l'anomalie, ces appellations . . . sont unanimement répudiées par toutes les confédérations de ce groupement, parce que toujours perçues par elles comme denigrantes sinon comme injurieuses.) A year later he again discussed the question in the Introduction to his Glossaire L'élé-Français (p. 136) : ‘. . . ce sous-groupe ne devrait pas être dit “gourounsi” car cet ethnique pluriel ne convient qu'à une seule tribu du groupe Moaya qui seule le reconnaît comme sien et le porte donc volontiers . . .’ The tribe referred to is the Nankanse, and the source of his information is Rattray. It may therefore be of some interest to discuss once more the question of the term ‘Gurunsi’ or ‘Grusi’
The Origin of the Name ‘Hausa’
Authors: Skinner Neil 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphIn his introductory notes to Bargery's dictionary, Westermann summarizes the early historical records of the Hausa-speaking peoples and, in particular, discusses the name ‘Hausa’ itself, without forming any theory as to its provenance. He points out that, apart from a reference to Ḥauṣiyin by Ibn Sa‘id, an Andalusian Arab writer who died in the last quarter of the thirteenth century, the first reference to the word is four centuries later, in the Tarikh-es-Sudan. Ibn Sa‘id incidentally—if we are to believe Ibn Khallikan—got no nearer to the Western Sudan than Tunis, so it seems that his information was as secondhand as that of most of our other Arab authorities for the area. In the interim four centuries, though Ibn Batuta uses such names of individual Hausa chiefdoms as Kūbar (Gobir), the only generic name used was by Al Maqrizi, an Egyptian, whom Hiskett suggests got the name from some Bornu source, without knowing much about the people it referred to. This was Afnū, which is still the name used for the Hausa by the Kanuri and other related peoples of the Chad area. While making no suggestion himself as to a possible source of origin, at the end of the first section of his notes, Westermann makes reference to the conquest of Hausaland by Muhammadu Askia of Songhai, and to his ultimate repulse by Muhammadu Kanta, chief of Kebbi, in 1513.
Joking Relationships, Kin Categories, and Clanship among the Gogo
Authors: Rigby Peter 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphInstitutionalized ‘joking relationships’ occur between several different categories of kin and affines, and between groups or categories of varying inclusiveness. Thus brothers-in-law, mother's brothers and sister's sons, and kinsmen of alternate generations are frequent categories between whom joking relationships exist; and localities, villages, clans, and peoples or ‘tribes’ may have joking relationships with one another, variously or simultaneously. Radcliffe-Brown (1952, p. 95) rightly points out that if such behaviour is to be adequately explained, all of the contexts in which it occurs must be taken into account. He also indicates the further ramifications of the problem by placing it in the wider context of ‘alliances’. Thus ‘alliance by the joking relationship may exist separately or combined in several different ways’ with alliances ‘(1) through inter-marriage, (2) by exchange of goods or services, (3) by blood-brotherhood or exchanges of names or sacra’, and so on (1952, p. 102).
Witchcraft and Sorcery: Taxonomy versus Dynamics
Authors: Turner Victor W. 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphIt is greatly to the credit of the editors of Witchcraft and Sorcery in East Africa that they have made generally available ten systematic accounts of witch beliefs in East and Central African societies. All teachers of anthropology must surely be grateful to them on this account alone. Moreover the book is spiced with many insights into sociocultural problems connected with the main theme. A permissive editorial policy has stimulated a rich diversity of viewpoints and presentations. But one is left with the feeling that Monica Wilson's plea for the comparative analysis of these ‘standardized nightmares’—a plea which forms the book's motto—as one of the ‘keys to the understanding of society’ has not met here with a wholly satisfactory response.
Traditional History and Social Structure in Ufipa
Authors: Willis R. G. 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphThe Fipa of south-western Tanganyika are a Bantu-speaking people numbering 78,000 at the last tribal census in 1948. Most of them live on a high and largely deforested plateau bounded on the west by the southern extremity of Lake Tanganyika and on the east by Lake Rukwa. On the plateau, a corridor of land roughly 140 miles long and varying from 30 to 50 miles in width, the Fipa are agriculturalists and raisers of livestock, particularly cattle, goats, and poultry; their principal crops are millet, maize, and beans. Along the shores of the two lakes the Fipa are also fishermen.
Paramountcy to Partnership: J. H. Oldham and Africa
Authors: Bennett George 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphThe jubilee of the World Missionary Conference, which was held at Edinburgh in June 1910, should be noticed by students of Africa, since it brought into prominence for the first time, as one of its two secretaries, a man who was to have considerable influence on African affairs and was the first Administrative Director of the International African Institute. This was J. H. Oldham who had been briefly a missionary in India and then secretary of the Missionary Study Council of the United Free Church of Scotland. ‘The conspicuous ability’ he showed in the organization and running of the great conference led to his subsequent appointment as full-time secretary of the Continuation Committee, which was set up to maintain the work of the conference and which became in 1921 the International Missionary Council. In this post, and as the first editor of the International Review of Missions, Oldham was in constant and daily touch with mission affairs from the whole world. He was, in fact, beginning a long career as a missionary statesman, with, from the First World War, his headquarters at Edinburgh House in London. In negotiating then with the Government over German missionaries and their property in India and the British African territories, Oldham began to build up a fund of goodwill in the official world.
The Yoruba Ogboni Cult in Oyo
Authors: Morton-Williams Peter 
Published: April 2006

Opening ParagraphThe Yoruba Ogboni cult has been referred to as a typical ‘secret society’ for over fifty years, yet it has never been described in any detail, or analysed in accurate general terms. Frobenius discovered its controlling importance in Yoruba religious organization in 1910 and promptly became initiated into the Ibadan Ogboni, but only to get information from the priests of other Yoruba cults. He made no attempt to study the beliefs of Ogboni members, whom he dismissed as ‘mystery-mongering greybeards’. Two anthropologists have been initiated into the cult in the course of the last twenty-five years, but have declared themselves bound by its oath of secrecy, and so have published nothing about it.