Permanent Pilgrims: The Role of Pilgrimage in the Lives of West African Muslims in Sudan 9781474473699

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International African Library 15 General editors: David Parkin and J. D. Y. Peel

PERMANENT PILGRIMS

International African Library General Editors

David Parkin and J. D. Y. Peel The International African Library is a major monograph series from the International African Institute and complements its quarterly periodical Africa, the premier journal in the field of African studies. Theoretically informed ethnographies, studies of social relations ‘on the ground’ which are sensitive to local cultural forms, have long been central to the Institute’s publications programme. The IAL maintains this strength but extends it into new areas of contemporary concern, both practical and intellectual. It includes works focused on problems of development, especially on the linkages between the local and national levels of society; studies along the interface between the social and environmental sciences; and historical studies, especially those of a social, cultural or interdisciplinary character. Titles in the series: 5 Günther Schlee Identities on the move: clanship and pastoralism in northern Kenya 7 Karin Barber I could speak until tomorrow: oriki, women and the past in a Yoruba town (Published in the USA by the Smithsonian Institution Press and in Nigeria by Ibadan University Press) 8 Richard Fardon Between God, the dead and the wild: Chamba inter­ pretations of religion and ritual (Published in the USA by the Smithsonian Institution Press) 9 Richard Werbner Tears of the dead: the social biography of an African family (Published in the USA by the Smithsonian Institution Press and in Zimbabwe by Baobab Press) 10 Colin Murray Black Mountain: land, class and power in the eastern Orange Free State, 1880s to 1980s (Published in the USA by the Smithsonian Institution Press and in South Africa by Witwatersrand University Press) 11 J. S. Eades Strangers and traders: Yoruba migrants, markets and the state in northern Ghana (Published in the USA and Africa by Africa World Press) 12 Isaac Ncube Mazonde Ranching and enterprise in eastern Botswana: a case study of black and white farmers 13 Melissa Leach Rainforest relations: gender and resource use among the Mende of Gola, Sierra Leone (Published in the USA by the Smithsonian Institution Press) 14 Tom Forrest The advance ofAfrican capital: the growth ofNigerian private enterprise (Published in the USA by the University Press of Virginia and in Nigeria by Spectrum Books) 15 C. Bawa Yamba Permanent pilgrims: the role of pilgrimage in the lives of West African Muslims in Sudan (Published in the USA by the Smith­ sonian Institution Press)

Editorial Consultants

Kofi Agawu Pierre Bonte John Comaroff Johannes Fabian Paulin Hountondji Ivan Karp Sally Falk Moore

PERMANENT PILGRIMS The Role of Pilgrimage in the Lives of West African Muslims in Sudan

C. BAWA YAMBA

EDINBURGH UNIVERSITY PRESS for the International African Institute, London

© C. Bawa Yamba, 1995 Transferred to digital print 2012

Edinburgh University Press Ltd 22 George Square, Edinburgh

Typeset in Linotronic Plantin by Speedspools, Edinburgh, and printed and bound by CPI Group (UK) Ltd Croydon, CR0 4YY

A CIP record for this book is available from the British Library

ISBN 0 7486 0592 4 ISBN 978 1 4744 7369 9 (EPDF)

To Kicki, Christopher, Bobby and Little Emily

CONTENTS

Chapter 1

Chapter 2

Chapter 3

List of illustrations

ix

Acknowledgements

xi

Introduction The problem and its setting The Hausa are everywhere Anthropologists and the study of pilgrimage Metaphysical and pragmatic views in social explanation What makes men tick: some anthropological approaches to the analysis of thought and action Concept, precept, context and praxis Outline of the argument

1 1 3 6 12 16 23 27

The history of West African migration to Sudan

30

A note on history and social anthropology The golden road to Mecca Hausaland before the Fulani jihads The Fulani jihads and the consolidation of Islam Some consequences of the Fulani jihads for our theme Mahdism, colonial rule and millenarian beliefs in Northern Nigeria at the end of the nineteenth century Two cogs in the wheels of history

30 33 35 38 46

The rural dwellers: moral virtues, secular constraints Entering and leaving Sudan from West Africa West Africans and the Gezira Scheme Rural life is good for pilgrims Wad Fellata: a pilgrim work camp in the Gezira A brief look at a polygynous pilgrim family The Quranic schools Sharecropping and farmwork in Wad Fellata Cold and warm debts in Wad Fellata Inter-village relationships Summary

65 65 68 70 72 77 79 83 87 91 92

48 52

PERMANENT PILGRIMS

viii

Chapter 4

The urban dwellers: landlords, clients, fakis and beggars

94

Wad Medani: the principal urban centre in the Gezira region 94 Old settlers and newcomers: two sets of occupational categories in Wad Medani 96 The ‘elite’: the landlords 101 The fakis 107 The lower set: tailors, water-vendors, butchers and beggars 112 The complementarity of town and country 117 Summary 118 Chapter 5

The Islamic pilgrimage and the West African subculture in Sudan 121 The cultural propensities model The ‘too-many-chiefs’ model The turuq and the power of dogma ‘Them’ and ‘us’: primordial sentiments and objective difference Some symbols of distinctiveness: custom and language Potential conflict and the dissenters Summary

Chapter 6

Chapter 7

122 125 129 136 140 146 151

Divine design and its consequences for the achievement of pilgrimage in this life 152 Debts, gifts and Insha’Allah: some key concepts and pre­ cepts in the ontology of West African pilgrims in Sudan Fakis and divine design Going there and getting there

154 170 177

The pilgrimage as a paradigm for life

181

Appendix I: In the field

194

Appendix II: Some brief biographical notes on the key informants quoted in the test

202

Glossary

203

Notes

206

References

223

Index

231

LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

MAPS

1 2 3 4

Hausaland in the nineteenth century. Traditional pilgrim routes, adapted from al-Naqar 1972. Hajiya and Abubakar’s journeys. The Gezira Scheme in Sudan.

xiii xiv 43 44

PLATES

1 2 3 4 5

For a West African pilgrim, a horse and cart is a symbol of Arabness and a sign of social mobility in Sudan, © C. Bawa Yamba. Interviewing the Sheikh of Wad Fellata, © C. Bawa Yamba. West African Muslims in prayer, © K. H. Krieg. A Quranic school in Wad Fellata, © C. Bawa Yamba. The streets of Wad Fellata, © C. Bawa Yamba.

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

The field research on which this book is based was carried out in the Republic of Sudan between 1982 and 1994. It was made possible by a generous grant from SAREC (Swedish Agency for Research Co-operation with Developing Countries). I gratefully acknowledge this support. I am indebted to a great number of people for their assistance and wish to thank them all, but I can, alas, only mention a few names here. It was Pro­ fessors Gudrun Dahl and Anders Hjort af Ornäs who first suggested West African pilgrims as a suitable research topic for my Ph.D. thesis. I have benefited from this foresight and thank them. This book is a revised version of my thesis, which was presented to the University of Stockholm in 1990. Early encouragement and suggestions in formulating and elaborating the research topic came from Professor Ulf Hannerz, A. H. M. Kirk-Greene, Dr Paul Baxter, Dr G. A. Balamoan and Professor J. Zwennermann. Such early direction proved invaluable. Thanks are due to Professor Gudrun Dahl, the academic supervisor for my Ph.D. dissertation, for being by turn a hanging judge, a benign judge, but always a meticulous critic in her striving for consistency and clarity; and to Professor David Parkin who, having taught me anthropology ten years earlier, now consented to become the customary public examiner of my Ph.D. thesis. Issues and questions he raised during this public examination turned out to be invaluable, marking stones for me when it came to revising the manuscript for publication. Many of my former teachers, now colleagues and friends, have also contri­ buted to the development of the central arguments of the book, and aided my revision of the manuscript. Dr Susan Drunker-Brown, Professor Bruce Kapferer, Professor Sandy Robertson, Dr Ulla Wagner and Professor Sandra Wallman were always generous critics who read and commented on various versions of my chapters, enabling me to improve and, on occasion, immunise my arguments against potential assailants. I am most grateful to them for this.

xii

PERMANENT PILGRIMS

The task of revising the manuscript was carried out at IHCAR, Department of International Health Care Research, the Karolinska Institute, Sweden, where I had been appointed to a research fellowship. I wish to pay tribute to Professor Göran Sterky and the whole of IHCAR for a very stimulating and congenial atmosphere of inter-disciplinary discourse, where no taken-forgranted assumption of another’s discipline escapes assault, but requires a justifying and convincing argument in order to be accepted. Chapter 2, on the historical background to the migration of West Africans to Sudan, has improved a lot as a result of the keen interest of Dr Murray Last, who made invaluable corrections to many an inaccurate assertion, and introduced me to the complex field of modern Nigerian historiography, with its contesting interpretations on the causes and consequences of the region’s Islamic revolutions of the past century. I cannot thank him enough. A version of Chapter 6 was read at the 6th Colloquium on African Religion and Ritual at Satterthwaite. I am indebted to Professor Richard Werbner and members of that colloquium for many useful comments which improved my revision of the chapter. Thanks are also due to some anonymous readers who reviewed the book for the IAI, for correcting my scholarship and suggesting ways of improving the book. In Sudan I was affiliated to the University of Gezira, Wad Medani. I am indebted to the members of the department of Rural Development for their warm hospitality. Particularly, I wish to thank Dr Khalid Hagar, Pro­ fessor Robin Mills and his wife Helen, Mr Sid Ahmed Khedin and Mr Rashad Mohammed for making my fieldwork a memorable experience. The staff of the Oriental Library, Durham, gave me invaluable help when I spent time there going through the Sudan Archive. My research in Stockholm would not have progressed smoothly had I not had access to the library of Folkens Museum, and the assistance of Ms D. Fröland, the lib­ rarian, who was ever willing to help me secure books from other libraries. To my West African brothers and sisters in Sudan, without whom this book would not have been possible, I owe the greatest of debts. Specifically, Dr Ibrahim Mohammed Ibrahim, Sheikh Hajj Radwan, Haj Ishamael Me Goro, and many other malams who devoted countless hours of their valuable time to me, explaining what the pilgrimage meant to them, and interpreting their understanding of the Holy Quran. With such great support, one would expect this book to contain less shortcomings than it does. The imperfections that remain must be attributed to the fact that I have somehow sought to retain my own stamp on the text. I alone, therefore, am responsible for any deficiencies that remain. Finally, my greatest gratitude is to Kicki, who nursed our two boys while I was in the field and took care of our little Emily while I grappled with the writing of this book.

