Difference between revisions of "Bantu" - New World Encyclopedia

From New World Encyclopedia
Line 118: Line 118:
 
==Faith==
 
==Faith==
 
[[Magic and religion|Magic]] takes a major central role in Bantu belief, with good and bad influence. They often saw a manifestation of the souls of deceased ancestors in ceremonies. The Bantu believed in the separation from body and spirit after death. The Afro-Brazilian [[Quimbanda]] cult is a new world manifestation of Bantu religion and spirituality.
 
[[Magic and religion|Magic]] takes a major central role in Bantu belief, with good and bad influence. They often saw a manifestation of the souls of deceased ancestors in ceremonies. The Bantu believed in the separation from body and spirit after death. The Afro-Brazilian [[Quimbanda]] cult is a new world manifestation of Bantu religion and spirituality.
 +
 +
==Somali Bantu==
 +
 +
[[Image:Somalia farmer woman.jpg|thumb|left|200 px|Somali Bantu woman working in the fields]]
 +
The '''Somali Bantu''' (also called ''Jarir'', ''Jareer'', ''Wagosha'' or ''Mushunguli'') are an ethnic minority group in [[Somalia]] which is largely inhabited by [[Somali people]] they primary reside in the city of Jowhar. They are the descendants of people from various [[Bantu]] ethnic groups in what is today [[Tanzania]], [[Malawi]] and [[Mozambique]] who were brought to Somalia as slaves in the 19th century.
 +
 +
Those Bantu are not to be confused with the members of [[Swahili]] society in coastal towns – like the [[Barawa|Bravanese]] or the [[Bajuni people|Bajuni]] of [[Kismaayo]] – who speak the Bantu language Swahili.
 +
 +
It is estimated that the Bantu of Somalia number around 600,000 (out of a total population of 7.5 millions).
 +
 +
== History ==
 +
It is estimated that 25,000–50,000 black African slaves were sold from the slave market of [[Zanzibar]] to the Somali coast from 1800 to 1890. Most of them were from the [[Yao (ethnic group in Africa)|Yao]], [[Makua]], [[Chewa]] (Nyanja), [[Zigua people|Zigula]], [[Ngidono]] and [[Zaramo]] ethnic groups.
 +
 +
In the 1840s, the first fugitive slaves from the [[Shebelle River|Shebelle]] valley began to settle in the – largely uninhabited and forested – [[Jubba River|Jubba]] valley.  By the early 1900s, an estimated 35,000 former Bantu slaves settled in the Jubba valley.
 +
 +
At the beginning of the 20th century, slavery in Somalia was abolished by the Italian colonial administration; some Bantu groups remained in slavery until the 1930s. Especially Bantus were conscripted to forced labour on Italian-owned plantations because only few Somalis wanted to do wage labour. They continued to be despised and discriminated by parts of the Somali society.
 +
 +
== Contemporary situation ==
 +
[[Image:Somalia farmers.jpg|thumb|right|250 px|Bantu farmers near Kismaayo]]
 +
 +
The Somali Bantu call themselves simply ''Bantu''. Like the Somali, most of them speak the [[Somali language]], only a minority has retained their own identity and language. The majority are muslims, but many have also retained animist traditions. Contrary to the Somali, who are mainly nomadic herders, the Bantu are mainly sedentary farmers. They may have darker skin than the lighter skinned Somalis, and rounder facial features.
 +
 +
During the [[Somali Civil War]], many Bantu were evicted from their lands by various armed factions of [[Somali clan]]s. Since they had only few firearms, they were especially prone to the violence and looting by armed people and militias.
 +
 +
=== Refugees ===
 +
[[Image:Somali bantu children florida.jpg|thumb|left|250 px|Somali Bantu refugee children in Florida, 2007]]
 +
Tens of thousands of Somali Bantu fled war and famines in Somalia and went to refugee camps in neighbouring [[Kenya]], like [[Kakuma]] and [[Dadaab]]. Most of them declared that they don't want to return to Somalia. Around 12,000 Somali Bantu are being resettled to the USA with the help of the [[United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees|UNHCR]].
 +
 +
In 2000 the [[United States]] classified the Bantu as a priority and began preparations for resettlement to select cities throughout the United States, among those it is known that [[Salt Lake City, Utah]] received about 1,000 of the refugees. Other cities in the Southwest, such as [[Denver, Colorado]], and [[Tucson, Arizona]], received a few thousand as well.  In New England, [[Manchester, New Hampshire]] and Burlington, Vermont have received influxes of Bantus numbering in the hundreds. Plans to resettle the Bantu in smaller towns, such as Holyoke, Mass., and Cayce, S.C., were scrapped after local protest. The resettlement patterns are in contrast to regular Somalis, who are concentrated in the [[Minneapolis-St. Paul]] area, [[Columbus, Ohio]], [[Washington, DC]], [[Atlanta]], [[San Diego]], [[Boston]], [[Seattle]], and with a few in [[Maine]].
  
