Sarkha 2

Sarkha AFRIKAN VOICES WWW.ARTRIKA.ORG

PEOPLE STILL GIVE NEGATIVE OPINIONS BASED ON THEIR SKIN TONES.

DOES DARFUR HAVE A FUTURE IN THE SUDAN?

HE IS NOW ONE OF THE POLITICAL LEADERS OF DARFUR’S SUDAN LIBERATION MOVEMENT.

IS BLACK BEAUTIFUL IN ETHIOPIA?

WE JUST NEED TO FIND A DERMATOLOGIST BUT WE REMAIN BEAUTIFUL AS A COUNTRY

VOLUME 02

ARTRIKA SUDAN SOUTH AFRICA

TO BE OR NOT TO BE

THIS CONFLATION OF RELIGIOUS AND ETHNIC IDENTITY THAT BEDEVILS THE SUDAN TODAY LIES AT THE ROOT OF THE PRESENT CONFLICT IN DARFUR AND WILL SURELY EMERGE IN THE EASTERN SUDAN IN THE NEAR FUTURE.

SUDAN

Because both sides, British and northern Sudanese, assumed that there was not a problem. To put the argument simplistically, the assumption was made by both parties that because the people of Darfur were Muslim, they were part of the north with which they would identify, an assumption as flawed as if the French in West Africa had decided to annex Senegal to Mauritania on the premise that all the indigénes involved were Muslim. This would have entailed joining the racially very conscious Arabic-speaking bidan (Whites) of Mauritania with the sudan (Blacks), who speak Wolof and other languages, of southern Mauritania and Senegal. Fortunately, the French were considerably more sophisticated than their British counterparts and recognised and promoted, if only to exploit it, the existence of an Islam noir, of a Muslim African identity that did not require one to pretend to be Arab.

It is this conflation of religious and ethnic identity that bedevils the Sudan today, as it has throughout its recent past, lies at the root of the present conflict in Darfur, and will surely emerge in the eastern Sudan in the near future. The northern Sudanese elite, recruited from approximately 5 percent of the population (ethnically, Ja’aliyyin, Danaqla, Shayqiyya, and Nubians [colloquially Halfawis]) regard themselves as Arab, known also as the awlad al-bahr, “people of the sea” [here meaning the Nile] or awlad al- balad, “people of the country.” How this perception arose is a complex and interesting question. The northern Sudanese speak Arabic and regard themselves as Arab—the Nubians are an anomaly here; they speak their own language and do not really regard themselves as Arab. The late Muhammad Ibrahim Abu Salim (b. 1927, d. 2004), one of the Sudan’s greatest scholars, spoke Nubian at home and certainly did not regard himself as Arab. But he functioned as an Arab and was at various times president or chairman of the Arab Archivists Association, mirroring in his own life the fact that the Sudan is a member of the Arab League, despite the fact that some 60 percent of its population are not Arab—but then so is Somalia.

Ethnicity is a moveable construct.7 From the perspective of an historian, the bottom line, if one can put it that way, is how many Arab nomads actually moved into the Sudan in medieval times and how did northern Sudanese ethnicity and identity .

THE ESSAY WILL BE UNDER IN THE PAGE NO 10 TO COMPLETE

PHOTO BY BUKR

SA

We travel not to escape life, but for life not to escape us.

Identity Culture and Art Magazine

02

A New journey for me and I'm very excited Edited by Nawekulo Gachanja

we just need to find a dermatologist but we remain beautiful as a country as a people ARTRIKA.ORG

My name is Rethabile Thantsha and I am 21 years old . I was born in 1999. I'm from Limpopo Polokwane but reside in Pretoria because of school. Went to Dino Park for crèche, and although I have a poor memory, I do recall not graduating from there I have a bad memory but 1 thing I do remember clearly is that I didn't graduate there I think I left early and went on to PEMPS, where I started grade 1 at the age of about 6) to move on to my next school started grade 1 when I was about 6 years old n of which I remember more of my after school moment more than anything, Funny enough, it seems as though I remember more of my life outside school than anything else) lol it feels almost like I blacked out during school then(came to) when the after school bell would rang I switch on again but got through smoothly moving on to Eventually, I moved on to high school at Eagles Nest Christian School This played which played a huge role in my life ... the experience allowed me to embrace my free-spirited nature and stay true let's just say I was a very free spirited human in those times and I was true to the Rethabile in that time, she was embraced fully and never compromised at any cost.

