Academic literature on the topic 'Senegambia and Sudan'

Studies of the history of the Atlantic slave trade in Africa have focused on demography and within it on the number of slaves exported from Africa (Curtin 1969; Lovejoy 1982, 1983; Manning 1981). Seen from the perspective of African history, the question of the number exported is a window on larger fields of inquiry and an area open to research, but it is only a small part of the larger question of the impact of the trade on Africa. Working out a reasonable estimate of the number exported does not give us the number lost, for we can only estimate the number killed in wars and raids or the number who died while being moved toward slave markets. Even if the demographic question were the most important one, the most crucial aspect of it would not be the raw statistics of exports but the question of reproduction (Gregory and Cordell 1987). Reproduction involves a host of variables: nutrition, disease, agricultural productivity, security, political stability, and quality of life among others. Most of these are not amenable to precise answers. Furthermore, the question of reproduction leads us to the larger questions of political, social, and economic relationships. This article examines the effects of the slave trade on the institutional structure of Senegambia and the western Sudan and the reproduction of the societies involved.

Jan Jansen has substantially advanced our understanding of the “status discourse” between polities, in Mande and far beyond, through a new approach to one of the more common types of historical evidence: genealogy. At the core of his paper is an analysis of genealogical metaphors used in status discourse, combined with an awareness of the principles of lineage segmentation; he uncovered a nexus of ideology and social structure. The quintessential observation made by Jansen is that “the status of recent immigration and the position of the youngest brother is very prestigious” and that both ultimately emanate from the “principles of patrilocal settlement and patrilineal descent.”Once this is accepted, everything falls into line: the unexpected claim for the status of ‘younger brother,’ as well as the contradictory genealogies of ‘related’ lineages. His observation has escaped the attention of previous research (including my own) because it contravenes our expectation that younger age, factual or figurative, always signifies subordination under ‘older’ authority. Oral traditions from different ethnic groups in Senegambia confirm Jansen and attest to Kangaba's historical prestige.Jansen's paper should be read in conjunction with his “The Younger Brother and the Stranger,” in which he studies the social basis of status discourse in more detail and also touches on the symbolism employed. He has overcome a crucial error in a long tradition of historical writing on the western Sudan: the taking of genealogy at face value, whereas genealogy reflects the recent state of relationship between persons or groups rather than factual ancestry.

AbstractThe Sahara Desert has acted as a barrier to human gene-flow between the northern and central parts of Africa since its aridification. Nonetheless, some contacts between both sides of the desert have occurred throughout history, mainly driven by commercial activity. Part of this was the infamous trans-Saharan slave trade, which forcedly brought peoples from south of the Sahara to North Africa from Roman times until the nineteenth century. Although historical records exist, the genetic aspects of these trans-Saharan migrations have not been deeply studied. In the present study, we assess the genetic influence of trans-Saharan migrations in current-day North Africa and characterize its amount, geographical origin, and dates. We confirm the heterogeneous and generally low-frequency presence of genomic segments of sub-Saharan origin in present-day North Africans acquired in recent historical times, and we show evidence of at least two admixture events: one dated around the thirteenth–fourteenth centuries CE between North Africans and a Western-sub-Saharan-like source similar to current-day Senegambian populations, and another one dated around the seventeenth century CE involving Tunisians and an Eastern-sub-Saharan-like source related to current-day south-Sudan and Kenyan populations. Time and location coincide with the peak of trans-Saharan slave-trade activity between Western African empires and North African powers, and are also concordant with the possibility of continuous recent south-to-north gene-flow. These findings confirm the trans-Saharan human genetic contacts, providing new and precise evidence about its possible dates and geographical origins, which are pivotal to understanding the genomic composition of an underrepresented region such as North Africa.