  
Line 136: Line 165:
  
  
 +
 +
== External links ==
 +
*[http://www.unhcr.org/publ/PUBL/3d9ac1b24.pdf UNHCR Publication ''Refugees'' about the Somali Bantu]
 +
*[http://www.cal.org/co/bantu/ The Somali Bantu: Their History and Culture]
 +
 +
About Somali Bantu refugees in the U.S.:
 +
*[http://www.refugeesusa.org/article.aspx?id=1195 Refugees USA]
 +
*[http://www.somalibantu.com/Utah%20State.htm Somali Bantus Arrive In Salt Lake City]
  
  
  
{{Credits|Bantu|158933524|Bantu_speaking_peoples_of_South_Africa|154463751|}}
+
{{Credits|Bantu|158933524|Bantu_speaking_peoples_of_South_Africa|154463751|Somali_Bantu|160930921}}

Revision as of 22:04, 2 October 2007


Map showing the approximate distribution of Bantu (light brown) vs. other Niger-Congo languages and peoples (medium brown).

Bantu is a general term for over 400 different ethnic groups in Africa, from Cameroon, Southern Africa, Central Africa, to Eastern Africa, united by a common language family (the Bantu languages) and in many cases common customs.

Definition

"Bantu" means "people" in many Bantu languages. Dr. Wilhelm Bleek first used the term "Bantu" in its current sense in his 1862 book A Comparative Grammar of South African Languages, in which he hypothesized that a vast number of languages located across central, southern, eastern, and western Africa shared so many characteristics that they must be part of a single language group. This basic thesis is still accepted by some people today, although the theory has been widely challenged since it was proposed – not least because a language may be spread by a relatively small number of human carriers.

Language

The Bantu languages (technically Narrow Bantu languages) constitute a grouping belonging to the Niger-Congo family. This grouping is deep down in the genealogical tree of the Bantoid grouping, which in turn is deep down in the Niger-Congo tree. By one estimate, there are 513 languages in the Bantu grouping, 681 languages in Bantoid, and 1,514 in Niger-Congo.[1] Bantu languages are spoken basically east and south of the present day nation of Nigeria; i.e., in the regions commonly known as central Africa, east Africa, and southern Africa. Parts of this Bantu chunk of Africa also have languages from outside the Niger-Congo family (see map).

The word Bantu was first used by Wilhelm Heinrich Immanuel Bleek (1827-1875) with the meaning 'people', as this is reflected in many of the languages of this group. A common characteristic of Bantu languages is that they use a stem form such as -ntu or -tu for 'person', and the plural prefix for people in many languages is ba-, together giving ba-ntu "people." Bleek, and later Carl Meinhof, pursued extensive comparative studies of Bantu language grammars.

Origins

1. = 3000 - 1500 B.C.E. origin
2 = ca.1500 B.C.E. first migrations
        2.a = Eastern Bantu, 2.b = Western Bantu
3. = 1000 - 500 B.C.E. Urewe nuclus of Eastern Bantu
4. - 7. southward advance
9. = 500 B.C.E. - 0 Congo nucleus
10. = 0 - 1000 C.E. last phase [2] [3] [4]
Early iron age findings in eastern and southern Africa

Before the Bantu, the southern half of Africa is believed to have been populated by Khoisan speaking people, today occupying the arid regions around the Kalahari and a few isolated pockets in Tanzania; whereas Cushites, Nilotes and other people speaking Afro-Asiatic languages inhabited north-eastern and northern Africa. Northwestern Africa, the Sahara, and the Sudan were inhabited by people speaking Mande and Atlantic languages (such as the Fulani and Wolof) and other people speaking Nilo-Saharan languages.

