Egyptians: Africans or Arabs?

[Grano-Grano]

Some Somalis think they are Arab. I never denied this. I'm just saying that if we're gonna use anecdotal evidence to prove our points, isn't my evidence stronger than yours, being a... Somali... that grew up in the Somali community?

Some Eastern Europeans think they're Jews and created a state over it, to each their own. But Somali's do not claim Arab descent.

Daaroods and Isaaqs may have a word with you

 

[Black smoke and cac jokes]

This doesn't make any fukking sense

Do you know how they depict west Africans in stories? The superiority they feel the darker your skin color is? The remarks made towards darker skinned people all the time? Have you heard the word "stelim" ? Kids yelling "aswad" and throwing stuff at newly arrived west Africans, most of them on their way to Yemen, Jordan or Saudi Arabia?

If you did, then it would make sense....

 

[emoney]

@ Kunta

I agree with Broke Wave, Somalis for the most part do not consider themselves Arabs. I do however believe some do have more of an affinity with Arabs then Africans due to the religion of Islam. There are some Somalis that claim Arab ancestry but these people make actually have Arab ancestry...But as a whole nah.

So yea, most of them consider themselves as Arabs and I'm fukking happy they do, I fukkin love that they don't see an ounce of them as Africans, because I don't want them to be.

The racism in Northern Africa is sickening and it's time to separate Africa into two fukking continents, seriously.

I feel you.

I wish that whole northern part of the continent (the maghreb) will just break off the rest of Africa. I actually want to pawn Arabs and Berbers off to the Europeans...it's a shame we have to share a continent with them.

African union was formed in 2002

but the AU is just the successor of the OAU. Same organization just a name change and some added institutions. AU wasn't like the EU, where there was a membership criteria...anyone who ratified the charter was welcomed...which is the reason why the organization is so ineffective today but that's another topic.

 

[Grano-Grano]

Even the Somalis who claim Arab descent know their Somali in ethnicity and culture but their founding ancestor(s) of their tribe(s), i.e., Daaroods and Isaaqs DID have Arab forefathers.

being Somali per say isn't as homogenous as westerners think of it. Over the last 1,000, there's been a Somalization of the whole Somali Peninsula. There's even two distinct variants of the Somali language. Af- Maay and Af- Waqooyi.

Somalis have different origins, the only things holding us together is a sense of language, culture, and shared national and religious obligations. You'll see Somalis who look straight big nosed kinky hair West Africans and Spanish wavy papi chulo to Somalis who look like their neighbors, the Ethiopians and Eritreans. Somalis never claimed Arabness, only out of kinship and a sense of economic partnership dating back thousands of years. So mothafukka, don't stereotype my people.

 

[TheGodGenesDecoded]

Respect to the great Moorish empire.

 

[Naijan]

Do you know how they depict west Africans in stories? The superiority they feel the darker your skin color is? The remarks made towards darker skinned people all the time? Have you heard the word "stelim" ? Kids yelling "aswad" and throwing stuff at newly arrived west Africans, most of them on their way to Yemen, Jordan or Saudi Arabia?

If you did, then it would make sense....

It's cause I always hear people say ignorant shyt like West african black
Acting like people in the west are the only dark skin africans

 

[lrm98]

Read this interesting article, made me think of a conversation I had with this Egyptian friend of mine and she said that she did not like the fact that most Egyptians identified as "Arabs" because ethnically it's different groups and it kind of pushes under the rug the african and mediterranean heritage...she actually grew up in Cairo and in the Emirates so she saw the differences...

Thoughts?

Are Egyptians Africans or Arabs?


Alarabiya.net English
MONDAY, 10 September 2012 Alarabiya.net English

Last Updated: Mon Sep 10, 2012 09:18 am (KSA) 06:18 am (GMT)
Are Egyptians Africans or Arabs?

By Shahira Amin

Monday, 10 September 2012
Shahira Amin

In July 2007 I was commissioned by CNN to produce a feature story on Egyptian identity. The four-minute piece was to air on CNN’s Inside Africa, a weekly show that takes pride in showing viewers the ‘real’ Africa in all its diversity, rich heritage, and culture. Unlike other programmes that often focus on poverty and disease when covering the dark continent , this is a show that looks at the success stories of Africans. My producer in Atlanta , Georgia , at the time was Cynthia Nelson, an African-American . She asked me to devote my four- minute piece to whether Egyptians really consider themselves Africans.

I hired a camera crew and set out on my mission, thinking I would only prove the obvious: Wasn’t Egypt in North Africa? Therefore, Egyptians are Africans. But it wasn’t simply a matter of geographical location-the issue turned out to be much more complex than that. I did not know it at the time but I was to be most astonished at what I would soon discover.