M ap 1: Hausaland in the nineteenth century.

M ap 2: Traditional pilgrim routes.

1 INTRODUCTION

THE PROBLEM AND ITS SETTING

Dotted across Sudan, from her dusty western borders to the salty waters of the Red Sea, are innumerable villages made of temporary structures - straw, cardboard, corrugated aluminium sheets and the like - in which Hausa rather than Arabic provides the language for daily intercourse. The inhabitants of these villages are at once the legacy and evidence of an on-going phenom­ enon: the traditional movement of Muslims from West Africa on their way to fulfil one of the principal injunctions of their faith, the pilgrimage to Mecca. Originating from countries all over West Africa but with a predomin­ ance of Northern Nigerians, these pilgrims tend to be fundamentalists by conviction who regard trudging eastwards along desert routes, with the great hardships such journeys entail, as the only proper way of performing the pilgrimage. Hence they tend to disparage their counterparts who travel by air: those who use swift, comfortable means of transport to Mecca cannot be true pilgrims. Their puritanical ideology appears to coincide with the fact that they belong overwhelmingly to the poorer classes. They would, however, regard the fact that most of their own members could not have afforded to travel by aeroplane, even if they had so desired, to be beside the point. They believe that since the pilgrimage to Mecca is one of the highest merits Muslims can attain, its pursuit must be made without consideration to the comforts of the flesh. A pilgrim must thus be prepared to endure any hardships encountered during the journey with Jobian equanimity. Suffering, by this view, is an intrinsic aspect of proper pilgrimage. Most of the inhabitants of the pilgrim villages in Sudan are third-, fourth-, even fifth-generation immigrants who have lived all their lives in Sudan, yet still regard themselves as being in transit. And not only do they define themselves as being on their way; to the outside observer, they live and act as if they were on the way. Their Sudanese hosts, too, accept this self­ ascription, commonly addressing them with the revered title of 'Haj', pilgrim.

2

PERMANENT PILGRIMS

One consequence of such views is that these pilgrims choose not to be encumbered by worldly goods that would, as it were, tie them down: they construct transient homes rather than build with bricks as their host does, and convert their earnings into ‘hard’ currency in anticipation of that day in the future when they will move on to Mecca. This category of West African immigrants, which comprises predominantly Hausa speakers, is the subject of this study. I must also emphasise that this category is to be differentiated from other categories of permanent West African settlers in Sudan, who do not reside in transitory camps and do not regard themselves as being on the pilgrimage (see, for example, Duffield 1981). A further distinction between the two categories of West African immigrants, which will become increasingly clear as we proceed, is that the permanently settled immigrants rarely acknowledge their West African ancestry, while the transi­ ents make their ancestry and Hausa culture the dominant organisational principles for their lives in Sudan. The Sudanese villages of these pilgrims are, in effect, liminal stations strung between home and Mecca, along a route emotionally charted with the graves of the beloved ones they have lost on their way. But although they reside permanently in these villages they still find it necessary, when asked, to include explanations in rational terms of why they have not yet reached Mecca. They might say, for example, that they lack the funds or are unable to acquire travelling documents to cross the Red Sea into Saudi Arabia; that they are indebted to some benefactor(s) in their adopted villages and are bound in webs of reciprocal relationships which are not so easily terminated. In addition to these, they might say that they are heeding the signs of inauspicious times and that their current state is merely a manifestation of God’s will. We can discern in the above description of the situation people living in what could be termed an extended state of liminality; not a ‘between and betwixt’ temporary construct, but one that persists as a permanent state. And we have groups who live in a time-space in the present, and yet conceive it in terms of a temporary station on the way towards an ultimate one, a destination at which they will most likely never physically arrive. How do we deal with these apparent inconsistencies? We could either assume that these people must have a rather peculiar notion of what it entails ‘to go on the pilgrimage to Mecca’; or that we are encountering an interesting contradiction between a given set of religious beliefs and the ensuing social action1 that holders of those beliefs pursue to fulfil their objectives. The former assumption cannot be correct because, as mentioned before, they themselves find it necessary to account for why they have not yet reached Mecca. Therefore, however much their own idea of pilgrimage diverges from the norm, they still share the concept of pilgrimage as prescribed in Islam. The latter assumption, of an inconsistency between belief and action,

INTRODUCTION

3

leads us inevitably to a consideration of the ontological basis of their beliefs and the practical actions that derive from those beliefs. When we turn our efforts in this direction, we naturally have to begin with questions pertaining to why they have stopped half-way in Sudan after having come this far, and why they do not continue the journey after a reasonable respite in their Sudanese villages. For example: would it do to argue that they stay on in Sudan because their migration was really an economically inspired one? Or are they perhaps honest pilgrims at heart who are constrained by circum­ stances beyond their control, so much so that they are unable to act sufficiently to achieve their defined objective? Issues derived from this second assumption, and the set of problems they raise, are my main concern here. The aim of this study, therefore, is to examine the role the Islamic pilgrimage to Mecca plays in the lives of West African immigrants in Sudan, and how these immigrants maintain and transmit beliefs in the utmost importance of the pilgrimage. I will argue that, tempered with cosmological ideas adapted in the new sociocultural context, these beliefs have led to a paradoxical conception and praxis of pilgrimage among the West Africans; a praxis which does not necessarily entail the expected spatio-temporal progres­ sion, but, if at all a progression, then one that is analogous to life itself. THE HAUSA ARE EVERYWHERE

Although Hausa make up only about 50 per cent of the West African pilgrims in Sudan, Hausa language and culture are the organisational prin­ ciples on which the pilgrim communities are based. But this is not surprising. Hausa culture is known to be remarkably resilient in places far away from Hausaland. The idea of the Hausa as being ‘everywhere’ is very common in West Africa. In Ghana around the early 1960s there was a joke to be heard among the admirable lorry drivers whose efforts through remote West African villages made travel and communications possible. Usually told in broken diaspora Hausa it went thus: Baa BaYorube, baa kobo; baa BaHause baa lafiya. Broadly translated it means: ‘Where you don’t find a Yoruba, there is not a penny to be made; where you don’t find a Hausa there is no peace to be had.’ If there is any truth in this saying there must be peace to be found in places as distant from Hausaland as Tripoli in North Africa, as far west as Guinea and as far east as Arabia. Ever since the chiefs of that loose conglomeration of tribes in Northern Nigeria were conquered by Fulani clerics and Islamised in the early decades of the 1800s, Hausa malams and merchants have traversed much of Africa, trading and/or spreading the word of the Quran. In Northern Nigeria the Fulani conquerors adopted Hausa language and culture as their own, while in other parts of West Africa they soon formed the organisational basis for stranger communities all over West Africa. These communities were located in areas known as ‘zongos’ and were usually found in towns with Muslim stranger-populations.

4

PERMANENT PILGRIMS

The Hausa language, too, became the root of the lingua franca the British colonial forces devised for native soldiers. Even in Arabia, when Ibn Saud’s forces attempted to capture Mecca in 1924-5 they found pilgrims, many of whom were Hausa, among the defenders of the city (Holden and Johns 1981: 85). If the Hausa are so widespread, why do they not define their diaspora stations in religious terms except in Sudan? How did this come about? The Republic of Sudan has a long history of immigration from the western parts of Africa. Traditionally these immigrations were associated with the Islamic pilgrimage to Mecca. Indeed, ever since the advent and spread of Islam to the region, the eastward route through the Sudan has been the most common one used by travellers trying to reach the religious centres of the Muslim faith.2 In the beginning, pilgrimages from West Africa were sporadic affairs, undertaken mainly by the better-off classes such as local chiefs, rich merchants and devout malams. But gradually, with the increased proselytisation of the masses, the Mecca pilgrimage became a common feature of West African Islam. These sporadic movements turned into mass popula­ tion movements around the turn of the last century. Three interconnected events served to bring about this transformation. First, a series of revolutions that swept through West Africa in the latter part of the nineteenth century, led by Muslim clerics who wanted to establish theocracies in the area (Smith 1961). Second, beliefs in an imminent End of Time, heralded by the appearance of the Mahdi, the saviour. And third, the coming of colonial rule to Northern Nigeria, and socioeconomic changes in the wake of colonial rule. In Hausaland, the revolutions of the nineteenth century culminated in the overthrow of the region’s Hausa rulers and the establishment of the Islamic theocracy known as the Sokoto Caliphate. Contrary to what might be ex­ pected, the establishment of the theocracy did not itself lead to an increase in the pilgrimage to Mecca. Indeed, the leaders of the Caliphate, none of whom undertook the pilgrimage, tried to redefine its relative merit in the range of activities demanded of believers. Consequently, they argued in some of their written works that remaining behind to fight local unbelievers was to be regarded at least as meritorious as - if not more than - going to Mecca.3 Yet the Sokoto Caliphate is important in that it sowed the seeds of a number of ideas and beliefs which later led to the large scale movements to the east. Beliefs in the impending appearance of the Mahdi who would precede the End of Time were common in West Africa during the nineteenth century. Not surprisingly West African Muslims readily accepted the Sudanese Mahdi as authentic, and several thousands left their homes for Omdurman to help him in his struggle against the British. The core supporters of the Mahdist regime were predominantly ‘Western’ so that the regime was often referred