There are two basic theories of Bantu origins. The first was advanced by Joseph Greenberg in 1963. He had analyzed and compared several hundred African languages and found that a group of languages spoken in Southeastern Nigeria were the most closely related to languages from the Bantu group. He theorized that Proto-Bantu (the hypothetical ancestor of the Bantu languages) was originally one of these languages that spread south and east over hundreds of years.

This was quickly challenged by Malcolm Guthrie who analyzed each Bantu language and found that the most stereotypical were those spoken in Zambia and in the southern Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC). This provided the alternative theory that Bantu speakers had spread from this location in all directions.

Bantu expansion

The Bantu expansion was not so much a physical migration as it was a natural spread of language and knowledge throughout different populations, and societal groups (usually through inter-marriage or by small groups moving to new areas).

By about 1000 C.E. it had reached modern day Zimbabwe and South Africa. In Zimbabwe a major southern hemisphere empire was established, with its capital at Great Zimbabwe. It controlled trading routes from South Africa to north of the Zambezi, trading gold, copper, precious stones, animal hides, ivory and metal goods with the Arab traders of the Swahili coast. By the 14th or 15th centuries the Empire had collapsed, with the city of Great Zimbabwe being abandoned.

Another theory held is that the Bantu originated from the Congo and due to factors like agriculture, trade in ivory they spread out to the north, east and the south. With slave trade the further scattered out across Africa some running from the slave traders. It has to be noted that although the Arabs were the main slave merchants some chiefs widely participated in the rise of slave trade as they sold on to the Arabs any captured prisoners of tribal clashes.

Bantu in South Africa

Black South Africans were at times officially called "Bantus" by the apartheid regime.The term is derived from the Zulu term for people "abantu" the plural of "umuntu" . Examples of its usage are as follows 1.One of South Africa's politicians of recent times General Bantubonke Harrington Holomisa " all the people" who is know as Bantu Holomisa . 2. The South African apartheid regime, used the term "Bantustan," to refer to Black homelands (Transkei, Bophuthatswana, Venda and the Ciskei) which included both Nguni & non-Nguni speaking blackSouth Africans 3. "Ubuntu" to be human

Black South Africans were at times officially called "Bantu" by the apartheid regime. The term Bantu is derived from the word for "people" common to many of the Bantu languages. In South Africa Bantu is no longer in wide use as a description of black South African people. The Oxford Dictionary of South African English describes its use in a racial context as obsolescent and offensive because of its strong association with white minority rule and the apartheid system. However, Bantu is used without pejorative connotations in other parts of Africa.

History

It is generally accepted that the Bantu speaking peoples originated from West Africa around 4,000 years ago. In several major waves of migration and dispersal they moved east (at first north of the tropical rainforest to the northern region of East Africa) and then south, coming to occupy the central highlands of Africa in the third wave. From there a final southwards migration took place into the southern regions of Africa, which is measurable from around 2,000 years ago. The final movement into the southern regions resulted in the displacement of the aboriginal Khoikoi and Khoisan peoples, resulting in some ethnic and linguistic mixing. They utilised relatively advanced technologies for the Iron Age compared to the people they displaced; they also led to profound changes in some regions they entered such as the area presently known as the Waterberg in about 450C.E. in the extreme north of South Africa; for example, they brought cattle raising to areas such as the Waterberg Massif and displaced natural grazers like white rhino and blue wildebeest.

At some stage after the tertiary dispersal period a settlement at Great Zimbabwe was established as the capital of a trading empire. Around this time there is evidence of coastal trading with Arabs, with the South East Asian region, and even with China. As the southern groups of Bantu speaking peoples migrated southwards two main groups emerged, the Nguni (Xhosa, Zulu, Ndebele, Swazi), who occupied the eastern coastal plains, and the Sotho-Tswana who lived on the interior plateau. The two language groups are easy to distinguish as the Nguni languages adopted clicks, whereas most Sotho-Tswana languages did not.

When the early Portuguese sailors (cf. Vasco Da Gama and Bartholomew Dias) rounded the Cape of Good Hope in the 1400s very few Bantu speakers were found there. The predominant indigenous population around the Cape was made up of Khoisan peoples. Following Jan van Riebeeck's settlement at the Cape in 1652 European settlers – mostly Dutch, French Huguenots and Germans, known in the past as Boers (today referred to as Afrikaners) – began to occupy Southern Africa in increasing numbers. Around 1770 Boers migrating north encountered land permanently occupied by Bantu speaking peoples (in particular around the Fish River) and frictions arose between the two groups. This began a pattern in which the new (white) settlers used superior force to subdue and/or displace the Bantu speaking peoples they encountered, much as had been done with the aboriginal Khoisan peoples the Boers had previously encountered at the Cape.

