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Tamazgha

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Tamazgha
Tamazɣa, ⵜⴰⵎⴰⵣⵖⴰ, ⵜⴰⵎⴰⵣⵗⴰ
Berber World
Cultural region
Flag of Tamazgha
Flag
Location of Tamazgha (green) in Africa
Location of Tamazgha (green) in Africa
Part ofAlgeria, Burkina Faso (Oudalan), Egypt (Siwa and Qara), Libya (Cyrenaica, Fezzan and Tripolitania), Mali (Azawad), Mauritania (Adrar and Tagant), Morocco, Niger (Aïr), Spain (Canaries), Tunisia, Western Sahara
Highest elevation
4,167 m (13,671 ft)
Lowest elevation
−55 m (−180 ft)
Population
 • Total
c. 110,000,000
Demographics
 • LanguageDarija, Berber languages
 • ReligionIslam
Time zoneWAT (Algeria, Morocco, Tunisia, Western Sahara, Niger)
GMT (Mali, Mauritania)
CAT (Libya)

Tamazgha (Latin Tamazight: Tamazɣa; Neo-Tifinagh Tamazight: ⵜⴰⵎⴰⵣⵖⴰ) is a term in the Berber languages denoting the lands traditionally inhabited by the Berber people within the Maghreb.[1]

The term was coined in the 1970s by the Berber Academy[2] and, since the late 1990s, has gained particular significance among speakers of Berber languages.[3] Although a neologism, Tamazgha, is grounded in historical reality.[4] While it is used politically, it also simply refers to the land that Berbers have inhabited since antiquity.[5]

The territories that it would encompass are the Canary Islands and the Siwa Oasis, Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, Libya, Mauritania, Western Sahara, and parts of Mali, Niger, Burkina Faso and Senegal.[4][6]

Overview

Historically, Berbers have recognized one another as belonging to a similar cultural and linguistic group, according to Laroui this recognition existed even prior to Roman and Phoenician settlements, which is supported by subsequent research.[7]

However, there was no singular endonym for the speakers of the languages descended from Proto-Berber. Instead, more specific terms for each subgroup were employed such as the Kabyle term Leqbayel or the Shawi term Ishawiyen.[8] Not referring to themselves as Berbers/Imazighen but having their own terms to refer to their own subgroups and communities.[9]

Ramzi Rouighi argues that the Amazigh started being referred to collectively as Berbers following the Muslim conquest of the Maghreb in the 7th century. This word referred mostly to groups in northwest Africa.[10]

This, out of political necessity, was then solidified during French colonization, to fight for civil rights, Berbers needed a unified political identity the French colonial empire understood. Which, despite having a diverse Maghreb populace, made a clear dual divide of Arab and Berber. As such, it was in this period when 'Berbère' became a relatively common term of self-identification.[11][12]

In an attempt to reclaim the identity from the history of colonization, the Agraw Imazighen coined the term Tamazɣa using the pre-existing triconsonantal root M-Z-Ɣ[13] in the 1970s to refer to the lands where the different Berber languages were spoken.[2]

The term has been translated into Spanish as Mazigia, abbreviated as MZG and used as an alternative international license plate code for some people.[14]