La problématique de la déportation ou des déportés d’Afrique de l’Ouest, durant l’ère coloniale, n’est pas assez prise en charge par l’historiographie africaine d’expression française et même anglaise qui s'est davantage appesantie plus sur les guerres, les résistances et leurs différentes formes. Ce faisant, une réalité d’un pan de l’histoire coloniale reste plus ou moins méconnue. C'est pourquoi nous voudrions étudier le thème suivant, qui a été et demeure d’une actualité brûlante: « Les déportés de la Sénégambie et du Soudan : entre résistances et répressions dans un espace colonial de 1840 à 1946 ». Les acteurs de cette histoire des déportés sont des figures emblématiques et/ou de simples anonymes, qui ont voulu défendre la terre de leurs ancêtres, diriger les destinées de leurs peuples, lutter pour le maintien des valeurs et des traditions africaines. L’histoire de « ces soldats du refus » – à savoir les chefs religieux, les combattants au service de l’islam et des valeurs ou croyances ancestrales et les chefs politiques auxquels s’ajoutent les aliénés mentaux, les bandits sociaux et délinquants, les hommes de presse, les partisans et/ou disciples des chefs et même les tirailleurs sénégalais – mérite d’être examinée. Cette thèse s’inscrit dans les questionnements d’une histoire coloniale attentive aux enjeux de la répression et du maintien de l’ordre. Face au refus manifeste des meneurs de troupes ou créateurs d’émotions de se résigner au diktat colonial, la réponse donnée par les autorités coloniales était, entre autres, de les déporter/emprisonner, les assigner en résidence surveillée, leur interdire de séjour, pour leur couper toute forme de communication, tout contact avec leur entourage et les mettre ainsi hors d’état de nuire. Dans de nombreux cas, il s'agissait d'une forme d'emprisonnement, ce qui nous conduit à l'étude du milieu carcéral qui dévoile les formes d’évitement, les conditions de vie des déportés, l’architecture liée aux questions sécuritaires, etc. L’application de cette technique de répression, entrant dans la logique des politiques de sécurité, était une manière de freiner l’élan des chefs et d’anéantir toutes les résistances coloniales. L'étude que nous souhaitons conduire vise surtout à cerner la place déterminante de la déportation dans le dispositif de répression coloniale, dans le maintien de l’ordre sécuritaire, de mainmise politique, de contrôle des hommes et des espaces, pour l’exploitation des colonies. La trame chronologique que ce travail tente d’éclairer va de 1840 à 1946, une période charnière de l’histoire coloniale en Afrique de l’Ouest, particulièrement en Sénégambie et au Soudan, en ce sens qu’elle est marquée par des transformations rapides à tous les niveaux (politique, économique, social et culturel). La déportation était-elle si fondamentale, si nécessaire pour la réalisation du projet colonial, le maintien de l’ordre sécuritaire ? Dans quelle mesure les déportés constituaient-ils un réel obstacle, une entrave à l’implantation et à l’imposition du pouvoir colonial ? Quel a été le rôle des acteurs de l’ordre dans le processus de déportation ? Cette thèse explore des thématiques majeures telles que les contextes de déportation, les abus de pouvoir des administrateurs coloniaux, l’Indigénat et la justice indigène, les motivations de la déportation, les multiples réponses des indigènes, leur arrestation et déportation, la place des agents/acteurs (armée, gendarmerie et police coloniales) dans le maintien, le rétablissement et/ou la protection de la stabilité et les conséquences politico-économiques d’une telle « technique de pouvoir»
The problem of deportation or deportees from West Africa during the colonial era is not sufficiently addressed by French- and even English-speaking African historiography, which has focused more on wars, resistances and their different forms. In doing so, a reality of a part of colonial history remains more or less unknown. That is why we would like to study the following theme, which has been and remains of burning topicality: "The deportees of Senegambia and Sudan: between resistance and repression in a colonial space from 1840 to 1946". The actors in this story of the deportees are emblematic figures and/or simple anonymous, who wanted to defend the land of their ancestors, direct the destinies of their peoples, fight for the maintenance of African values and traditions. The history of "these soldiers of refusal" – namely religious leaders, fighters in the service of Islam and ancestral values or beliefs and political leaders to which are added the mentally insane, social bandits and delinquents, men of the press, supporters and/or followers of leaders and even Senegalese riflemen – deserves to be examined. This thesis is part of the questions of a colonial history attentive to the issues of repression and the maintenance of order. Faced with the manifest refusal of the leaders of troops or creators of emotions to resign themselves to the colonial diktat, the response given by the colonial authorities was, among other things, to deport/imprison them, to house arrest, to prohibit them from staying, to cut them off all forms of communication, any contact with their entourage and thus put them out of harm's way. In many cases, it was a form of imprisonment, which leads us to the study of the prison environment that reveals the forms of avoidance, the living conditions of the deportees, the architecture related to security issues, etc. The application of this technique of repression, part of the logic of security policies, was a way of slowing down the momentum of the leaders and annihilating all colonial resistance. The study we wish to conduct aims above all to identify the decisive place of deportation in the system of colonial repression, in the maintenance of security order, political control, control of people and spaces, for the exploitation of colonies. The chronological framework that this work attempts to illuminate goes from 1840 to 1946, a pivotal period in colonial history in West Africa, particularly in Senegambia and Sudan, in that it is marked by rapid transformations at all levels (political, economic, social and cultural). Was deportation so fundamental, so necessary for the realization of the colonial project, the maintenance of security order? To what extent did the deportees constitute a real obstacle, an obstacle to the establishment and imposition of colonial power? What was the role of law enforcement actors in the deportation process? This thesis explores major themes such as the contexts of deportation, the abuse of power by colonial administrators, indigénat and indigenous justice, the motivations of deportation, the multiple responses of indigenous people, their arrest and deportation, the place of agents/actors (army, gendarmerie and colonial police) in maintaining, restoring and/or protecting stability and the politico-economic consequences of such a "technique of power"