From the late 1700s and early 1800s there were two major areas of frictional contact between the white settlers and the Bantu speaking peoples in Southern Africa. Firstly, as the Boers moved north inland from the Cape they encountered the Xhosa, the Basotho, and the Tswana. Secondly attempts at large coastal settlements were made by the British in Xhosa territory (now the Eastern Cape), and in Zululand (now KwaZulu-Natal).

At the time KwaZulu-Natal was populated by dozens of small Zulu-speaking clans. In 1816 Shaka acceded to the Zulu throne (at that stage the Zulu were merely one of the many clans). Within a relatively short period of time he had conquered his neighboring clans and had forged the Zulu into the most important ally of the large Mthethwa clan, which was in competition with the Ndwandwe clan for domination of the northern part of modern day KwaZulu-Natal. By many accounts Shaka used ruthless military force against his opponents, often adopting a scorched earth policy to destroy or displace civilian populations.

After the death of the Mthethwa king Dingiswayo around 1818, at the hands of Zwide, the king of the Ndwandwe, Shaka assumed leadership of the entire Mthethwa alliance. The alliance under his leadership survived Zwide's first assault at the Battle of Gqokli Hill. Within two years he had defeated Zwide at the Battle of Mhlathuze River and broken up the Ndwandwe alliance, some of whom in turn began a murderous campaign against other Nguni communities, setting in motion what has come to be known as Mfecane, a mass migration of communities fleeing the Zulu. By 1825 he had conquered a huge empire covering a vast area from the sea in the east to the Drakensberg mountains in the west, and from the Pongola River in the north to the Bashee river in the south, not far from the modern day town of East London.

Shaka is well known for the many military, social, cultural and political reforms he used to create his highly organized and centralised Zulu state. The most important of these were the transformation of the army, thanks to innovative tactics and weapons he conceived, and a showdown with the spiritual leadership, limiting the power of traditional healers, and effectively ensuring the subservience of the "Zulu church" to the state. Whereas previous battles had been limited to relatively minor encounters, Shaka introduced the more deadly stabbing spear to replace the throwing spear, military encirclement to replace allowed retreat of the enemy, and the total destruction of lands to remove any means of sustenance for the enemy.

Shaka integrated defeated clans into the Zulu, on a basis of full equality, with promotions in the army and civil service being a matter of merit rather than circumstance of birth.

As a result of the Mfecane, an offshoot of the Zulu, the Matebele, also known as the Ndebeles, were ejected from Zululand. They then migrated more than 1,000 kilometres, first west to the land occupied by large numbers of small Sotho-Tswana communities, and then north to the Tswana nation, and finally north-east to encounter the Shona in what is morden day Zimbabwe. Their king, Mzilikazi created an empire centred on Bulawayo (named after the original settlement in Zululand) in modern day Zimbabwe.

Shaka, who had had contacts with English explorers realized that the Europeans posed a threat to local populations, and had planned to begin an intensive program of education to enable the Nguni people to catch up with the Europeans. However in 1828 he was assassinated by his half brother Dingane, who succeeded him. A weak leader, Dingane was defeated by the Boers, however under his successors Mpande (another half-brother) and Mpande's son Cetshwayo the Zulu were able to rebuff Boer attempts to conquer them. He handed the British army the worst defeat it ever suffered at the hands of a non-European fighting force at the Battle of Isandlwana, at great cost to his impis, before succumbing to modern European military technology.

With the growing settlement of white peoples in southern Africa came social, economic, and political forces that had profound effects on the Bantu speaking peoples. Whereas the British policy was "divide and conquer," the Boer policy could probably be summed as "outright domination." In the 19th and 20th centuries there were several uprisings against settlers, one of the most notable being the Bhambatha rebellion in Natal.

The establishment of political boundaries in Southern Africa, as had happened elsewhere in Africa, was arbitrary to the local population. For example: Tswana-speaking peoples live both sides of the Republic of South Africa / Botswana border; half of the land occupied by the Swazi was given to the Boers (and is now part of South Africa) at the time Swaziland was declared a British Protectorate; a division of the land occpied by the Basotho were constrained to the Protectorate of Basutoland (now Lesotho) to the least viable agricultural land; the Swati were denied access to traditional lands at Maputo by the Portuguese colony in what is now Mozambique.