Currently i'm a student at Tshwane University of Technology and my talents include playing soccer) talents I would say soccer for me. Additionally I'm the creative director at Artrika is a new journey for me and I'm very excited about it this journey as we have a lot to explore and give back to the people of Africa.

Funny how you're asking about my music journey and u didn't include this in my talents but I mean is it still a talent if it's not exercised and is unknown of by the masses but I sang in church but obviously started in the house singing while showering or cleaning and at the school choir had a band but I just never took it seriously well even now actually but yeah I've sang here and there. At the moment I don't have anything interesting to share lol unless you want to hear about my varsity life so no. I think my existence in itself is art going back to our creator (God) being knitted in my mother's womb, having been pottered by the potter is art in itself and football is a form of art if you pay attention to the game and the way in which the ball is moved around singing is art but I don't sing so I'll just leave that here. A message to south Africa, South Africa is very beautiful let me compare it to a beautiful lady who has pimples or blackheads on her face, having pimple doesn't now mean she is ugly it just means she needs a dermatologist who will get rid of them and we have those pimples in SA we just need to find a dermatologist but we remain beautiful as a country as a people...

BLACK:FRIEND OR FOE? A LOOK AT COLOURISM IN ETHIOPIA

Growing up in Addis Ababa isn’t as easy as you think, especially when you have a dark skin tone. My name is Debora Oboya. I’m Ethiopian, (I hail from Gambella region in the west of the country, and I have a dark skin tone. I would like to share

my

experience

in

relation

to

colourism, (This) which is defined as prejudice or discrimination against individuals with dark skin tone.

I was born in Gambella and raised in the capital, Addis Ababa, from the age of two. I have experienced colourism in many aspects of my life, from bullying to discrimination throughout my journey. Growing up, from my own experience at an early

age,

I

understood

the

perspective of many in Ethiopian society

towards

dark

skinned

people. It was clear that, if you are not light or brown skinned, then you’re

not

good

enough

for

anything! I had to work twice as hard in school or in any other places to fit in, to disprove these narratives and earn my place.

Duke | 102

By : Debora Oboya Photography Konan Tipen Styling Nawekulo Gachanja

Artist of the Month

#BLACKISBEAUTIFUL

'03

lufituaeBsIkcalB# aipoihtErettamsedahsllA#

'01

PHOTO BY KONAN TIPEN

It all started in my neighborhood in Addis Abeba, when adults picked on me using names such as baria or kesel, on the streets, all the way to school, in shopping centers, etc. where I was bullied for the color of my skin. It’s not pleasing to be referred to as “a slave” or “charcoal,” and see people normalize it. Being treated in such a way in my own country is what makes it even more harrowing. Where else am I supposed to be? I am still told, “Go back to where you come from!” And after years in the same school, teachers would still ask if they should speak to me in English, even though I speak Amharic fluently.

The lack of representation of dark skinned people in the media, is a good example of colorism in my country. I have not seen anyone with a darker skin tone in Ethiopian movies, on TV shows, national news anchors.

We do have some national role models from our community such as Omod Okori, who is a footballer, or Amar Othou, who is a model.

But people still give negative opinions based on their skin tones.

ARTRIKA is a multilingual, web-based, freecontent Artrist project. | Artrika.org

think less, live more PHOTO BY KONAN TIPEN

I remember when Lupita Nyong'o won the best supporting actress Oscar at the 86th Academy Awards for her role in 12 Years a Slave in 2014, it was one of my first times seeing a beautiful, famous woman who looked like me. I was so inspired to the point where I competed and won in a speech contest at my school the same year. She gave me courage to stand tall.