I spent the next couple of days interviewing hundreds of Egyptians– not just academics and researchers but also laymen and women in different districts in Cairo — asking how they view themselves. My question raised a few eyebrows among people on the streets, the majority of whom replied ” I’m a Muslim Arab, of course ” or “an Arab Muslim .” They shrugged their shoulders and looked perplexed as they responded for wasn’t it an already-known fact that Egyptians are Arabs and that Egypt has a majority Muslim population ?

A few of the interviewees said that they “were descendants of the Pharoahs” but surprisingly, none in the sample interviewed thought of themselves as Africans.

Their responses led me to contemplate the conceptual Sahara divide. For centuries, the Sahara Desert has been viewed as a vast impenetrable barrier dividing our continent into two distinct areas : Northern “white” and sub-Saharan “black” Africa. The countries south of the Sahara have long been considered authentically “African” while those to the north have been perceived as Mediterranean, Middle Eastern or Islamic. While most anthropologists refute this perception of Africa as “inaccurate”, it has nevertheless, influenced the way people think about the continent and our region in particular. Apparently, it has also impacted the way Egyptians view themselves. Many Egyptians are oblivious to their “African-ness “, failing to identify themselves as Africans. When confronted with the reality of their African roots, some Egyptians are stunned, others reluctant to acknowledge the fact. Though I hate to admit it, we are a racist people.

African refugees living in Egypt often complain of discrimination and verbal and physical harassment on the streets. Egyptians look down on darker-skinned sub-Saharans as their “inferiors,” they claim. Historian Jill Kamel confirms this, explaining that it may be attributed to the fact that across generations, Egypt’s elite community was made up mostly of lighter-skinned Egyptians whereas the underprivileged Egyptians were those toiling under the hot sun to earn their bread. ”Egyptians have thus come to associate fair skin with elitism,” she said.

The nationalist pan-Arabism ideology promoted by the late President Gamal Abdel Nasser in the fifties and sixties led his supporters (the Nasserists) to take pride in their Arab identity. The notion of pan- Arabism gained wider acceptance in the seventies when, in the wake of the Gulf oil boom, millions of Egyptians traveled to oil-rich Gulf states to earn their livelihoods. They adopted many of the habits of the host countries, bringing home a new conservatism which was reflected in their style of dress and mannerisms. Author and writer Galal Amin discusses the impact of Wahhabism, a rigid form of Islam practiced in Saudi Arabia, on Egyptian culture at length in his book “Whatever Happened to the Egyptians” a two-part series that chronicles the changes brought about by the mass exodus to the Gulf in the seventies.

President Hosni Mubarak (who was toppled by a mass uprising early last year) had adopted anti-Islamist policies and tried to impose more ‘liberal’ values on the society. His attempts however, were largely futile and many Egyptians became more conservative as a result of their opposition to what they believed were “Western-imposed values.” Some skeptics doubt Mubarak’s true intentions, claiming that he “was more of an Islamist than the Islamists.” They argue that “he allowed our satellite space to be infiltrated by a host of Saudi-financed TV channels that dictate the way people behave.” Others tend to believe that Egyptians turned to religion as a result of Mubarak’s repressive policies. Mubarak may also have encouraged the trend of Islamism to keep Egyptians occupied with religion and away from politics. Indeed, the political repression and economic hardships that marked the era of the ousted authoritarian leader were contributing factors to the growing religiosity in recent decades. Meanwhile, the then-outlawed but tolerated Muslim Brotherhood had stepped in to fill the vacuum left by the government, extending badly-needed charity services to society’s downtrodden and poor. In so doing, the group won many converts to its cause.

The result of all of the above is today’s Egypt-a polarised country divided along ideological lines: Islamists on the one hand and liberals and Christians on the other. The ‘new ‘ Egypt has witnessed a rise in Islamism but roughly half the population continues to resist the change and is desperately clinging on to the fast-fading ‘secular’ image. Emad Gad, researcher and political analyst at Al Ahram Center for Political Studies told me in the days after the January 25 Revolution that “We have claimed Egypt back from the grip of the Saudis” and that the revolution was about “Egyptianising ‘Egypt once again after years of “attempts to Saudise it.” A year and a half later, his statements couldn’t be further from the truth as the reality on the ground proves the country has taken a different course.

Moreover, Egyptians have increasingly used religious symbols like the hijab or Muslim headscarf for women and men growing their beards to assert their Islamic identity. Such symbols do not necessarily mean greater piety -Egyptians have simply become “more visibly pious.” Teenage girls often take on the veil as a result of peer pressure , said Dr.Madiha El Safty, Professor of Sociology at the American University in Cairo.

