Performance Poetry and Political Conscientization in the Horn of Africa: Examples from the Somali Bantu Jareer Community

Abstract

Ever since the arrival of colonialism gained momentum in the country, Somali literature has been approached narrowly from the tutelage of the pastoral culture. Colonial as well as early Somali writers have taken the comfort of disdaining the study of anthological themes related to the non-nomadic cultures and literatures. That restricted notion of one culture, as purported by colonial writers and later politically enshrined by the state and a section of Somali scholars, has obscured the wealth of the various non-nomadic cultures in this Horn of Africa nation. Therefore, contrary to the notion of a homogenous Somali nation of the same nomadic culture, this essay aims to highlight a non-nomadic version of Somali literature as practised by a section of the agrarian communities in Somalia; those known as Bantu or Jareer. Because the Bantu is an ethnically oppressed community in Somalia, all that is related to their culture and literature in particular has been deemed valueless and, as a consequence, an institution unworthy studying. In particular, this essay argues that despite the degradation by the Somali state and neglect by Somalia scholarship often obsessed with the apocryphal ideology of a self-same Somalia, the agrarian wordsmith is bestowed with rich cultural and literary wisdom which makes him view his environment with sharp consciousness.