The

underrepresentation

of

dark-skinned

people

in

Ethiopia is an issue that must be addressed. The lack of representation

and

diversity

has

negatively

impacted

young girls and boys in a way that they are left with only very few role models to look up to. It becomes more difficult for girls and women to believe in themselves and have the courage to pursue their dreams, when they don’t see someone who looks like them reaching a higher level of achievement.

We need to start a conversation about the daily realities of dark skinned Ethiopians. We must also talk about the lack of attention and neglect of regions with dark skin tone people, mainly western and southern parts of the country, where there has been less focus on development. We feel that colorism has contributed to this – we are seen as less.

Now in Ethiopia there is a lot of conflict, with different communities fighting each other. Many people are dying and many people are scared. There is a lot of hatred. It is the right time now, that

we

need

to

start

questioning

ourselves. Who are we as a country and who do we want to be? How can we build a country where everyone is treated with respect and dignity? Ethiopia is a diverse country and home

to

diversified

peoples,

nations

and

nationalities,

black people with different shades, from light to brown to dark-skinned. We have different languages, cultures and

PHOTO BY KONAN TIPEN

religions too, and so now is the time to focus on what can bring us together, what unites us, how can we build our country together.

I believe that coming forward with my story will inspire others

to

share

theirs,

so

that

we

can

start

this

conversation and make a better future for our country one that is diverse but inclusive, and one where all people, and all shades of people, are represented equally. #AllshadesmatterEthiopia #BlackIsBeautiful

WWW.ARTRIKA.ORG

DOES DARFUR HAVE A FUTURE IN THE SUDAN?

ARTICEL

BY REX SEÁN O’FAHEY Does Darfur have a future in the Sudan? I ask the

In the same year, 1882, that the Mahdi manifested himself

question because Darfur does not really have that much

as the “divinely-guided” one, the British occupied Egypt.

of a past in the Sudan. Despite a history of interaction

Because they had no interest in the Sudan, they forced

with the Nile Valley, as much with Egypt as with what is

Egypt to abandon it, sending Charles Gordon, who had

now the northern Sudan, Darfur was not finally

been governor-general of the Sudan from 1877 to 1880

incorporated into the Sudan until 1916. Neglect by the

charged with suppressing the slave trade, to withdraw the

centre, both in colonial times and since independence,

Egyptian garrisons from the country. The Mahdist forces

has led to the emergence in the mid-1960s of political

continued to make military gains, culminating in the fall of

protest, culminating in a rebel uprising and a much-

Khartoum and the death of Gordon in January 1885. The

publicized conflict unfolding since 2003. Darfur’s place

latter caused an outcry from antislavery circles and from

within the Sudan has become an internationally

Queen

debated question. Let me say at the outset that I believe

Victoria, to whom Gordon was a hero. This British

Darfur’s future lies with the Sudan—I prefer “with” rather

government indifference changed in 1896, when for

than “in”—but it has to be with a Sudan that is ruled very

reasons that had to do with European politics, the British

differently than the present Sudan. But in order to

decided to “reoccupy” the Sudan, allegedly on behalf of

discuss Darfur’s place within the Sudan in the future, an

Egypt, using in part the Gordon myth as justification.3 By

understanding of the past is necessary.1

1898, they had destroyed the Mahdist state and gradually occupied Kordofan and the southern

I have never asked the question, is Darfur “naturally” a part

Sudan; in the same year, Sultan Ali Dinar restored the

of the Sudan? From an historian’s perspective, the answer

Darfur Sultanate, a development that the British, for the

has to be no. The modern Sudan is the artificial creation

moment, acquiesced in.4 In 1916, largely because of the

of two imperialisms, Egyptian and British. In 1821, today

French advance eastwards from Lake Chad, the British

the northern Sudan. He had seemingly also planned to

decided to “pinch out” Darfur and occupied it, killing its

invade Darfur, but a serious revolt along the Nile thwarted

ruler in the process.

that plan. As it turned out, there was little gold and the

The above is a brief and crude presentation of the wider

slaves were too few, so Muhammad Ali turned to using

geopoliti- cal history of what today we call the Sudan.

