I read a fascinating response to the intriguing question of whether Sudan is an African or Arab country, or actually both - by a Sudanese blogger, who goes by the screen name of The Sudanese Thinker.
He says it’s a tough call but that the feels his country is an Afro-Arab nation. This makes perfect sense, given Sudan’s history and heritage, a subject area our blogger-guide seems to know inside out and is good enough to share with us.
The Sudanese Spectrum
Sudan belongs to both the African Union and Arab League, and has around 600 different tribes, some of which are African, some Afro-Arab and others Arab.
Within Sudan’s diverse ethnic landscape you can find purely African tribes such as the Nuer from Southern Sudan. The Rashaida, hailing from the East of country, represent the most recent Arab tribe to arrive in Sudan, having crossed the Red Sea from the Arabian Peninsula around 150 years ago. The Rashaida have remained purely Arab as they haven’t intermarried with local African or Afro-Arab tribes.
All the Arab tribes found in Sudan today came over from the Arabian Peninsula at one time or another, while the African tribes such as the Nuer, Dinka, Nuba and Nubians are indigenous.
The Afro-Arab tribes spring from intermarriages between Arab tribes and African tribes. The Sudanese thinker, is ethnically a Shaigee: an (exotic) combination of Nubian, Nuba and Arab blood.
Names and Numbers
Pure Arab tribes like the Rashaida in Sudan are minorities. The majority of tribes are either African or Afro-Arab. Therefore when it comes to numbers, Sudanese are mainly African and not Arab.
“Whether we’re Arab or African, can’t be fully answered without taking into account how we Sudanese view ourselves though.” Sudanese Thinker explains, adding that Southerners consider themselves Africans, while for many Northern Sudanese, it gets a little more “complicated”.
Northern Sudanese are predominantly Afro-Arab, and have been both “Arabized” and “Islamized” so, culturally speaking, Northern Sudanese are mainly Arab, not African.
Arab culture dominates in Sudan, although many Afro-Arab tribes have retained a lot of African traditions and have not been fully Arabized. Still, according to native wisdom from our trusted source, Arab culture is what ties many tribes together in Sudan, with the other common link being Islam. About 70% of Sudan’s population is Muslim, and the majority of Sudanese people are multilingual, speaking Arabic together with other languages.
Multi-Me
The Sudanese Thinker concludes that (not surprisingly) it’s tricky for him to choose between whether he feels more Arab or more African and life would be easier if he could choose both. He rounds off with a very interesting point: Which one plays a bigger role in forming one’s identity? Ethnicity or culture? For him, as for me: the answer is ethnicity.
The Sudanese Thinker has consecutively been a finalist in the Weblog Awards three years in a row. Seems to me, he’s brilliant, openminded, and both ethnically and culturally informed and aware.
Photos courtesy of worldreligion.nielsonpi.com, sudan101.com.
{ 9 comments… read them below or add one }
Loved the pictures, I am also from the ’shaigee’ tribe, I smiled at the use of ‘exotic’ to describe the mixture.
This topic has been on my mind lately and my mum made a very good point. The term ‘Arab’ refers to any native arabic speaker, regardless of their geographic location. Since arabic is the offiicial language in north sudan it makes them arab. african refers to where they are in the world. the beauty of looking at it this way is realising that there is no conflict, we are arab not because we are trying to imitate or be part of the arabs in saudi arabia/uae etc, its simply because we speak arabic
Thank you – how fascinating…
I’ve read that post by Sudanese Thinker and he sounds quite ignorant. He uses outdated (and racist) European distortions of Sudanese history and what African features look like. If I read him correctly he seemed to be implying that the variety of African features in Sudan came from the Arab admixture and that before, all Sudanese tribes looked like the Dinka or Nuer. If that’s what he is saying then he most ignorant and incorrect. You yourself chose a very stereotypical picture of an African by choosing a sweaty one with broad features in scrappy clothing. There are other Sudanese tribes that look nothing like that. That one picture does not display the diverse range of facial features and clothing in Sudan. The Beja and Nubians have narrow features similar to Arabs, but they have ALWAYS looked like that.