INTRODUCTION

5

to as ‘Nass-al-gharib [Western countries men]’ (Balamoan 1976: 157). At this time Muslims in West Africa saw the appearance of the Mahdi as a partial fulfilment of the prophecy, the awaited End of Time being expected to follow in its wake. Finally, the coming of colonial rule, marked by the fall of the Sokoto Caliphate in 1903, directly resulted in tens of thousands of Northern Nigerians leaving their homes for the east. The conjunction of these events, then, was catalytic to mass population movements to Sudan. However, the last of these, colonial rule, is particularly important not only for ‘causing’ the migrations, but for sustaining them as well. Colonial rule brought about an improvement in the infrastructure of the colonialised areas thereby making travel comparatively easy; it also offered prospective pilgrims opportunities for working en route towards their continued journey. The early immigrants, who were predominantly Fulani, settled in the Nile valley and formed the nucleus of West African immigrants in the Sudan. The early groups of West African migrants have generally become assimil­ ated Sudanese and do not any more define themselves as pilgrims on their way. However, the migration of these earlier West African Muslims is relevant to this study in so far as it has served to perpetuate the traditional movement of pilgrims. Nonetheless, it is necessary to differentiate those who came at the turn of the century to escape colonial rule (or by the logic of their beliefs, to await the end of the world) from the latter-day pilgrims who came (and still come) in their wake and who live in pilgrim villages. The former category of West Africans have already been dealt with in a very interesting study (Duffield 1981). Except for scanty references in the literat­ ure, however, no detailed anthropological study of the latter category of West Africans exists. This latter category of West African immigrants, who regard themselves as pilgrims and reside in transient camps, are the subject of this study. West Africans living in Sudan are collectively referred to as ‘Fellata' (a term derived from a Kanuri word for Fulani). Possibly at one stage a term used for self-ascription by the early settlers, ‘Fellata' has undergone a transformation in meaning and is now regarded as derogatory by the West Africans.4 These days they prefer to be designated ‘Takari' (sing. Takruru or Tukruri) or ‘yan Nigeria’ (Nigerians). ‘Takari' is a generic term commonly used in the Middle East to describe West African Muslims (Al-Naqar 1972: 4). Though lacking the derogatory connotation of ‘Fellata', the criteria for inclusion under the ‘Takari' label are basically geographical. For my purpose I find none of these terms adequate to denote the West African groups in the Sudan who are the subject of this study. The groups I will be dealing with here, though they are Hausa speaking and have a form of Hausa social organisation, originate from places as diverse as Chad, Ghana and Mali. It seems to me, therefore, that the collective term ‘West African’ is adequate

6

PERMANENT PILGRIMS

enough to enclose all these groups. I thus prefer the term ‘West African’ to ‘Fellata' or its counter-active label ‘Takari' throughout this study. There are insufficient data on the number of West Africans in Sudan today. Estimates range from 900,000 to 3,000,000, depending on what type of data one uses.5 The groups who are the subject of this study, however, lived in six villages in the Gezira, all in close proximity to Wad Medani town. The sizes of the villages ranged from 300 to 5,000 inhabitants. ANTHROPOLOGISTS AND THE STUDY OF PILGRIMAGE

The study of pilgrimage confronts anthropologists with one of the funda­ mental methodological problems in the discipline: how to relate the specificity of our parochial objects of study to comprehensive and general statements of the kind that any scientific work demands. Pilgrimage seems very suitable for theoretical generalisation because the sacred spots, which are the focus of the visits, often attract people from different communities, regions and continents, who ‘seem to share cosmological features that transcend particular cultural and religious traditions’ (Sallnow 1988: 1). At the same time, each manifestation of pilgrimage derives its significance from its regional, historical or geographical specificity. The conclusions one draws or any statements one makes about one’s findings in any particular instance might easily be refuted by the counter-examples from studies by others. Because of the specificness of the phenomenon, any theoretical efforts at a generalising level in the study of pilgrimage is bound to run into difficulties (Bowman 1986). Despite such difficulties, one would still have thought that the study of pilgrimage would particularly attract anthropologists. In the global religions any specific manifestation of pilgrimage ought to enhance rather than inhibit generalisation. The Islamic pilgrimage to Mecca, for instance, has a global distribution, attracting worshippers from all races, all of whom are united during the pilgrimage, and seemingly all in pursuit of the same goal. Similarly the pilgrims one is likely to encounter in St Peter’s Square in Rome, or in the streets of Jerusalem, come from all continents and belong to all races. The theme of pilgrimage further contains the sort of ingredients that appeal to anthropologists: the formation of processual units (some of which solidify into communities), the production of religious ideology and commitment, the poss­ ibilities for fascinating analytical constructs of time and space, etc. Thus, I try to show in Chapter 3, for instance, that the pilgrims possess two complement­ ary, sometimes even contradictory, notions of space. In one sense, space is seen as relating to and defined by its geographical proximity to Mecca, which gets increasingly holy as pilgrims draw near. In another sense space is defined by another source of holiness derived from the baraka, grace, of sheikhs (each of whom is more holy and has more baraka than the previous one) whose villages are the targets of immigration from other villages.

INTRODUCTION

7

The potential for analytical innovation notwithstanding, one finds that of the voluminous literature relating to pilgrimage, few actually deal with the sociological aspects of pilgrimage as a central theme and fewer still are by anthropologists. The works of geographers, historians and theologians still predominate. Primarily interested in the spatial aspects of population move­ ments, geographers often include in their works details of such movements as well as of the evolution of various pilgrimage centres and towns. Such works are an invaluable resource to the anthropologist (e.g. King 1972; Birks 1978). In a similar manner historians and theologians seem primarily more interested in the historical development of particular pilgrimages than in analysing pilgrimages as contemporary social processes (cf. Sumption 1975; Works 1976).6 A little over a decade ago Sallnow (1981), in a paper on Andean pilgrimages, could observe that anthropological contributions to the study of pilgrimages were, with the marked exception of Victor Turner’s works, almost non­ existent. Today the picture, alas, remains largely unchanged, not because works on pilgrimage by anthropologists are lacking but rather because much of what they have written has not been theoretically very innovative. There are only a few exceptions, about which I will say something in a moment. I shall not attempt to provide a detailed coverage of anthropological works on pilgrimage; this has already been done by Morinis (1984, see particularly his Chapter 8). I shall instead confine my discussion to some few aspects and themes in the study of pilgrimages that are relevant to my own specific problem. One of the earlier anthropological ventures into the theme of pilgrimage was Dobyns’ (1960) study of what he termed ‘religious festivals’. He saw these as, in several ways, fulfilling the same functions as pilgrimages. Religious festivals involve ‘as is the case with pilgrimages’ the sacralisation of particular spots which attract visits and veneration of devotees from across a wide area. Dobyns divides religious festivals into a typology of four, beginning with the most local ones and ending with global forms. He proposes the following types: (a) the locality festival (b) the area festival (c) the regional cult, and (d) the community-wide cult. As conveyed in their names, locality festivals occur locally, attracting worship­ pers from the village level, whereas the area festival, correspondingly, draws from a given area of wider compass than the village, and so on. What we have are increasing levels of incorporation and inclusion, leading ultimately to the great world religions, the ‘community-wide’ cults, to use Dobyns terminology. To find an analytic framework to deal with his data, Dobyns turns to Robert Redfield’s concepts of little and great traditions. The visiting

8

PERMANENT PILGRIMS

of the holy spots and taking part in these festivals serve to create functional linkages between the elite guardians of the great traditions and the members of local communities (Dobyns 1960: 88). Thus a community-wide cult, such as, the Islamic pilgrimage to Mecca, might be seen as serving to integrate local areas, regions and, ultimately, the world into one global religious whole. Pilgrimage, therefore, is one of the ways through which the little and great traditions engage in a dialectical relationship with each other. A number of anthropologists have chosen to pitch their studies of pilgrimage at phenomena of the middle range (i.e. Marx 1977; Eickelman 1976), at what Werbner has termed ‘regional cults’ (1977: ix), thereby seeming to endorse the approach of Dobyns’ pioneering study. By and large, Dobyns’ theoretical framework could be said to have had little appeal to anthropolo­ gists. However, it is essentially the same framework that Ahmed Beita Yusuf (1975) suggests as a suitable complement to the Turnerian concepts of ‘structure and communitas’ for the analysis of the Islamic pilgrimage. Thus Ahmed Beita Yusuf would have us see Mecca and Medina as equivalent to the centres of the ‘great traditions’, while the areas of origin of the pilgrims who visit these places correspond to the ‘little traditions’. From the centres of the great tradition ideas, religious practices and material goods emanate, the circulation of which serves to reinforce the Muslim community, umma (Ahmed Beita Yusuf 1975: 5). We can rightly infer from these brief references that anthropological works with pilgrimage as their central theme are few and far between. Victor Turner, whose works are still predominant in this field, himself once imputed the lack of attraction of the phenomenon of pilgrimage for anthropo­ logists to difficulties in approaching it with traditional anthropological methods of study (Turner 1974). He conjectured that anthropologists feel more comfortable dealing with geographically stable and easily delimited social entities located in time and space, than in following processual units with no clearly defined structures (Turner and Turner 1978: 187). A little over a decade later we find other anthropologists (see, for example, Bowman 1988) expressing a somewhat similar view. Bowman, as mentioned earlier, further emphasises the inherent difficulty of adequately addressing both the particularities of pilgrimages, on the one hand, and their transcendental/general aspects as social phenomena on the other. The points both Turner and Bowman make concerning pilgrimage as an object of study, and on its intractable relation to anthropology in general, may well reflect a problem that was once true of the state of the discipline. The situation is different these days. Anthropology has certainly come a long way since its early ‘slice and study’ days, when any new graduate student could simply pick an ethnographically uncharted area (or group) off the map to deal with. Nowadays academic departments of anthropology and agencies which fund research, demand research proposals focusing on ‘prob-

