Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Humanities/2017 September 24

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September 24

What happened to people in Kenya whose land was expropriated to British settlers?

Were they forcibly removed and replaced by British settlers somewhat like what happened to natives in North America? Uncle dan is home (talk) 03:15, 24 September 2017 (UTC)

Moving the Maasai discusses some of the issues, although there may be more than a hint of historical apologism (if that's a word) about it. The book it is criticising, Moving the Maasai: A Colonial Misadventure by Lotte Hughes (Palgrave MacMillan, ISBN: 978-1403996619) can be downloaded in full from the internet - not sure of the copyright status, so I'll let you search if you want to. Google Books has a preview here.

For shorter articles, see Key Issues with the Anglo-Maa Treaties of 1904 and 1911- Death of a Nation by Moses Kintalel, Maasai: The Background To The Land Question from the Unrepresented Nations and Peoples Organization (UNPO) and The Maasai's century-old grievance by Gray Phombeah, BBC Nairobi. Alansplodge (talk) 11:18, 24 September 2017 (UTC)

They where killed, enslaved and/or driven off to less valuable soil, just like the natives in the USA. Also alike there where multiple official agreements which similar eventually where not honored by the "invaders" later on. The natives where screwed over again and again and they still are today. --Kharon (talk) 15:51, 24 September 2017 (UTC)

Killed? perhaps. Driven off? Perhaps. But enslaved... No. By the time the British colonized Kenya they were strongly opposed to slavery. Blueboar (talk) 16:29, 24 September 2017 (UTC)

Let's have some references if you wish to make accusations of genocide please. None of the sources I have cited above mention killing people. The Maasai were nomadic herders, moving large distances from pasture to pasture, so it wasn't difficult to occupy parts of their grazing lands when they were grazing elsewhere. Alansplodge (talk) 18:55, 24 September 2017 (UTC)

The sources for the responses focus on the Maasai people, many of whom still live as pastoralists, but Demographics of Kenya states that they are only the 8th largest ethnic group. The population at the end of the nineteenth century, when Lord Delamere decided that what would become Kenya was ripe for commercial agriculture and thus British colonists, was similarly mixed. Our article on Settler colonialism doesn't have much on Africa, unfortunately, but from History of Kenya:

The area [interior central highlands] was already home to over a million members of the Kikuyu tribe, most of whom had no land claims in European terms, and lived as itinerant farmers. To protect their interests, the settlers banned the growing of coffee, introduced a hut tax and the landless were granted less and less land in exchange for their labour. A massive exodus to the cities ensued as their ability to provide a living from the land dwindled.

The British Empire (and no doubt other colonial administrations) found tactics of divide and rule profitable. Especially in an area where no one ethnic or linguistic group forms anything like a majority, different peoples can be played off against each other.

To aid colonial administration, the British divided Kenya’s Bantu-, Nilotic-, and Cushitic-speaking peoples into ethnic classifications based on linguistic variations and locality. Thus, specific ethnic subgroups, called “tribes,” were created in a form that had not existed previously. The ethnic groups were assigned to live in separate areas of the colony. Within each subgroup, colonial administrators designated one “chief,” who became responsible for collecting taxes levied by the colonial state.[1]

So yes, some people were moved. Carbon Caryatid (talk) 12:14, 29 September 2017 (UTC)

Somalia on Crisis in Palestine/Islamic Extremism

I am researching the government of Somalia's views on Islamic extremism and the crisis in Palestine, but I've hit a wall. I can't find anything about in on Wikipedia or the internet as a whole. If you could help me out by pointing me in the direction of some resources that I can use to learn more about these two topics in relation to Somalia, I would really appreciate it. JackGraterisGreater (talk) 17:11, 24 September 2017 (UTC)

What is "Somalia's views" even supposed to mean in this context? Somalia has had no real central government since 1991. Recently, there's been an attempt to form a new national government under foreign sponsorship, but it's highly preoccupied with internal issues. I would assume that members of the government are opposed to al-Shabab, or they wouldn't be participating in the first place... AnonMoos (talk) 16:58, 24 September 2017 (UTC)

I am referring to the government known as the Federal Government of Somalia. I assumed that the government would be opposed to terrorist organizations, but I'd like to see what they have done about it in the past and the comments that have been made by people in leadership roles within the aforementioned government. JackGraterisGreater (talk) 17:11, 24 September 2017 (UTC)

Enki and Yahweh

Is there a connection between the Yahweh of the bible and Ea (Enki). Enki was regarded as having created man, warned Ziusudra of the flood, and confused the languages. The early inscriptions of Urukagina suggest that the couple, Enki and Ninki, were the progenitors of seven pairs of gods, including Enki as god of Eridu, Enlil of Nippur, and Su'en (or Sin) of Ur, and were themselves the children of An (sky, heaven) and Ki (earth). Also, his son Marduk kiled Tiamat. Compare to Yahweh and the Leviathan/Sea. As Ea, he was equated with El and maybe even Yah at Ebla. Idielive (talk) 20:10, 24 September 2017 (UTC)