Egyptian peasants as cannonfodder. From 1839 onwards,

Ironically, Muslim Darfur has a shorter history as part of the

a motley collection of European adventurers, Egyptian

Sudan than the non-Muslim south. Until 1874, Darfur was

and northern Sudanese traders, and others penetrated

an independent state; it was conquered by the slave-

into the southern Sudan, looking for ivory and slaves. The

trader al-Zubayr Pasha (d. 1913), who was then cheated out

great divide between the Muslim Sudan and the non-

of his con- quest when the Egyptians marched in on al-

Muslim south had been breached. The Egyptian Sudan

Zubayr’s heels and briefly occupied the country for some

remained a wasting Egyptian asset until the Egyptians

nine years (1874–1883). The latter never

were swept away by a messianic revolution led by the Mahdi, a self-proclaimed messiah, in 1882–1885.2

Ironically, Muslim Darfur has a shorter history as part of the Sudan than the nonMuslim south.

really controlled Darfur; neither did the Mahdists. Between 1874 and 1898, a period remembered in Darfur as Umm Kwakiyya, best translated by an Irishman as “the Troubles,” Darfur experienced more or less what it is experiencing today: drought, rape and rapine, and warlordism. Many fled, as they did in 2003, as refugees to what is now Chad. In 1898, the then sultan, Ali Dinar, brought the “troubles” to an end; his methods were rough but effective and the British simply inherited his state.5 Between 1916 and 1956, Darfur was ruled by the British, but their con- trol was minimal, of development there was virtually

BY R.S. O’FAHEY

none—the people were left more or less to their own devices. The same reality continued after the British left and Darfur was part of an independent Sudan.

DOES DARFUR HAVE A FUTURE IN THE SUDAN?

PHOTO BY UN

When the British occupied the Sudan in 1898, they were very con- cerned to keep the French out of the South—this “Scramble for Africa,” cul- minating in the confrontation of Kitchener with Captain Marchand at Fashoda, nearly led to war between Britain and France.6 In other words, already in 1898 the British decided that the southern Sudan was part of a putative Sudan, while Darfur was left on hold until 1916. Indeed, ever since the breakthrough into the south through the sadd or vegetation barrier on the White Nile in 1839 by Salim Qapudan, the south was much more part of the affairs of the north than ever was Darfur. Indeed, al-Zubayr Pasha conquered Darfur in 1874 from the south. In other words, the south was from about 1839 to about 1882 a part of the north in a way that Darfur never was, and the British moved much more rapidly after 1898 to take con- trol of the south than they did in Darfur, partly motivated by the desire to control the Nile Valley. Ergo the south has a longer chronological connexion with the north than does Darfur.

Chronologically the south was part of the north from 1839 to the present—166 years—while Darfur was part of the north from 1874 to 1898 and from 1916 to the present—113 years.

Before pursuing this argument at other levels, there is a further point to consider; in the transition to independence, 1953–1956, Darfur did not figure in the argument. Both the politicians of the northern elite in their dealings with the British and the latter were aware of the fact that they had a southern problem; no one at that time ever raised the issue of a Darfur problem. Why?

A Pan-African Perspective

by M. Jalāl Hāshim To be or not to be is an analysis of linguistic, cultural, political, economic and social factors, which explain the intricate root causes of conflicts which have ravished Sudan. It stands in stark contrast to the dominant simplification and distortions which have come to typify presentations of the region.

Central to the book is an unapologetic explanation of Arabization; which often is portrayed as individual choices of religious loyalty, but, in fact, masks an intentional power-system which viciously corrupts Afrikan identities.

By highlighting the detrimental complexities of manipulation, geopolitics, identity confusion and cultural imperialism, Hashim has not only written an authoritative book about Sudan, but also presented a comprehensive case study that all of Afrika must learn from. Rarely are we presented with such a vigourous insideview to an area of Afrika which once was held in the highest civilizational esteem, but has been reduced to an WRITTEN BY M. JALAL HASHIM ideological field of Arab-led “A most timely book, written with sensitivity, terror, massacres and knowledge and forthrightness about the crisis of disintegration. identity in the Sudan. It has an excellent background historical narrative pieced together with finesse and insight. It is the sort of text which will educate the wider public on what is happening in the Sudan in broad historical perspective.”