INTRODUCTION

9

lems’ rather than, say, on tribes. It is not, therefore, only the difficulty of dealing with units with no clear structures that has kept anthropologists away from pilgrimages; so why then have they generally balked at the study of pilgrimages? I will myself hazard the following reason: because anthropolo­ gists who embark on the study of pilgrimage almost all start out debating with the pronouncements of Victor Turner, whose framework they invariably employ as a point of departure, but beyond whose initial formulations and questions they never venture. Consequently, one finds that the most interest­ ing studies of pilgrimage are those which reject or ignore the Turnerian model and instead go on to do their own thing, so to speak (e.g. Eickelman 1976; Morinis 1984; Sallnow 1987). The problem of the anthropologist, therefore, arises from inhibitions derived from Turner himself, whose own varied and complex pronouncements on pilgrimage provide what amounts to an uncomfortable yardstick for every prospective analysis of the phenom­ enon. The best anyone who starts on the study of pilgrimage can do, is to hope that the novelty of one’s ethnography will come to the rescue. Hiding behind one’s own ethnography, so to speak, may be a common enough anthropological propensity, but it is one that happens to be most acute when one deals with pilgrimage. But what is it in Turner that is so inhibiting? It seems to me it is that seminal, if rather overworked, model of‘structure’ and ‘anti-structure’ which most anthropologists who embark on the study of pilgrimage inevitably adopt as the main theoretical model for their analysis. Consequently, visits to holy places are seen as constituting rites of passage, marking a symbolic transition from one social state to another, as Turner expresses it: ‘the temporal structure of the pilgrimage process beginning in a Familiar Place, going to a Far Place, and returning ideally “changed”, to a Familiar Place can be interestingly related to van Gennep’s concept of the rite of passage, with its stages of separation, margin or limen and reaggregation’ (1973: 213). Turner thus viewed pilgrimages in what might be termed a Bunyanian perspective. Like Christian in Bunyan’s allegorical classic, pilgrims are per­ ceived as physically progressing through time and space towards some ultimate holy spot. The anthropologist, of course, tackles all aspects of this progression, but concentrates, above all, on how the progression towards the object of the pilgrims’ quest or their goal results in a destructuring in the field of social relationships between the pursuants of the pilgrimage. As pilgrims approach their goal, the destructuring that occurs brings with it a correspond­ ing increase in ‘communitas’, a state of affairs induced by the cosmic force of the Holy Spot(s) towards which (and into whose orbits) the pilgrims are inexorably drawn. With such a perspective the central attribute of pilgrimage is that of the levelling effects of liminality: that cut-out point in time, which Turner describes as ‘a state in which the structural view of time is not applicable’ (1974: 238), during which pilgrims shed their secular differences

10

PERMANENT PILGRIMS

and, as it were, stand naked before a mightier force. In the Bunyanian model, pilgrimages, like rituals, are in essence parentheses between structured phases in daily life. Turner himself employed the above framework in his study of Christian pilgrimage (see Turner and Turner 1978). Now, the ‘structure and com­ munitas’ model, with its vast potential as a tool for the analysis of social phenomena, is very suitable for the study of pilgrims, who constitute tempor­ ary (and ephemeral) groupings which coalesce to travel together, perhaps not to have any contact with each other once they have attained their goal and returned to their former lives. Pilgrims embarking on a pilgrimage are certainly one such temporary grouping. But as I will make clear in the course of this study, not all pilgrimages are amenable to this model. Indeed, one distinguishing feature of the pilgrimage dealt with in this study is that it seldom entails a geographical progression towards the object of the quest. Because of this absence of a spatio-temporal movement towards an ultimate holy spot, it is not enough to examine changes that can occur in structural relationships in increasing proximity to that spot. The Bunyanian perspective of Turner’s can thus fruitfully be only one aspect in the analysis of pilgrimage. Turner’s writings on pilgrimage are expounded in a number of writings (see Turner 1969; 1973; 1974; 1978) in formulations so rich and so complex that it is difficult to pinpoint one clear statement as exemplifying them (without being able to find within the same text some statement that could be interpreted as a counter-assertion). The following, however, seems a fair outline of his main perspective: As with the liminality of initiation rites, such an actor-pilgrim is con­ fronted by sequences of sacred objects and participates in symbolic activities which he believes are efficacious in changing his inner and, sometimes, hopefully, outer condition from sin to grace, or sickness to health ... As we have seen, in the pilgrim’s movement toward ‘the holy of holies’ the central shrine, as he progresses, the route becomes increasingly sacralised. At first, it is his subjective mode of penitence that is important while the many long miles he covers are mainly secular, everyday miles, then sacred symbols begin to invest the route, while in the final stages the route itself becomes sacred, ... No longer is the pilgrim’s sense of the sacred private; it is a matter of objectified, collective representations which become virtually his whole environment and give him powerful motives for credence. Not only that, but the pilgrims whole journey becomes a paradigm for other kinds of behaviour - ethical, political, and other. (Turner 1974: 197-8, my emphasis)

Turner’s model of pilgrimage, as outlined here, has two key aspects. The first is the relation of pilgrims to an ultimate (geographically defined) spot (which they regard as holy). The second is the relations between pilgrims

INTRODUCTION

11

themselves as they draw closer to that spot. Underlying these two aspects is the assumption that although the quest for pilgrimage is a voluntary individual affair, its actual achievement occurs mainly in conjunction with social others, since pilgrimages often occur in religiously determined seasons and at particu­ lar dates. The proximity to the goal, the ‘holy of holies’ (Turner 1974 loc. cit.), affects the interaction of co-pilgrims as well as their outlook on life. It is mainly these tenets that have led to the preoccupation with analysis in terms of ‘structure and communitas’. Although this is still a common model for an anthropological analysis of pilgrimage, some anthropologists have increasingly began to question its usefulness (see Messerschmidt and Sharma 1981; Werbner 1977; Sallnow 1981 and 1988). Sallnow, for example, in his study of pilgrimage in the Andes, found cleavages along economic and ethnic lines so common among the pilgrims that he was led to the view that: ‘If communitas is the ultimate goal of pilgrimage, then for the pilgrims of the Andes a plethora of divisions and interferences contrived to frustrate its realisation, sometimes in an appar­ ently gratuitous fashion’ (Sallnow 1981: 176). It was clear from his data that despite the uniform sanctity of the shrines to which the pilgrims were drawn, there appeared to be nothing to show that the pilgrims themselves strove after any degree of interpersonal inclusiveness as a structureless group. His inevitable conclusion was that the concept of communitas was ‘dispensable for an understanding of [pilgrimages] and that it in fact tends to inhibit an appreciation of the contradictions and emergent processes in Andean regional devotions’ (Sallnow 1981: 164). In the present study, to present the pilgrims as lacking structured relation­ ships would be to misrepresent the data. Pilgrim villages in Port Sudan are no less structured than those in the Gezira, although the former is closer to Mecca. Nor do the pilgrims in the Gezira conceive of their villages as any less imbued with sacred symbols. To conceive of pilgrimages mainly as manifestations of ‘anti-structure’ is thus not very satisfactory. On the other hand, ‘structure’ and ‘anti-structure’, like all concepts, are relative and meaningful in some conceptual scheme of sorts. The West Africans pilgrims may well be conceived as being anti-structural to the structures through which they move and within which they live (there being always anti­ structure within structure as is implicitly logical in Turner’s treatment of these concepts). Such is the case in Sudan where sometimes prevailing local ideas regard the ‘anti-structural’ proclivities of the pilgrims as manifestations of holiness, thereby legitimating behaviour that would normally not be tolerated. A clear example of this is the case of begging which is forbidden by law, and yet ‘permitted’ for pilgrims (see Chapter 4). ‘Structure and communitas’ in the case of these pilgrims do not therefore merely derive meaning in terms of the proximate relation of pilgrims to the immanence of any geographic spot. As mentioned before in passing - and this will be

12

PERMANENT PILGRIMS

made clear in Chapter 3 - the pilgrims sometimes move from one village to another, describing each immigration as corresponding to the attainment of a higher degree of holiness, irrespective of how geographically close to Mecca the villages of immigration are. It is necessary to point out, however, that despite my misgivings about Turner’s model, my own efforts must be seen as logically derived from his idea that pilgrimage can become a paradigm for life. Viewed from such a perspective pilgrimage must be regarded not as something that occurs outside of life daily lived, breaking its regular flow, but rather as something that is part of everyday life itself. Unfortunately, this was a notion that Turner neither expanded on, nor indeed pursued. METAPHYSICAL AND PRAGMATIC VIEWS IN SOCIAL EXPLANATION

