DiscussWorldIssues - Socio-Economic Religion and Political Uncensored Debate - View Single Post - My own Stereotypical observation of Somali clans

**stuntduood** · 09-10-2010, 11:20 AM

You're correct...a sense of "Somaliness" is pretty new to Somalis, just like being an "Ethiopian" "Eritrean" or lol, "Djiboutian" are all new.

True, but being "Ethiopian" isn't so new. There's long been a concept, but it was intricately tied to being Christian until the modern (19th c.) period.

The second term historically used to describe Europeans was Ferenji, which was basically a borrowing from the Islamo-world's habit of describing alll Crusaders by the blanket term "Franks". I think this is the term used for Europeans to this day in Ethiopia.

Yes, the term is "Ferenj" in Amharic (I think "Ferenji" in Tigrinya), which comes from "Frank" via Arabic.

When I went to the States, I noticed a distinct change, where African Americans almost ALWAYS saw me as Black, (even AfrAm) and would refer to me as 'my brutha' etc. While Whites were more along the lines of 'You're brown' or some kind of Muslim'' as if its an ethnic/racial group.

Where was your experience? Because mine's generally been the opposite (with exceptions both ways). I've had my racial affiliations questioned more by Aframs than by white people.

09-10-2010, 11:20 AM	#27
stuntduood Join Date Oct 2005 Posts 435 Senior Member	You're correct...a sense of "Somaliness" is pretty new to Somalis, just like being an "Ethiopian" "Eritrean" or lol, "Djiboutian" are all new. True, but being "Ethiopian" isn't so new. There's long been a concept, but it was intricately tied to being Christian until the modern (19th c.) period. The second term historically used to describe Europeans was Ferenji, which was basically a borrowing from the Islamo-world's habit of describing alll Crusaders by the blanket term "Franks". I think this is the term used for Europeans to this day in Ethiopia. Yes, the term is "Ferenj" in Amharic (I think "Ferenji" in Tigrinya), which comes from "Frank" via Arabic. When I went to the States, I noticed a distinct change, where African Americans almost ALWAYS saw me as Black, (even AfrAm) and would refer to me as 'my brutha' etc. While Whites were more along the lines of 'You're brown' or some kind of Muslim'' as if its an ethnic/racial group. Where was your experience? Because mine's generally been the opposite (with exceptions both ways). I've had my racial affiliations questioned more by Aframs than by white people.
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