While the signs of increasing piety may indeed be the result of peer pressure, a political statement against the West’s policies vis-a-vis the Middle East or even economic (with a large segment of the population unable to afford to keep up with fashion trends or visit the hairdressers on a regular basis), the fact remains that the signs of ‘Islamisation’ of the society are increasing. The lifting of the ban on hijab for Egyptian State TV anchors this week is another step in that direction.

It’s important not to forget that while a portion of the society is increasingly “Islamising,” there’s another portion that is showing fierce resistance to the trend. In any free, democratic society the people have a right to make their own personal choices. If we hope to revive our glorious past and re-create the Egypt that was once a melting pot of cultures and a crossroad of civilisations, we must celebrate our diversity and take pride in our roots: African, Mediterranean or Arab. It is this mix that makes us who we are: Egyptians.

that article is propaganda breh....For all intents and purposes similar to most North Africans mos tEgyptians are arabs with heritage from both the Middle East(Persia,Turkey,Arabia,etc) and Southern Europe(Rome,Greece,etc)...They consider themselves arabs for good reason...They are literally no different from their peers in the rest of Arabia which their ancestors invaded Egypt from...While there are native/African Egptians left(the black Egptians) they are a minority in a sea of arab.

 

[FAH1223]

honestly, i asked plenty of egyptians i knew when I was in Egypt if they considered themselves africans and a lot of them did

the fair skin and superiority feeling is true with them though... if you go to egypt and you see all the bill boards, you will not see ONE darker skinned Egyptian up there

when you go to southern egypt and even in the western part, you will see the people change and you'll see how different they view things... those folks will say they are africans much more quickly than someone in Cairo or Alexandria

 

[lrm98]

There is a huge thread on this already... short story is that the modern day Egyptians are not the same as the ancient Egyptians. In present day Egypt they are mainly from Berber tribes like most of North Africa but they like to consider themselves of Arab decent, just like northern Sudanese and some Somalians in Africa. To some people saying their African means black so they deny that.

your right about one thing which I bolded...but modern Egyptians like most North Africans are infact the seeds of arab and European colonist/invaders.

 

[Hip-Hop-Bulls]

Egypt is in Africa soooo....

 

[Freshology]

Egypt is in Africa soooo....

You'd think it's a no-brainer... but every time they mention northern African countries they refer to it as the middle east.... it's ridiculous the type of stuff people try to pull these days. It's like asking if Samoans from Hawaii are American or Asian. When these type of discussions surface you realize just how fukked up people are in the head when it comes to race, ethnicity & how it affects one's identity

 

[SpursFanSinceNovember2017]

Live video of US embassy in Egypt (large crowd gathered outside)

http://reuters.livestation.com/demo

 

[Black smoke and cac jokes]

It's cause I always hear people say ignorant shyt like West african black
Acting like people in the west are the only dark skin africans

Oh I can't lie, even I was raised up believing they were somewhat different from us (Eritreans) because of their skin color. It's a cultural thing where dark-skinned east Africans (Djibouti, Somalia, Uganda, Kenya, etc) have similar "eastern" traits and that we somewhat should distinguish them from the westerners (ironically).

 

[88m3]

Live video of US embassy in Egypt (large crowd gathered outside)

Reuters Live Stream

 

[ThatKidBlackHippy]

yeah fam but sudan is not somalia. they look like us but they really are mixed with arabs, and even though their c00ning thats their own thing. somalis are actually pretty inclusive but the xenophobia comes from Kenyans being christians. if we're talking about actual fringe racism, then every society has that. Plenty of somalis live in Kenya hell my mom was there not too long ago, plenty of somalis in the NFD area.

Not all tribes in (north) Sudan are mixed with Arabs. And even the ones that are mixed, it is not a significant enough mix that the African lineage is completely diluted. (e.g. the ja'aliya tribe is mixed with nubian/arab ... but the arab mix is relatively scare similar to how some africna americans have white ancestors mixed in etc) The people who blatantly downplay their African heritage in favor of being "Arab" are just misguided/self-hating, the latter having a lot to do with the brainwashing by the current Sudanese government, who for some reason think being more Arab means being more Islamic. (which isn't the case, but ..)

Trust me, I had this argument with many relatives and friends. And yeah, Somali brehs don't c00n it up as much but I have met some that wanna play the "I am Arab" card too ... just like some from Ethiopia try to say the same thing. I think all the once "Arabized" African countries will have some people trying to say that, maybe under the false notion that it will make them closer to Islam or something. *shrug*