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University of Toronto [martin.klein@utoronto.ca] The Fulbe have dialect differences. My understanding is that Pulaar is the Western Fulbe term and Fulfulde the term used in the greater Hausa zone. I use Fulbe for the people. In my classes, however, in those rare cases where I was talking about a person, I used Fula. I should use Pullo, which is the singular in Pulaar, but undergraduate and lay audiences have enough problems with diverse terminologies. Like others on this list, I have always had trouble with official orthographies that are ignored by both the government and most citizens. My ear also cannot detect differences between a and aa. It is also difficult to decide whether to write a man's name the way it is written on his identity card or the way it should be written if Senegalese or Malians took their orthography seriously. In most cases, I consult works by my Senegambian friends and use their orthography. They are not, however, always consistent. If in doubt, I usually stick to conventional spellings. The problem with Bantu is that the objection to the term seems to be limited to South Africa. There is now a huge literature on Bantu languages, Bantu migrations, even Bantu philosophy. No one I know has suggested another term for these languages, and if it were to be proposed it would cause a lot of confusion, for African students as much as for foreign ones. In 1968, when I gave a lecture in Kisangani, I offered the group either a talk about race in the US or about Bantu Migrations. The overwhelming choice was Bantu Migrations. When I gave the lecture, I realized that they were hungry for their history, which was Bantu history. The bottom line is that we have to communicate. When dealing with undergraduates, we don't want what we have to say blunted by the confusion students feel at the wide array of terms. When dealing with lay audiences or interviews on television news, we have to use terms our listeners. But even within AFrica, when chatting with people in the market or on a car rapide, if they talk about tribes or using invalid ethnic terms, those are the concept that are still valid. One other question. Doug Thomas talked about ethnicity being defined by paternal ancestry. I am not sure of that. I think that may often be true, but I also think that people define themselves the way they want to be defined. It may not have much meaning. If a guy named Fall from Kebemer tells me he is Tokolor, I ask what language he speaks. The thing about Senegal is that so many people have mixed ancestry. I would guess that if I asked those participated in this discussion thread to define themselves and discuss their roots, I would get a hodge-podge of several dozen combinations. This is not knew. When doing research on Sine-Saloum, I was fascinated by Saalum as a multi-ethnic state. When I asked what language was spoken in 19th century Kahone (the capital), they were always confused because they had never thought about. In fact, most of the Burs were Wolof on the patrilineal side and Seerer on matrilineal and were probably bilingual if not trilingual. MArtin Klein Jeremy Rich wrote: > Date: Thursday, 6 December 2007 > From: Ralph Austen <wwb3@uchicago.edu> > > If there is such a consensus re "Pulaar" how do we account for > this web site? > > http://www.flw.com/languages/fulfulde.htm >
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