‘Anthropologists,’ writes Joanna Overing in her introduction to the volume Reason and Morality, ‘ask questions about moral universes, their basic duty being to understand the intentions and objectives of actors within particular social worlds, as well as what these actors say, understand, believe truth and those worlds to be, a task in metaphysical description’ (Overing 1985: 4, emphasis in the original). I am inclined to agree with this view of the anthropologists’ task: in general, the core problems of social anthropology and, indeed, most of its more interesting assumptions, are dauntingly meta­ physical (cf. Jarvie 1984: 13-14).7 It seems to me, however, that the position of anthropologists on this issue of ‘metaphysical description’ is not very clear. How do we elicit such data, and how do we proceed to work out descriptions or explanations based on the metaphysics of others? Obviously, the important thing is how we stand towards what we regard as ‘the meta­ physics of others’. What should the attitude of the anthropologist be, whose informants state positively that the prevailing state of affairs in which they find themselves is a manifestation of God’s will, even to the extent of attributing causal agency to that will? Should the anthropologist, who presum­ ably has a different metaphysical heritage, reject such an explanation or should he proceed to translate assertions of this kind so as to render them comprehensible to the members of his own cultural universe? Attitudes on this issue range from those who would elicit such data and render charitable translations of alien thought systems (even retaining their metaphysical idio­ syncrasies), to those who would avoid following up metaphysical statements of informants altogether. When trying to account for why they have not yet reached Mecca, the pilgrims start with what I will term mechanistic/materialist explanations and end with metaphysical explanations. By mechanistic/materialist explanation in this context I mean explanations which proceed by citing empirical accounts that follow a logic of easily understood cause and effect of practical constraints. For example, when a pilgrim says that debts and his inability to secure a

INTRODUCTION

13

passport have made his movement to Mecca impossible, this is a mechanistic/materialist explanation in my usage. By metaphysical explanations, how­ ever, I refer to explanations that attempt to account for questions that come after (and, indeed, go beyond) verifiable facts about life and man’s place in it. Usually, these are important questions that are not easily or adequately addressed by empirical evidence alone; they belong to the class of issues that concern and affirm ‘the ultimate reality of things’ (Eliade 1954: 3) implying in effect ‘a metaphysical position’ (loc. cit.). If, therefore, a pilgrim says that his present state is a manifestation of God’s will, as is his inability to proceed to Mecca, this is a metaphysical explanation according to my usage. It is clear that an important criterion for what might be termed metaphysical explanations, therefore, is that they provide answers to existential questions that are not easily falsified by reference to external fact(s) (cf. Popper 1963: 275ff.). Such explanations are akin to what Collingwood (1940) has termed ‘absolute presuppositions’; they underlie thought and the thinking of people about their world. They include accounts of an ontological nature, such as, for example, those concerning beliefs in the inevitability of divine design and its determining role in the affairs of man; what the members of a given group see as being of ultimate importance in life; etc. Thus, explanations addressing the religious precepts or the moral rules of other societies fall under metaphysical issues. It is necessary at this juncture to emphasise two fundamental points before we proceed. 1. Recognising the importance of metaphysical accounts of actors in their efforts to explain the reality of their worlds need not commit us to a relativist position that entails the acceptance of any tenet of their explanation as context-bound and therefore, beyond reproach. We may sometimes encounter certain forms of cultural praxis - for example, ritual initiations, female and male circumcision with unsterilised instru­ ments, etc., certainly harmful for their practitioners - which are explained away in metaphysical terms. We may find such practices objectionable. More important anthropologically, however, is a recogni­ tion of the fact that the very persistence of these practices in any society raises questions which belong to the metaphysical realm of discourse. 2. Hence the further fact that metaphysical explanations must ultimately be judged in terms of their consistency or inconsistency with the logic of a given thought system, or with the ethnographic context from which they are extracted. In other words, whether they stand or fall depends on the structure of the explanation the anthropologist advances. Metaphysical explanations may be advanced by those we study to answer existential questions; but for the anthropologist they can come into question only after mechanistic/materialist accounts have been offered and shown to

14

PERMANENT PILGRIMS

be wanting in their explanatory force. I have made these points because it is not clear to me that anthropologists, who are normally empiricists by inclina­ tion, would accept the necessity of pursuing what I have termed metaphysical explanations. For some anthropologists, explanations that are not materialist fall under rational and irrational terms of reference. Others present interpreta­ tions of alien metaphysical systems to make them comprehensible to the members of the anthropologists’ own universe of discourse. The earlier Leach, in his study of the Kachin, belongs to the former category of anthropo­ logists, while Evans-Pritchard in his studies of the Azande and the Nuer belongs clearly to the latter. Since I am sympathetic to the latter category, let me show why I reject the former. The now familiar statement (see Gell­ ner 1973: 37; MacIntyre 1977: 70) by the earlier Leach (1954: 14), perhaps best illustrates what might be representative of an attitude shared, I should think, by many anthropologists towards metaphysical issues. ‘How­ ever abstract my presentations, my concern is always with the material world of observable human behaviour, never with metaphysics or systems of ideas as such.’ Earlier on the same page Leach exemplifies his approach: ‘if I see a Kachin killing a pig and I ask him what he is doing and he says nat jaw nngai - “I am giving to the nats”, this statement is simply a description of what he is doing and it will be nonsense to ask such questions as: “Do nats have legs? Do they eat flesh? Do they live in the sky?”’ One might wonder to what extent these views expressed by Leach are representative for anthropo­ logy. There is no doubt, however, that the late Sir Edmund Leach remains a major figure in social anthropology, possessing as he did that rare and laudable facility to express, in no uncertain terms, much that became a paradigmatic programme for analysis in the discipline.8 Let us return to the position as held above by Leach. The performance of a sequence of observable acts constituting ‘killing a pig’, conveyed clearly enough a description of what the Kachin was doing. However, Leach deemed it necessary to elicit an answer to something that he already knew, and received an answer that imparted information which went beyond what he was observing. And yet he would bar any further query as to whether nats eat flesh. If Leach cannot allow for such questions as to whether nats live in the sky or eat flesh, then what was the purpose of asking his initial question ‘what are you doing?’ when he saw the Kachin ‘killing a pig’. My own point of view is that anthropologists need not stop at statements they elicit from what they can observe. The data from which we construct our explanations should include the actors’ own metaphysical statements on why a given state of affairs prevails, or, in this specific instance, on whether or not nats have legs or can fly; whether or not some coherent and specific set of ideas underlay this conception and how this might be seen as shaping Kachin response to reality. Data of this kind are certainly part of reality as conceived by those we study. Obviously when an anthropologist refuses to go beyond

INTRODUCTION

15

(initial) emic descriptions of observed action, he cannot escape the charge that his disinterest is grounded in the fact that he regards the Others’ theories about why they are doing what they are doing as incorrect. In the course of this study, I will also be addressing questions of an extraempirical kind, pertaining to a conception of reality as perceived by these pilgrims. Leach’s stand on this issue seems to me similar to one which might hold that if the pilgrims say it is ‘God’s will’ which keeps them from reaching Mecca, it would be nonsense to ask ‘How does God’s will accomplish this?’ or nonsense to try to account for the ‘system of ideas’ underlying their notion of ‘God’s will’, particularly its manifestation and its relationship to social action. It is clear, however, that if we are dealing with action or behaviour derived from beliefs, then questions pertaining to the social contexts in which those beliefs occur, and their postulated relation to action in the world, should be a necessary part of our analysis. I am not suggesting that the anthropologists explain social action by themselves advancing meta­ physical explanations such as destiny, the agency of witchcraft, etc.; I am merely saying that we should pursue actors’ accounts of these if they have bearing on ontological issues such as those with which I am concerned. The pilgrims are prone to cite empirical reasons for being unable to move beyond their villages towards Mecca, and append these with a reference to ‘God’s will’, which they regard as the ultimate force determining and influencing the state of affairs. As will become clear, ‘God’s will’ for them encompasses both what Mandelbaum (1966) regards as ‘pragmatic and transcendental’ aspects of life. For the sake of analysis, however, I find it expedient to start by examining pragmatic and empirical levels of explanation, and only when they do not satisfactorily address the central questions raised in the analysis do I examine the metaphysical issues raised by the pilgrims’ own accounts. Explanations which only choose to examine materialist and pragmatic aspects of phenomena seem to me to reflect a position close to that which Gellner has labelled ‘sociological materialism’, which he juxtaposes to ‘ideal­ ism’ (1973: 123). My usage of metaphysical explanation is predicated on a similar conceptual contrast between ‘materialist’ and ‘idealist’ attempts to explain social phenomena. Suppose, for instance, that the former perspective alone were applied to the question of why the pilgrims are stuck in Sudan. From this we might find ourselves easily led to the conclusion that these pilgrims are unable to act sufficiently to achieve their objective of reaching Mecca. Alternatively, we might regard their migration as possibly motivated by some other more easily understood materialist incentives, thus the prevail­ ing result of their efforts. Either of these conclusions would entail an implicit rejection of their own account of why they are still in the Sudan (which was, as maintained before, that their stay was ultimately caused by the will of God).

16

PERMANENT PILGRIMS

Mechanical and pragmatic accounts alone cannot sufficiently explain appar­ ent inconsistencies between belief and action as is the case here. Certainly, economic factors, for example, must have weighed significantly in the whole process of the migration of these pilgrims: their decision to leave home, from the journey’s start to the present stage, and their current rut. Such factors, however, must be considered in conjunction with others that are non-economic and non-mechanical, if we are to seek an explanation of why they are still in Sudan. Furthermore, rejecting their own explanations would leave us grappling with why pilgrimage for them has become essentially a paradigm for daily life, rather than a physical progression towards the ultimate spot (in the future). We need, therefore, to explore their total situation, which must include the examination of metaphysical statements of the kind Leach eschews in order to better understand the particularity of their notion of pilgrimage, how they are able to transmit its essence from generation to generation, and how those beliefs have themselves become in effect a subcul­ ture that generates a self-identity as pilgrims on their way.