THE ESSAY WILL BE PUBLISHED IN SERIALS

TIPS FOR A SMOOTHER TRIP

PHOTO BY UN

The character of Arab supremacism is manifest in a racist vocabulary and in sexual violence. The term ‘zurug’ has long been used in the casual racism of Arabs in Darfur, despite—or perhaps because of—the absence of any discernible differences in skin colour.

Attributions of female beauty or lack thereof are similarly made, again despite or because of the lack of noticeable difference. The term ”abid’, which has long been used by the riverain elites to refer to all Darfurians, has been adopted by some Arab supremacists to refer to non-Arab Darfurians, despite—or because of—its lack of historical precedent. And widespread rape itself is a means of identity destruction or transformation, particularly salient and invasive for Muslim communities. In the early 1990s Nuba Mountains counterinsurgency campaigns, there is ample documentation that rape was used systematically and deliberately for this purpose.29

The creation of ‘Africanism’ is more recent than the ascent of Arab supremacism. It owes much to the SPLA, whose leader, John Garang, began to speak of an ‘African majority’ in Sudan to counter the Islamist government’s claim that Sudan should be an Islamic state because it had a majority Muslim population. Garang reached out to the Nuba and peoples of southern Blue Nile, for whom ‘African’ was an identity with which they could readily identify. For example, the Nuba clandestine political and cultural organization of the 1970s and early ’80s, known as Komolo, asserted the Nuba’s right to their own cultural heritage, which they identified as distinctively ‘African.’

Under the leadership of Yousif Kuwa, Komolo activist and SPLA governor of the Nuba Mountains, the Nuba witnessed a revival of traditional dancing, music and religion.30 Wikipedia is a multilingual, web-based, freecontent encyclopedia project. | wikipedia.com

THE ESSAY WILL BE PUBLISHED IN SERIALS

PHOTO BY LUKE CATINA

He is now one of the political leaders of Darfur’s Sudan Liberation Movement.

ALEX DE WAAL Trapped in a set of identity markers derived from the historical experience of the Nile Valley, a number of educated Darfurian non-Arabs chose ‘African’ as the best ticket to political alliancebuilding. The veteran Darfurian politician Ahmed Diraige had tried to do this in the 1960s, making alliances with the Nuba and Southerners, but had then switched to trying to bring Darfur’s nonArabs into the Umma Party, hoping thereby to broaden and secularise that party. Daud Bolad, a Fur and a prominent Islamist student leader, switched from one political extreme to the other and joined the SPLA, leading a poorly-planned and militarily disastrous SPLA expedition into Darfur in 1991. Sharif Harir, a professor of social anthropology and as such inherently distrustful of such labels, was one of the first Darfurian intellectuals to recognize the danger posed by the new Arab Alliance, and has ended up reluctantly donning the ‘African’ label.

www.artrika.org

African Culture Art & Identites

Explore More in the next issue The Scramble for Arab Genealogies by M.J.H & Alex de Waal

Special thanks to the Artrika teams and people who Contributed

02

items.ssrc - African Writing Rex Seán O’Fahey is professor of African History at the University of Bergen, Norway. His connexion with the Sudan began as a lecturer at the University of Khartoum, 1967–1970.

Dr. Mohammed Jalal A. Hashim is a Sudanese writer and lecturer at Khartoum University Also thanks to - Roopa Gogineni & Rhea Schmitt Editorial and Design Team - Konan Tipen,Tom Rhodes, Rawa Ahmed, Abdelsalam yakoubmarajan -Nawekulo Gachanja , Rethabile Thantsha, Reem Shawkat, Tsakane C Langa, Azza Abdalla, Alaa Ahmed

There are 370 million Indigenous people around the world and spread across more than 90 countries. They belong to more than 5,000 different Indigenous peoples and speak more than 4,000 languages. Indigenous people represent about 5% of the world’s population.

The vast majority of them – 70% – live in Asia.