Following the election in the Republic of South Africa of the National Party in 1948 the white minority government of South Africa insitutionalised the system of Apartheid. One effect of this policy was to balkanise (into "homelands") and greatly limit the land which Bantu speaking people were allowed to occupy, depriving them of political and economic opportunities. With the election in 1994 of a democratic South African government this system was abolished and limited land restitution was begun. At the same time civil liberties for all citizens were enshrined in a new constitution of the Republic of South Africa. In accordance with the principles of the African Union boundaries between different countries that were determined during colonial times remain intact.

Social organization

Until very recently, the Bantu speaking peoples were often divided into different clans, not around National federations, but independent groups from some hundreds to thousands of individuals.

The smallest unit of the political organisational structure was the household, or Kraal, consisting of a man, woman or women, and their children, as well as other relatives living in the same household. The man was the head of the household and often had many wives; and was the family's primary representative. The household and close relations generally played an important role. Households which lived in the same valley or on the same hill in a village were also an organisational unit, managed by a sub-chief.

Chiefdomship was largely hereditary, although chiefs were often replaced when not effective. With most clans the eldest son inherited the office of his father. With some clans the office was left to the oldest brother of the deceased chief, and after his death again the next oldest brother. This repeated until the last brother died. Next was the eldest son of the original chieftain; then the oldest one of the brothers as the leader. The chief was surrounded with a number of trusted friends or advisors, usually relatives like uncles and brothers, rather than influential Headmen or personal friends. The degree of the democracy depended on the strength of the chieftain. The more powerful and more influential a chieftain was, the lesser the influence of his people. Although the leader had much power, he was not above the law. He could be criticized both by advisors as well as by his people, and compensation could be demanded.

Ethnic partitioning

The Bantu speaking peoples of South Africa are roughly "divided" into four main groups: Nguni, Sotho, Vhavenda and Shangana Tsonga, with the Nguni representing the largest group. These are divided as follows:

  • Nguni
    • Northern Nguni
      • Swati
      • Zulu
      • Ndebele
      • Ngoni (in Northern Zimbabwe)
    • Southern Nguni
      • Mfengu
      • Mpondo
      • Mpondomise
      • Thembu
      • Xhosa
  • Shangane Tsonga
  • Sotho
    • Basotho (also: Southern Sotho)
    • Barotse
    • Northern Sotho
      • Balobedu
      • Bapedi
    • Batswana (also: Western Sotho)
  • Vhavenda
  • Vhalemba

Common among the two powerful groups of the Nguni and the Sotho are patrilineal societies, with which the leaders formed the socio-political units. Similarly, food acquisition was by cultivation and hunting. The most important differences were the strongly deviating languages, although both are Bantu languages, and the different settlement types and relationships. With the Nguni settlements were villages widely scattered, whereas with the Sotho settled in towns.

Culture

The Bantu were not territorially minded like the Europeans, but rather group-related. As long as sufficient land was available, they had only very vague conceptions of borders. Borders were natural features such as rivers or mountains, which were not by any means fixed.

Food acquisition

The food acquisition of the Bantu was primarily limited to agriculture and hunting, where generally the women were responsible for agriculture and the men drew for the hunt. Except with the Tsonga (and partially the Mpondo), fishing was surprisingly of little importance. The diet consisted of corn (introduced from South-East Asia), meat (mostly wild game and beef), vegetables; and milk, water and grain beer (which contained very little alcohol compared with European beer).

The Bantu had a number of taboos regarding the consumption of meat. No meat of dogs, apes, crocodiles and snakes could be eaten. Likewise taboo was the meat of some birds, like owls, crows and vultures.

All Bantu groups commonly had clear separation between the tasks of the women and those of the men.

House types

The Bantu lived in two different types of houses. The Nguni used the Beehive house, a circular structure out of long poles, which was covered with grass. The huts of the Sotho, Venda and Shangana Tsonga used the Cone and Cylinder house. A cylindrical wall was formed out of vertical posts, which was sealed with mud and cow dung. The roof was built from tied-together poles. The floor of both types is compressed earth.

Faith

Magic takes a major central role in Bantu belief, with good and bad influence. They often saw a manifestation of the souls of deceased ancestors in ceremonies. The Bantu believed in the separation from body and spirit after death. The Afro-Brazilian Quimbanda cult is a new world manifestation of Bantu religion and spirituality.