WHAT MAKES MEN TICK: SOME ANTHROPOLOGICAL APPROACHES TO THE ANALYSIS OF THOUGHT AND ACTION

The main problem of this study can also be framed in the following manner: given that these pilgrims share the traditional concept of pilgrimage, which entails a journey from one place to another, why do they live on in the Sudan and yet still define themselves as being on a journey? I will tackle this problem by examining the role and scope of the social actions that emanate from the beliefs of these pilgrims; actions that ensue from the motives and goals they have defined on the basis of their religious beliefs. By motive, I largely follow Weber’s usage of the term: as a complex of inter-subjective meaning which both the actor and the observer - to whom, presumably, the reason for a particular conduct has been given - regard as a sufficient account for the execution of that particular conduct (Weber 1947: 98-9). From the sense of this usage, it follows that any questions we can address to an hypothetical actor on the reason for acting in a given manner, and the answers or ‘accounts’ the acting agent gives in explanation - or as the purpose for acting - are themselves socially constituted. This means, therefore, that in order to understand the motives of other people (or to be able to impute motives to them at all) we must examine the social contexts within which such motives are embedded, just as we have to examine the social action that is carried out in the wake of particular motives. We know that even the subjective motives of individuals are themselves subject to the constraint and influence of imposing structures outside the individual. There­ fore, social actions that emanate in any society must be seen as deriving from a dialectical interplay of several factors: individual propensity, institu­

INTRODUCTION

17

tional contexts, and cultural/conceptual notions of the spheres of possibility and achievement. We may perhaps not be sufficiently equipped to do so, but some analysis of such factors must be attempted before we can claim that action and its results - in a given case - fall short of the professed aim or motive that ‘caused’ that action.9 There are two important assumptions underlying anthropological methodo­ logy in general, which might be stated as follows. First, anthropologists need not be of a Weberian bent to accept the view that one of the basic units of observation in their discipline is social action (cf. Feinberg 1979: 543). Second, it is necessary to state the obvious fact that social action is socially meaningful by virtue of some social matrix in which it is embedded. The prerequisite for that meaningfulness, then, is that the perpetrators of social actions share cognitive maps (which serve both as a basis for defining and for delimiting that group). It seems to me, therefore, that the very procedure of identifying and delimiting any group for research by the anthro­ pologist is, in effect, an ontological commitment of some sort, since it attributes a distinct form of being to that group as opposed to other groups. The ontological commitment, then, is a basic point of departure for the anthropologist. Now, the members of a given society may state to the anthropologist that they have a distinct set of beliefs, which entails, for example, that they sometimes say they are slaughtering sheep for the ancestors, or giving pigs to the nats, or that they consider their twins to be birds. What they do is assail us with verbal statements, which belong to the linguistic domain. In order to deal properly with such statements we must relate them to our observation and analysis of the social action which members of that society, who share a particular set of beliefs, provide us with. Where the statements we collect are verbal with no associative action to observe, we use language as datum, thereby arriving at, or inferring, social action by way of the cognitive map(s) we attribute to the group we are studying. (How else do we delimit a cultural ‘group’?) Presumably, these are maps which both define and prescribe what type of action is culturally appropriate to that group. However, even by such a reverse route, that is, studying action by way of postulated cognitive maps, it is still through the resultant action that we have the key to any inferences we can make as to what mental pictures of reality the group possesses. It is through the observation of action that we can infer beliefs: as MacIntyre tells us, ‘actions may be said to express beliefs’ (1977: 51). It is always necessary, therefore, to examine how social action is induced and rendered socially meaningful within the structural contexts of which it is embedded. In the case of the pilgrims, therefore, it is only through the action of going to Mecca that we can infer their belief in the utmost importance of pilgrimage. How have anthropologists dealt with this relationship between thought

18

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and action? This is a rather difficult issue. It appears that anthropologists are generally rather wary of making any categorical - or indeed any clear statements, such as that a given thought, a precept or symbol produces such and such action. Yet the presupposition of causal interconnections between institutions and activities is, perhaps, the main distinguishing characteristic of the anthropological perspective. Indeed, a similar idea is incapsulated in our very notion of ‘the social system’. We anthropologists may react sceptically to causal statements of the kind that hold that a given group pursues a given symbolic action because of a given precept, but we cannot avoid making causal statements altogether, if we are to try to relate the beliefs of a given group to how they act culturally. This is because the ontological commitment, whereby we postulate the existence of a distinct social entity as our basic point of departure, further requires statements about what is distinctive of that entity in relation to others, and, as argued above, such statements must pertain to the action of people. The ontology of being cannot stop short of the action of such being in the world, since ‘being’ without ‘acting’ must surely result in the extinction of that being. It follows, therefore, when we delineate and categorise a collectivity of people a ‘group’, ‘tribe’, or ‘class’, as opposed to other such entities, we implicitly impute a particular thought­ system to those people, or (in addition to) some other characteristics as a criterion for demarcation, doing so under the assumption that they share some distinguishing traits distinct from other collectivities of human beings. Their action in this world is therefore datum and must be the subject of analysis. In trying to relate the thought of a given group to their action, we are further faced with the problematics of accounting for how such and such a concept, precept, or more broadly, symbol, leads to a given result. The main stumbling block is that even goal-directed action (mediated by various categories, i.e. cultural norms and symbols as vehicles for the achievement of given ends) can lead to consequences that were not envisaged. This is ‘the unintended repercussions of social action’ which Popper would see as the proper explanatory task for social sciences (1959: 282). As we shall see, the pilgrims in this study spend their whole lives trying to reach Mecca, spurred on by their beliefs, and yet are unable to do so. There is here the case of a disparity between belief and motives on the one hand, and social action that falls short of its desired end on the other. It is, perhaps, this kind of disparity that makes anthropologists wary about making any clear statements about the relation between thought and action. This is, however, a problem that I cannot sidestep, since I must account for why the pilgrims pursue the singular action of ‘going on the pilgrimage to Mecca’ and yet do not seem to do so. The ontological commitment of the anthropologist has other epistemolo­ gical implications worth noting. Take some of the basic concepts and cat-

INTRODUCTION

19

egories we use in the social sciences such as ‘Culture' and ‘Society’, for example. They presuppose both conceptual criteria for demarcation of such phenomena and how the demarcation itself is arrived at. We sometimes speak of or write of ‘Hausa culture’, ‘Asante society’, etc. as if these were unproblematical, clearly defined entities. We do not as a rule feel called upon to legitimate how we have arrived at the demarcating of such entities. This is presumably because it would be very difficult, if not impossible, to do so. Thus, we occasionally start by postulating the interrelation between distinct structures of thought and their manifestations in this world by speaking in terms of the ‘key symbols’ of such and such a group, the ‘subculture of x’, etc. Such concepts then provide the criteria for demarcating and lumping together one collectivity of people as distinct from another. It is not surprising, therefore, that one area where anthropologists come near to making clear statements on how thought relates to action is in works that deal explicitly with what we gloss as symbols in a given society, and social action or between concepts and action. As clearly stated by Turner (1964), ‘Symbols,. . . produce action, and dominant symbols tend to become focuses of interaction.’ I use the word gloss deliberately. Though one of the most common words in anthropology, symbol is also one of the woolliest. As Ortner has noted: ‘Anything by definition can be a symbol, i.e. a vehicle for cultural meaning’ (Ortner 1973).10 The meaningful usage of this word ranges from a denotative label for tangible entities, on the one hand, to a connotative application to immaterials such as abstract concepts, on the other, upon which is superim­ posed the notion of conative power (Cohen 1974b), or of an ‘emotional charge’ (Firth 1973: 16), that can impel humans to act.11 Of course, one cannot pretend that there is a consensus among anthropologists on the ‘use’ and role of symbols in social life. But efforts in this direction might easily be arranged along a continuum between two distinct views on the function of symbols. At the one end, the assumption is that each society has certain key terms, the grasp by the fieldworker of which is a prerequisite to an understanding of that society (implicit here is the notion that the action of these people in and upon the world derives its distinction from their key symbols). At the other end, the assumption holds that symbols have structures of connativity, saturated with emotion-creating mechanisms, thus impelling humans to act. (Again the implicit predication of a distinct action in the world, although first and foremost is the fact that symbols are seen as catalytic to action.) The former assumption might be termed the Weak Form of symbol-action theory; the latter the Strong Form. The two forms of symbol theory contain an implicit view that the symbols which are charac­ teristic of any given group have, first and foremost, to use Ortner’s (1973) terms, ‘a summarizing, and/or elaborating’ effect, thereby providing the institutional framework within which those symbols derive their meaning. I

20

PERMANENT PILGRIMS

think generally most anthropologists would accept the Weak Form version of symbol-action theory as stated by Evans-Pritchard:

To understand a people’s thought one has to think in their symbols . . . in learning the language one learns the culture and the social system which are conceptualised in the language. Every kind of social relation­ ship, every belief, every sociological process ... is expressed in words as in action . . . I may add that, as every experienced fieldworker knows, the most difficult task in anthropological fieldwork is to determine the meaning of a few key words, upon which an understanding and the whole investigation depends. (Evans-Pritchard 1951: 79-80)

Symbol theory of the Strong Form, however, does not merely postulate a relation of thought and action by way of ‘meaning’ but makes the claim of a catalytic relation between the two. This is clear from the following statement by Abner Cohen, one of the clearest exponents of this perspective: ‘By symbols I mean normative forms that stand ambiguously for a multiplicity of meanings, evoke emotions and impel men to action’ (Cohen 1977: 117). Elsewhere, Cohen makes an explicit contrast between symbol and sign, by pointing out that the latter need not carry any ambiguous messages while the former often does.12 For example, a road sign - of a given convention and context - indicating the figure ‘70’ means, and can only mean, that the allowed speed limit to all motorists who pass the sign is 70 miles per hour. Symbols, however, have no such clear messages, as well as the fact that they have a capacity to evoke emotion. Cohen further qualifies the difference between a symbol and sign as ‘a matter of degree, depending on the density of different and disparate meanings that it connotes, on the intensity of feeling that it evokes, and its action impelling properties. This variation in degree can be described as potent' (1974a: 24, my emphasis). Cohen’s notion of symbols requires the analysis of the structures in which their potency lies (see, for example, 1969). Thus, symbols and custom are more or less treated as the same thing. Indeed, Cohen sometimes writes of symbols as if they are able to achieve their catalytic functions because of some intrinsic properties of the symbols themselves. Between these two forms of theory, concerned particularly with how symbols are related to social action, and in a class by itself, is the work of Clifford Geertz, who might sometimes be seen as stating one or both of these two positions depending on how one reads him (see particularly Geertz 1968; 1973). Culture for Geertz ‘denotes an historically transmitted pattern of meanings embodied in symbols, a system of inherited conceptions expressed in symbolic forms by means of which men communicate, perpetuate and develop their knowledge about and attitudes toward life’ (1973: 89). He