Yes, North Sudan is Arab CULTURALLY and some North Sudanese are mixed with Arab, but this fact should not be misconstrued into thinking that Northern Sudanese facial features came from Arabs. Most of the physical differences between North and South Sudanese are from geography. NOT from admixture. The truth is that the north is Cushitic while the South is Nilotic. The former tends to have narrow features, small heads, and wavy/curly hair like Ethiopians while the latter has broader features, full faces, a tighter, coarser hair texture, and deep dark skin. There was never a time when all Sudanese had a South Sudanese look. Those features originate from the south and have always been unique to the south. The country of Sudan, like any African country, is merely manmade lines carved into Africa by European colonial powers. National boundaries forced all these various ethnic groups to share a national identity that they originally did not have and they never looked the same. When people like Sudanese so-called-Thinker believe that all Sudanese tribes used to all look like Nilotes, then they are treating these man-made national boundaries as if they’re real; as if there was some monolithic Sudanese race that filled these boundaries when there never was a homogenous Sudanese race or bone structure.
I just want to make that clear. The blogosphere would be better off if there weren’t people like Sudanese Thinker perpetuating lies about their country and what African features look like.
To put it bluntly, Sudanese Thinker can’t think.
Nothern Sudanese would do anything to be Arabs. This is not only a phenomenon limited to them. Muslim groups ranging from Hausas in the west to Somalis in the east, and as far afield as in Malysia have shown a strong tendency for identifying with Arabs. As Muslim converts, these groups have concocted some genealogical line to put themselves in close proximity to the the genealogy belonging to Prophet Mohamed who happens to be an Arab. What makes the case of the Sudanese to differ from everybody is that the fictitious genealogy has become so complete that it has foreshadowed the original sudanese identity. Sudan is the cradle land of the Nilotes, and the northerns, among whom are the Nuians, belong to this group. They are not Kushitic, like the Beja who happen to be the only Kushitiuc group living in the Sudan. Though the Sudanese are not Kushtic, the Kingdon of Kushite belong to Sudan and not to people known as Kushite whose original homeland is far away from Sudan. I believe if the northern rulers were willing to embrace their real identity, half of Sudanese problems would not have been with us. Southern Sudanese whose mobilisation strategy to win support is based on the claim of fighting for liberation from the Arab domination is successful because their fight is based on the logic of “we Africans” against “them Arabs ”
I am afraid the same strategy may in future come to play a major role in shaping conflict in the south when different southern group will have to fight for political and economic dominance.
I wish southern Sudanese good luck
But speaking Arabic does not make any one an Arab.I think you errored in your opinion there.Like wise speaking English or German or any European languages doe snot make you a European. I am from Kenya and i dislike to see many African loose their heritage to foreign cultures as is the case of so many African tribes in Sudan.
north is arab south isnt north are mixed with the indigenous nubains of southern egypt and northern sudan we are arabs culturally and genealogy so to simply it north are arab mixed with nubian south are pure african
All Arab are mix ,even inside the Arabian peninsula,so why we in sudan are the only ones focusing in oure mixing???ex.north Africans are amazeek.egebtions are nubians mixcuptics,Syrian and Lebanese are Greece.Iraqis are Persians kurds extra ,Yemeneese has a lot of Indian areas.uae Bahrain extra have a huge Persia blood.Saudi Arabia is little USA,very mix country .so why we the only ones talking about it??!!!!we simply Arabic nation deep seeded .probably more than most of Arabsthe Arabic are not white peeple .b
Most Arabs are mixed,right from early days of pre-islamic history, we dont care if we are black or white,the Arabic language does not have two words to differenciate people like the europeans do///Black and White,you people should also know that Arabs are not white people neither are they Black people, they are mixed up,and they dont care as long as we spread our religion,and if some body is not happy ,let the person go huge a transformer,you people are talking about sudan what about the Arabs in Tchad Cameroon Nigeria And Niger.
WWWOOOOOOOOOOOWWWWWWWWW!!!!! amaziiiiiiiiiiiiing