There are some leads to follow in Enki#Ea and West Semitic deities. Also, have you read the general article on Ancient Canaanite religion? The thing is, none of the religious traditions of the wider region were (so far as we know) invented in isolation; many of the peoples involved were nomadic to some degree, or made one-off migrations, or were forcibly moved by conquerors at one time or another, or were invaded and perhaps occupied, so their religious ideas undoubtably "cross-fertilised" far back beyond any written evidence we have. {The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} 90.201.115.180 (talk) 20:35, 24 September 2017 (UTC)

Idielive -- the ancient Israelites were in an area where Mesopotamian cultural influences coming from one direction met Egyptian cultural influences coming from another direction, but Israelite "prophetic" monotheistic religion wasn't too closely connected with either of them (only in rather vague and indirect ways). Various Canaanite cultural motifs, and sometimes even myths (as with the flood/ark story) are found in the Bible, but generally repurposed to serve monotheistic morality. Sometimes little tidbits of Sumerian stuff show up, like the word É.GAL as the origin of the Hebrew word היכל heikhal "temple, palace", but the Sumerian language was never spoken anywhere close to ancient Israel, and was basically dead by the time the Bible started being written down, so that Sumerian cultural traits were only partially accessible to Israelites, and in a form which resulted from being transmitted through several intermediate cultures, a process which does not tend to preserve fine details of theological interpretation... AnonMoos (talk) 22:12, 24 September 2017 (UTC)

Enki/Ea started out as a Sumerian deity, but his worship and myths seem to have spread to the Akkadians, the Assyrians, the Babylonians, the Hittites, the people of Ugarit and of Ebla, the Canaanites, and the Hurrians. His cult was still extand in the Hellenistic period, when the Sumerians themselves were long gone. That his myths had some influence on Jewish mythology is likely, but we can not be certain when and with which version of the myth the Hebrews and/or Jews came in contact with. The Biblical tale of the flood turns up in the Book of Genesis, which was composed in the 6th and/or 5th century BC, either in the Neo-Babylonian Empire (or Babylon itself) or the Achaemenid Empire. Scholars have noted Babylonian and Persian influences in the book, but often disagree about specific details.

The mostly discredited theory of Panbabylonism regarded the entire Bible and Judaism itself as derivatives of Babylonian religion. While supporters made some decent points, as with other ideas based on hyperdiffusionism, they overlooked the fact that trans-cultural diffusion is rarely a simple process with a single point of origin for any given idea.

Our article on Ancient Mesopotamian religion mentions that some of its cults survived to the 4th century AD, with indications that Ashur, Sin, Shamash, Hadad and Ishtar still had individual temples. The religion possibly died out, due to competition with the then-expanding Christianity, Judaism, Gnosticism, and Manichaeism. By then the Summerians were mostly forgotten. Dimadick (talk) 09:30, 25 September 2017 (UTC)

The Book of Genesis received its final form around that time (as seen in updatings of the tabula gentium in Chapter 10), but elements and traditions in it go back quite a ways further. Any mythic elements in it are likely to reflect influences that had been incorporated into Israelite/Jewish society for some time, and not things that Israelites/Jews were being newly exposed to right at that moment... AnonMoos (talk) 17:27, 25 September 2017 (UTC)

You do realize that we know little about specific aspects of Jewish religion before Josiah (reigned c. 641-609 BC)'s religious reforms, right? Besides the theory that Josiah and his propaganda are underlying the Deuteronomist sources and their suspect historical information, it is quite likely that older works were edited to match the reformers' views. Dimadick (talk) 08:22, 26 September 2017 (UTC)

Precisely what is a "collegiate dictionary"?

I have seen copies of Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionaries for sale but I can't find a definition for the term "collegiate dictionary"; I have also found Webster's New World College Dictionary at Barnes & Noble. What is the difference between a "collegiate dictionary", "college dictionary", and other variants of dictionaries (like "desk dictionary", etc.)? 67.239.109.183 (talk) 22:49, 24 September 2017 (UTC)

One that doesn't skip words like coruscate and pneumonoultramicroscopicsilicovolcanoconiosis? Sagittarian Milky Way (talk) 23:13, 24 September 2017 (UTC)

67.239.109.183 -- There's not necessarily any exact definition, but it's supposed to be suitable for college students to use. In the Merriam-Webster line, it's basically intermediate between "Unabridged" and "Condensed". We have some info at Webster's Dictionary... AnonMoos (talk) 23:22, 24 September 2017 (UTC)

"Suitable for the general reader and especially for the college student" per the intro in my copy. The unabridged is ginormous. The Collegiate is a normal-sized book. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 23:27, 24 September 2017 (UTC)

On the other hand, the Trump edition is about five pages long. Clarityfiend (talk) 00:19, 25 September 2017 (UTC)

In 140 character chunks. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 00:56, 25 September 2017 (UTC)

With plenty of 'alternative' spellings.DOR (HK) (talk) 08:09, 25 September 2017 (UTC)

But at least it includes covfefe, which the others don't. Andy Dingley (talk) 12:11, 25 September 2017 (UTC)

And Nambia, which I believe most encyclopedic resources stupidly omit. Hayttom (talk) 17:46, 28 September 2017 (UTC)