INTRODUCTION

21

notes that ‘cultural patterns have an intrinsic double aspect: they give mean­ ing, that is, objective conceptual form, to social and psychological reality both by shaping themselves to it and by shaping it to themselves’ (1973: 93). This double aspect enables humans to construct a model of reality as they perceive it, and a model for reality as they live it. In his early pronouncements on the role of religion in social life,13 Geertz could be interpreted as saying that symbols cause action in social life. In the Geertzian perspective the strength of religious symbols lies in their ability to synthesise the world view of a people (the what there is), and their ethos (one might say the ideological precepts and imperatives of what are culturally appropriate to their action in this world). Geertz does not actually say the religious symbols cause action; the relation between thought and action remains assumed. But there is no doubt that he goes to great lengths to show how symbols create an all-pervasive mood, in which action occurs and from which action derives its meaning. In their ‘models for' aspect, symbols are in effect templates for future action within their contexts.14 The criteria an anthropologist uses for selecting a particular symbol as characteristic of a given group is usually imputed to the groups being studied, but it is often not quite clear that the choice of one symbol instead of another is not due to the propensity of the anthropologist. It is perhaps partly due to difficulties of this kind that Ortner (1973) in her article with the significant title ‘On key symbols’, attempted a taxonomy of ‘key cultural symbols’ based on ‘ways in which [they] operate in relation to thought and action’ (loc. cit.). However, she also seeks to distinguish symbols whose function might impel humans to act from those which have a primarily integrating effect, and this is how she arrives at the dichotomy of ‘summariz­ ing’ and ‘elaborating’ symbols. As she notes in both types ‘the investigator observes something which seems to be an object of cultural interest and analyses it for its meanings (loc. cit.)’; the former are unifying while the latter are good ‘to think with’. Ultimately both types will appear to serve a sort of Geertzian model of and model for function. The principle difficulty with symbol theory Strong Form relates to how and whither a given cultural symbol might direct action (causally or meaning­ fully). This might be labelled the teleological objection. The objection can be stated in the following manner: in order to assert a causal relationship between symbols and social action, that is, if we can claim that a given symbol has a ‘key’ standing in some society and that it has an elaborating or a summarising effect, we must logically accord that symbol some degree of autonomy (Cohen 1974a: 64), thereby attributing to it a force or potency of some kind that enables it to achieve this function. However, if this is granted, it is clear that that same potentiality, through which symbols achieve the function of ‘impelling’, could also carry the victims of the impelling to God knows where (since we cannot both attribute a catalytic force to symbols

22

PERMANENT PILGRIMS

as well as harnessing or directing that force). Symbols as autonomous and potent entities that, as it were, drive men, can lead to results that we may not have envisaged. Indeed, this is very clear when we consider the evidence of social change. We discover daily that there is often no fit between clearly contrived means for achieving a given end and the end result. Unintended and unforeseen consequences are always to be expected as part and parcel of such efforts. Yet we can infer from certain types of symbol theory, particularly their relation to action, a scenario in which people appear rationally to choose the symbol with which they expect to achieve a given function by virtue of its force or the force it conjures. In Cohen’s analysis (e.g. 1969), for example, the Hausa come across as, more or less, constructing their culture and destiny by choosing their own collective representations which provide the normative compulsion for behaviour as Hausa in Ibadan. But surely the non-fit between envisaged ends and the actual state of affairs that may ensue must make it difficult to pick up some symbol beforehand and present it as catalytic to a given course of action. The anthropologist, therefore, must always be prepared to analyse the inevitability of unintended consequences; were it a mere case of postulating a catalytic relationship between a key symbol and some predictive type of action, much of what we label as social problems would not exist. When we attribute catalytic properties to symbols, we in effect view them in causal terms; that is, we see them as causing (or at least influencing) the course of action. But in order to demonstrate convincingly how the impelling character­ istic or mechanism comes about, it will require a sophisticated knowledge of psychology, something with which anthropologists are hardly equipped. Perhaps that is why we sometimes merely hint at a Pavlovian connection between the connotations of a symbol within a given context and the resultant action that is expected to follow (Cohen 1977: 121). This in my opinion is not adequate. It will further not do to take the institutional contexts that give a certain meaning to a symbol as given. The fact is that symbols out of context are dead symbols, so to speak. They mean nothing and do nothing. It is only in a particular sociocultural context, and in conjunction with symbol-users, who have been schooled to accept a given meaning of the symbol and socialised into realising its potentiality, that symbols come alive and can do something in the first place. Yet it is still perhaps true that how symbols ‘do’ anything at all, how their potentiality is activated, remains a mystery. Even if the above discussion highlights the difficulties of advancing causal explanations of social phenomena by postulating a connection between sym­ bols and action, it can still be a rewarding exercise to try to account for what factors make a certain type of action the distinctive response of a given group to certain sociocultural events. It seems to me that providing the contexts in which particular types of action are likely to emanate, or asserting

INTRODUCTION

23

a causal relations between precepts and action within a particular social context, is no little achievement. Philosophers such as MacIntyre (1962: 49) might regard the weak sense of causal explanation as no more than ‘facile interactionism’. But, in so far as Popperian epistemology teaches that the descriptive or empirical content of a theory must supersede its probability content for the theory to be worthy of its name, causal explanations by anthropologists, by virtue of the fact that such explanations result from fieldwork which provides knowledge of the contexts in which social facts of a particular kind are embedded, certainly merit the status of fully adequate explanations. Nonetheless, although anthropological explanations deserve more respect than they are usually accorded, it is perhaps true that anthropolo­ gists do not aspire to provide ‘scientific’ explanations that can, say, predict action. Anthropological explanations are rather more fruitfully regarded as hypothetical constructions that enhance a better understanding of the prob­ lems that are being dealt with. We should, however, be happy with such a modest achievement. CONCEPT, PRECEPT, CONTEXT AND PRAXIS

Purposive human actions derive from beliefs. Concepts, precepts and, gener­ ally, symbols (or sets of such entities) are vehicles through which beliefs are articulated, generated and reproduced, both to ourselves and to others. Such terms, then, must be treated as synonymous with the norms and values of society; they prescribe and proscribe the kind of action that is to be deemed culturally appropriate for the members of a group. Concepts might thus be conceived as having a causal relation with the action of a given collectivity of people in this world. Given this, what we need is a model for analysis that can encompass the dialectical relationship between symbols, institutional contexts and symbol-users. What could be conceived as the end-result of any action within a particular sociocultural context, and the analysis of the unintended consequences of purposive efforts related to these, could then easily be dealt with as a part of the model. Parkin (1978) and Kapferer (1988) would each in his own way seem to contribute a model of analysis of the kind I am asking for. Parkin, in his study of the Luo (ibid), is not so much concerned with symbols that define or entail action as with how culturally meaningful action can derive its legitimacy from the public use of key verbal concepts, thereby perpetuating custom. In the question of how symbols might be said to relate to action, Parkin sees symbols as able to acquire potency only in specific social contexts. Consequently, he would not see symbols as able to cause action, a point of view I have attributed to proponents of Strong Form symbol (action) theory (whom as we saw equated symbol with custom). The term ‘symbol’, Parkin writes, suggests ‘a two-fold interaction between word and concept, rather than a three-fold interaction, between word, concept, and action that makes

24

PERMANENT PILGRIMS

up custom’ (ibid 1978: 299). Indeed, he sees the multivalent ‘efficacy’ of symbols as deriving ‘precisely [from] their transcendence of activities’ (p. 228). In the multi-ethnic city of Nairobi during the immediate post-colonial period, the Luo found themselves in sharp competition with other ethnic groups in an ever-changing, indeed, diminishing, socioeconomic environ­ ment. As is the case with social groups in similar situations (see Cohen 1969, for example) they found it expedient to work out a response to the changing environment of opportunities by turning to some facets of their own culture. Luo culture is presented here as comprising ‘key terms, ideological assump­ tions, and practices’ (Parkin 1978: 208), corresponding respectively to their institutions of polygyny, bridewealth transactions and segmentary lineage organisation. The institution of polygyny was perceived as a prerequisite to the perpetuation of Luo cultural identity, since it reinforced the patrilineal segmentary ideology by insuring the procurement of many children. Thus Luo men, involved in urban economy, would invest their surplus earnings by paying inflated bridewealth for second wives. Second wives alternated between the urban and rural homes of their husbands, enabling the polygynist to retain an emotional base within these two contexts, one from which emanated the traditional norms that defined Luo culture. All this was seen as being in accordance with custom. However, the principal manner in which Luo culture was regenerated and reinforced in social action was through formal public speeches in which key verbal terms recurred, imbued with connotations that refracted and reaffirmed traditional Luo values. For instance: ‘The term for polygynist connotes the ability of a man to perpetuate himself and his name through many wives and many children’ (Parkin 1978: 22), and ‘it also has the additional connotation of arbiter and man of eminence and authority’ (p. 25). Key verbal concepts were invoked to express those traditional values which were seen as a prerequisite for ethnic perpetuation. The illocutionary force with which the Luo express these ideas, Parkin argues, produces a compelling and even a ‘mystifying’ control and helps to reproduce the cultural structure. Parkin sees such concepts as shaping ‘people’s perceptions of change in the groups’ environment of opportunity which, in turn redefine the lexicons and taxonomies’ (ibid: 26). Now this does not mean that there is a one to one correspondence between the messages conveyed in the key verbal concepts and the ensuing action they define and generate. In fact, Parkin argues that it is the key words that have remained unchanged, whereas the phenomena they describe (such as polygyny and lineages) have become adapted to new external circumstances: ‘[It] is not so much how they operate and what practical consequences they have for the Luo people, but how they are thought and spoken about. Under the compelling cover of word and thought, significant changes of action are taking place’ (ibid: 22). We therefore find that emic taxonomies, though seemingly unchanging, since it is the same recurrent sets of codes we use to denote phenomena, can adequately classify

