CIAO DATE: 03/2011
Volume: 6, Issue: 0
July 2006
Table of Contents (PDF)
Editor's Note (PDF)
Like most demanding intellectual projects, Bildhaan is never easy to produce. Every issue requires serious investment in labor time and material commitment from the members of the editorial board as well as Macalester and Wellesley Colleges. On the first account, I salute Professors Lidwien Kapteijns and Lee Cassanelli for their invaluable editorial work. We have been partners for the past six years and look forward to many more years of sustaining Bildhaan as a site for the dissemination of writings in Somali Studies. In this regard, I want to acknowledge the devotion of Margaret Beegle of Macalester College and the new Institute for Global Citizenship to the overall production of the Journal. Margaret is one precious asset! This year she had the splendid help of Ms. Erin Gullikson ’07. Macalester and Wellesley Colleges have been the institutional bedrock of Bildhaan. Both are places at once committed to high standards and cognizant of civic obligations. Because Bildhaan appealed to both of these characteristics of the two colleges, they have stood with us, from the maiden volume, with exceptional and continuing magnanimity. On behalf of the Journal, I say to both, bless yo
Contributors (PDF)
Interview with Professor Said Sheikh Samatar (PDF)
Ahmed I. Samatar
AS: I would like to start the conversation by asking you to reflect a bit on the beginnings, that is, where were you born and the context, as much as you can remember. SS: My birth and upbringing had been somewhat colorful, eventful, and that’s because of my old man, Sheikh Samatar. He was a remarkable individual with a rather flamboyant kind of lifestyle and history. He joined the banda (the Italian Somali army), and was sent to Libya
State and Politics in Ethiopia's Somali Region since 1991 (PDF)
Tobias Hagmann, Mohamud H. Khalif
When asked by an interviewer whether he felt more Somali or more Ethiopian, Sultan Korfa Garane Ahmed, a federal member of parliament representing part of Ethiopia’s Somali Region, diplomatically responded: “I am an Ethiopian-Somali.” 2 The MP’s self-description as an Ethiopian-Somali highlights two crucial implications for the analysis of contemporary politics in what was formerly known as the Ogaden and is today referred to as the Somali Regional State or simply Region 5. For the first time in the history of the Ethiopian empire-state or, more precisely, since the forced incorporation of the Somali inhabited Ogaden into Ethiopia at the end of the 19th century, the Somalis are officially recognized as one of the country’s “nations, nationalities and peoples.” Since the accession to power of the Ethiopian People’s Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF) in May 1991, attempts to forge a distinct “Ethiopian-Somali” or “Somali-Ethiopian” identity have superseded the former regimes’ patronizing attitudes toward the country’s “subject nationalities.”
Short Story: A Foreign Language is Such a Nuisance! (PDF)
Samatar Soyaan
Once he had put his glasses securely in front of his eyes opened wide in surprise, Farah quietly asked his wife Kaltuun, “How do you spell the word ‘heart’? Is it with a double consonant and two r’s or with a long vowel and double a?” Distorting her mouth in a sneer, pulling up one side of her light cotton caftan with one hand and throwing the other, fingers pointed, at her husband, she answered, “Listen, that you must ask our child. What do I know about this foreign language? I hate it!” “Anyway,” she added, “what does that word ‘heart’ refer to in Somali? Does it have to do with the lungs or, perhaps, the stomach?
The Internet and the Somali Diaspora: The Web as a Means of Expression (PDF)
Abdisalam M. Issa-Salwe
The disappearance of the Somali state from the international scene in 1991 is seen as a unique phenomenon in this nation-state era. This experience was expected to leave Somalia “out of the loop” of new global technologies, markets, politics, and cultures. Contrary to this expectation, Somalis have not been so excluded. In fact, with the impact of globalization during the close of the 1990s, the World Wide Web presented an opportunity for the Somali diaspora to communicate, regroup, share views, help their groups at home, and organize activities (e.g., development projects). Since the late 1990s, the Somali civil war has entered a new stage: the stage of media war. The web page became a means to promote group political identity. Similar to the personal web page, these websites are constructed for group/self presentation. When a society begins to disintegrate during a period of social or economic turmoil, it experiences an identity crisis. In such a situation, people endeavour to reconstitute their identities and social meaning by articulating and identifying with alternative discourses. The effect of the rollback of the state “virus” has been that every community has been attempting to rediscover itself. The web page offers such a venue
Resettled Somali Women in Georgia and Changing Gender Roles (PDF)
Dorian B. Crosby
“Women and men experience conflict, displacement, and post-conflict settings directly because of the culturally determined gender division of roles and responsibilities.” 1 As a result, women face different challenges than men in the aftermath of war. 2 Since women comprise the majority of refugees, they tend to be the majority of asylum seekers. 3 According to the United Nations High Commission for Refugees (UNHCR), approximately 80 percent of refugee women are responsible for themselves and children. 4 Many female refugees are from patriarchal societies where men tend to dominate the political, economic, and social decision-making processes. 5 Consequently, men tend to provide the dominant economic support for the family. However, when men are killed or go missing during war, 6 women must become their own providers and protectors. This makes them heads of their households. 7 For most, this is a new responsibility.
Poem: The Poet's Death is His Life (PDF)
Mahamud Siad Togane
According to Quondam Prime Minister Abdirashid Ali Sharmarke, we Somalis have two aces in the hole: Our faith in Islam and our Lyrical Poesy. So it is with great sadness that I share with you the distressing news of the death of Abwaan Ahmed Ismail Diirye, better known to the world as “Qaasim,” who distinguished himself and made us all proud in his compositions of unforgettable lyrical poesy in our own mother tongue. Rabindranath Tagore, the great Indian Nobel Laureate, said: “God respects me when I work, but he loves me when I sing.
New Collection of Somali Folktales (PDF)
Suzanne Lilius
Human beings, graced with the capacity to speak, use oral language (in addition to body language) for all sorts of communication: disseminating information, giving orders, paying respect. But mostly we love telling stories. Storytelling constitutes an integral part of a living oral tradition. When such a tradition gains access to a written language, among the first things people write down are folktales that are then spread further, in various ways. One form of dissemination is through schoolbooks; another is the reading material produced for literacy campaigns. For people who are not accustomed to reading, the reading process is facilitated if they recognize the content. Many of the folktales are not only well known but also much loved. Even if the stories in themselves are not familiar, at least the form is understood. This awakens the joy of discovery. Reading becomes more attractive and the effort pays off. A parallel movement of writing down folktales takes place when people collect and translate stories, making them available to people of other cultures. Folktales, more than any other stories, are implicitly seen as offering keys to the culture where they originated