Somali Bantu

Somali Bantu woman working in the fields

The Somali Bantu (also called Jarir, Jareer, Wagosha or Mushunguli) are an ethnic minority group in Somalia which is largely inhabited by Somali people they primary reside in the city of Jowhar. They are the descendants of people from various Bantu ethnic groups in what is today Tanzania, Malawi and Mozambique who were brought to Somalia as slaves in the 19th century.

Those Bantu are not to be confused with the members of Swahili society in coastal towns – like the Bravanese or the Bajuni of Kismaayo – who speak the Bantu language Swahili.

It is estimated that the Bantu of Somalia number around 600,000 (out of a total population of 7.5 millions).

History

It is estimated that 25,000–50,000 black African slaves were sold from the slave market of Zanzibar to the Somali coast from 1800 to 1890. Most of them were from the Yao, Makua, Chewa (Nyanja), Zigula, Ngidono and Zaramo ethnic groups.

In the 1840s, the first fugitive slaves from the Shebelle valley began to settle in the – largely uninhabited and forested – Jubba valley. By the early 1900s, an estimated 35,000 former Bantu slaves settled in the Jubba valley.

At the beginning of the 20th century, slavery in Somalia was abolished by the Italian colonial administration; some Bantu groups remained in slavery until the 1930s. Especially Bantus were conscripted to forced labour on Italian-owned plantations because only few Somalis wanted to do wage labour. They continued to be despised and discriminated by parts of the Somali society.

Contemporary situation

Bantu farmers near Kismaayo

The Somali Bantu call themselves simply Bantu. Like the Somali, most of them speak the Somali language, only a minority has retained their own identity and language. The majority are muslims, but many have also retained animist traditions. Contrary to the Somali, who are mainly nomadic herders, the Bantu are mainly sedentary farmers. They may have darker skin than the lighter skinned Somalis, and rounder facial features.

During the Somali Civil War, many Bantu were evicted from their lands by various armed factions of Somali clans. Since they had only few firearms, they were especially prone to the violence and looting by armed people and militias.

Refugees

Somali Bantu refugee children in Florida, 2007

Tens of thousands of Somali Bantu fled war and famines in Somalia and went to refugee camps in neighbouring Kenya, like Kakuma and Dadaab. Most of them declared that they don't want to return to Somalia. Around 12,000 Somali Bantu are being resettled to the USA with the help of the UNHCR.

In 2000 the United States classified the Bantu as a priority and began preparations for resettlement to select cities throughout the United States, among those it is known that Salt Lake City, Utah received about 1,000 of the refugees. Other cities in the Southwest, such as Denver, Colorado, and Tucson, Arizona, received a few thousand as well. In New England, Manchester, New Hampshire and Burlington, Vermont have received influxes of Bantus numbering in the hundreds. Plans to resettle the Bantu in smaller towns, such as Holyoke, Mass., and Cayce, S.C., were scrapped after local protest. The resettlement patterns are in contrast to regular Somalis, who are concentrated in the Minneapolis-St. Paul area, Columbus, Ohio, Washington, DC, Atlanta, San Diego, Boston, Seattle, and with a few in Maine.


Notes


Bibliography

  • J. Desmond Clark, The Prehistory of Africa, Thames and Hudson, 1970
  • April A. Gordon and Donald L. Gordon, Understanding Contemporary Africa, Lynne Riener, London, 1996
  • Kevin Shillington, History of Africa, St. Martin's Press, New York, 1995 (1989)
  • Schapera I (OD.): The Bantu Speaking Tribes OF South Africa. 1959: Routlege & Kegan Paul, London.
  • Guthrie, M. 1967. Comparative Bantu. Farnborough: Gregg International Publishers Ltd. Vols. 1–4.


External links

About Somali Bantu refugees in the U.S.:


Credits

New World Encyclopedia writers and editors rewrote and completed the Wikipedia article in accordance with New World Encyclopedia standards. This article abides by terms of the Creative Commons CC-by-sa 3.0 License (CC-by-sa), which may be used and disseminated with proper attribution. Credit is due under the terms of this license that can reference both the New World Encyclopedia contributors and the selfless volunteer contributors of the Wikimedia Foundation. To cite this article click here for a list of acceptable citing formats.The history of earlier contributions by wikipedians is accessible to researchers here:

The history of this article since it was imported to New World Encyclopedia:

Note: Some restrictions may apply to use of individual images which are separately licensed.