Notes

  1. ↑ Brahim El Guabli (2023). "The Idea of Tamazgha: Current Articulations and Scholarly Potential". Tamazgha Studies Journal. Retrieved 2024-03-13. Often described as a neologism, Tamazgha can be simply defined as the Amazigh homeland.
  2. 1 2 Brahim El Guabli (2023). "The Idea of Tamazgha: Current Articulations and Scholarly Potential". Tamazgha Studies Journal. Retrieved 2024-03-13. The Académie Berbère may have invented the word Tamazgha, but the existence of a land where different varieties of Amazigh languages were spoken preceded the creation of the Académie itself.
  3. ↑ Brahim El Guabli (2023). "The Idea of Tamazgha: Current Articulations and Scholarly Potential". Tamazgha Studies Journal. Retrieved 2024-03-13. Tamazgha is a concept that has acquired a transnational cultural and political significance among Amazigh speakers since the late 1990s.
  4. 1 2 El Guabli, Brahim (2024-12-01). "Amazigh Indigeneity and the Remaking of Tamazgha". Current History. 123: 347–353. doi:10.1525/curh.2024.123.857.347.
  5. ↑ "L'État marocain et la question amazighe: Rapport alternatif de Tamazgha au Comité pour l'élimination de la discrimination raciale (CERD)" (PDF). Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights. 2010. Retrieved 2024-03-13. Tous les historiens de l'Afrique du Nord attestent que le pays est peuplé de Berbères depuis les temps les plus anciens. Ainsi, Ibn Khaldoun dans son Histoire des Berbères, peut écrire à propos du pays que l'on appelle le Maghreb et que nous appelons Tamazgha ou pays des Imazighen : "Depuis les temps les plus anciens, cette race d'hommes habite le Maghreb dont elle a peuplé les plaines, les montagnes, les plateaux, les régions maritimes, les campagnes et les villes.
  6. ↑ Slyomovics, Susan (2006). "Self-Determination as Self-Definition: The Case of Morocco". In Hannum, Hurst; Babbitt, Eileen F. (eds.). Negotiating Self-determination. Lexington Books. p. 135. ISBN 0739114336. Retrieved 3 April 2017.
  7. ↑ MADDY-WEITZMAN, BRUCE (2011). The Berber Identity Movement and the Challenge to North African States. University of Texas Press. p. 18.
  8. ↑ Jane E. Goodman (2005-11-03). Berber Culture on the World Stage: From Village to Video. Indiana University Press. p. 7. ISBN 9780253217844. Historically, these groups did not call themselves 'Berbers' but had their own terms of self-referral.
  9. ↑ Goodman, Jane E. (2005). Berber Culture on the World Stage: From Village to Video. Indiana University Press. pp. 7 and 11. ISBN 978-0-253-21784-4.
  10. ↑ Ramzi Rouighi (2019-07-05). Inventing the Berbers: History and Ideology in the Maghrib. University of Pennsylvania Press. p. 19. ISBN 9780812251302. At the same time, the military conquests gave the word Berber meanings that distinguished it from both 'barbarian' and 'ajam. Most notably, in conquest narratives (futūb), Berber refers mostly to groups in northwest Africa. With time, this specialization in the usage became the most dominant one, though the memory of the Berbers of eastern Africa did not disappear.
  11. ↑ Jane E. Goodman (2005-11-03). Berber Culture on the World Stage: From Village to Video. Indiana University Press. p. 7. ISBN 9780253217844. Usage of the term 'Berber' by the populations themselves began to become more generalized under French rule. From early on, the French viewed North Africa through a Manichean lens. Arab and Berber became the primary ethnic categories through which the French classified the population. This occurred despite the fact that a diverse and fragmented populace comprised not only various Arab and Berber tribal groups but also Turks, Andalusians (descended from Moors exiled from Spain during the Crusades), Kouloughlis (offspring of Turkish men and North African women), blacks (mostly slaves or former slaves), and Jews. Of the various Berber groups, Kabyles were singled out for special attention—probably because of their geographic proximity to Algiers and France. In what came to be called the Kabyle Myth, a number of the French military men charged with governing the new colony contended that Kabyles were closer to the French than were Algerian Arabs and demonstrated greater promise of being able to assimilate into the French polity.
  12. ↑ Frank Tachau (1994) Political parties of the Middle East and North Africa, Greenwood Press, p. 2
  13. ↑ Vermondo Brugnatelli (2012-07-18). "À propos de la valeur sémantique d' amaziɣ et tamaziɣt dans l'histoire du berbère". Academia EDU. Retrieved 2024-03-13.
  14. ↑ Canarian Nationalist Flags (Spain). (2006, May 27). In Flags of the World. https://web.archive.org/web/20100818221014/http://www.atlasgeo.net/fotw/flags/es}ic.html
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