INTRODUCTION

25

changes and transformations in the phenomena they denote. We have here an analysis of how the central concepts of society are reproduced through the collective striving of the members of a cultural universe to live up to the cardinal value prescriptions of that society. Symbols might not cause action, but in some roundabout manner they derive their efficacy from the actions they define and, hence, induce. The principal concern of Kapferer (1988) is to show how social action is derived from the logic of a particular ‘ontology’ prevailing in a given society. His use of the term ‘ontology’ covers the analysis of cultural being, rather than being in general; and this includes the symbols, precepts, deep-struc­ tures, key verbal concepts, etc., which might be postulated as providing models of and models for existential life within a particular society. This dual aspect of ontology, he holds, enables human beings to make sense of the world in which they live, and ‘orient [them] toward the horizons of their experience’ (p. 19). If I do not misrepresent Kapferer, the particular sense in which he uses the term presupposes a given group, or set of groups, possessing some distinct logic, which underlies their distinctiveness in this world.15 Kapferer prefers to see such logic as inherent in the reflected and unreflected concepts of such a group. Ontology is thus a total orientation to being, which has, as Kapferer would argue, different manifestations in this world, dependent upon the conjunction of economical and historical factors availing within a particular context, at a given point in time. It is through such conjunction that ontology acquires meaning, and this meaning directs and sways persons (who share a given ontology) to act in pursuit of their goals. Now because the conjuncture of factors from which ontology derives meaning are contingent, the range of meaning potential and the force ensuing thereof is as wide as it is indeterminate. It follows, therefore, that the course(s) of action that might ensue from such meaning cannot be predicted. The anthropologist might, however, postulate and hypothesise a causal link­ age between, as it were, the underlying ontological ground and the emergent forms of social action that derive from it. In its emergent and reflected forms, ontology functions as what we would normally term ideology. It is also in the overt forms, that is, as ideologies that respective ontologies become constructions or models for lived reality (cf. Kapferer 1988: 79-84). Paradoxically, it is from the indeterminacy of meaning that ontology acquires the potency to carry people any number of directions, sometimes contradicting the logic of precepts derived from the same ontology. From this postulate, Kapferer (ibid) is able to show how Sri Lankan Buddhism, for example, despite its non-violent ideology, can at times result in violence and ‘great human anguish and suffering’ (1988: 83) in certain instances. The amorphousness of the term notwithstanding, I still find ontology a suitable concept for my attempt to analyse how the absolute presuppositions of the pilgrims are generated. I must emphasise, however, that I use ontology

26

PERMANENT PILGRIMS

in a dual sense: not merely in the extended sociological sense in which it is sometimes used in lieu of terms such as ‘concepts’ and ‘culture’, but in the sense in which, though ‘ontology’ is predicative of some group, it also serves to demarcate the universe as defined by that group.16 In order to show further how Parkin’s analysis of ‘key verbal concepts’ and Kapferer’s treatment of ‘ontologies’ have influenced my own analysis, let me recapitulate what are, for my purpose, the essential aspects of their models. First and foremost, both works deal explicitly with the relation of thought to action, in a manner that does not only postulate (what often amounts to) an epiphenomenal relation between the two. They demonstrate how such an interrelation occurs, and clearly do so in the analysis. Usually, anthropologists tend merely to postulate a relation between social life and certain concepts and symbols that are regarded as blueprints for action. Often the linkage between the two domains of social life is only hinted at, and left out as something to be inferred from the maze of ethnographic detail and, consequently, rarely explicitly argued. Yet clearly, the point is worth reiterating: that any conception of ‘a sociocultural group’ can only validly proceed from the assumption that some hypothetical set of cognitive maps (however diffuse) affects and shapes the outward behaviour of members of such a group, thereby making it possible for us to delimit that group as beings in the world, distinct from other beings. Hence the necessity for us to deal with the question of how action that is distinct for that group is brought about. It will become clear in the course of this study that a number of key verbal concepts, all of them deriving from the central precept of the pilgrimage recur in daily intercourse among the pilgrims. ‘A pilgrim’ connotes ‘a good Muslim and hard-working family man’, one who possesses all the good names by which a pilgrim may be described. Telling stories about the pilgrimage, or wishing a person a fast journey to Mecca, or wishing to live as a good member of the pilgrim community are all expressions of pilgrim ontology. My effort all along is, therefore, to present the institutional context within which ideas proliferating from the pilgrimage are transacted and presented as the ultimate value to strive for. This is what serves to differentiate West African Muslims in Sudan from other migrants, thus legitimating their existence as a group as opposed to others who might be in Sudan for mundane or profane reasons. The ontology of the pilgrims, I shall try to show, carries the definition of a proper man, the honest man, and impels those wishing to be so defined to live and act in a certain manner. Inspired by the models summarised above, we can derive a theoretical framework for our data in which concepts, precepts and context conjoin to result in praxis of a particular kind. We can then see that the key precepts of society have a potentiality to go any number of ways, depending on the conjuncture of factors availing within a given social context. The perspective

INTRODUCTION

27

derived from the notion of key verbal symbols enables us to see how the culturally appropriate norms of the pilgrims are produced and maintained. It is in defining the key terms of pilgrimage and its associative norms, and living up to them, so to speak, that the reality of pilgrimage receives its perpetuation and is thereby maintained over time. Similarly, viewing my problem as that essentially concerned with the retention and transmission of a particular ontology, I am able to generate a model of social explanation in which the production and reproduction of the norms, which give meaning to the lives of a people (who share such norms), are maintained in an on­ going dialectic. This suggests that the result of any particular action is not as an end result in itself, but a manifestation of being that is in a perpetual state of reproducing itself. The analysis of the production and reproduction of symbols and their meaning becomes, then, a clear-cut empirical problem. Related to my data, such a perspective enables me to see that what at first glance looks like a discrepancy between motives and actions among the pilgrims, could be more fruitfully regarded as a process in the reproduction and regeneration of the same total contexts of which the pilgrimage is the dominant symbol. What I offer, then, is an empirical discussion and conjec­ tural assertions on how this is achieved. OUTLINE OF THE ARGUMENT

Chapter 2 provides a context to the problem with which this study is concerned, by examining the historical background to the movement of West Africans Muslims towards Mecca via Sudan. The chapter starts with written historical sources and ends with the life histories of two of the pilgrims which are generally representative. The presentation is predicated on an inversion of one of the tenets of the philosopher Robin Collingwood’s view of history: the notion that the ‘history’ of an event derives from the ability of the historian to reconstruct that event by means of his own introspect­ ive ‘experience’ of the epoch during which the events occurred. In this case the pilgrims who took part in the great upheavals which constitute the events that are the subject matter of that ‘history’, recount their experiences and their roles as unknowing participants in the unfolding of that history. The chapter ends with the pilgrims in their Sudanese villages. Chapter 3 deals with the rural dwellers. It starts with the liminal aspects of the communities in which the pilgrims reside. The authorities designate these communities as ‘work camps’, while their inhabitants regard them as ‘villages’, yet eschew building permanent houses to emphasise their sojourn status. Two major themes are then dealt with here. (a) The idea of rural life and farmwork as epitomising a wholesomeness that strengthens the resolve of rural dwellers, thus enhancing pilgrim­ age, as a result of which the rural pilgrims are regarded by their Sudanese hosts as hardworking and reliable.

28

PERMANENT PILGRIMS

(b) And the role of reciprocal social relationships involving debts, as factors inhibiting the mobility of pilgrims, thus reducing their chances for a continued movement towards Mecca. Pilgrim life in the urban areas is the theme of Chapter 4. The urban pilgrims are divided into two distinct occupational sets, the first of which comprises a number of prestigious occupations such as malams, landlords and fakis, who sponsor and have clients among the members of the second, less prestigious set. On the less prestigious side of occupations, I discuss lorry­ driving and tailoring, which are accepted by hosts and immigrant alike as quite respectable to be involved in, while others such as being a potter or a beggar are regarded as demeaning. An attempt is made here to highlight the ambivalence of the host population towards such occupations that also reflects the disparity between the obvious lucrativeness of some of these occupations, and the social stigma they carry. The argument is further that, even though some of these activities are regarded as demeaning to do, they are still generally accepted as legitimate for pilgrims. Furthermore, in contrast to the rural pilgrims, the urban pilgrims are shown to be the ones who have given the West Africans a negative reputation in the Sudan, chiefly because they indulge in some activities which are regarded as criminal by the author­ ities. Yet, despite the pilgrims’ own ideas on the corrupting influence of urban life and its detrimental effect on the immigrants’ pilgrim-intent, it is still the urban centres which set the pace for West African fashions and norms in the Sudan. Chapter 5 begins with an examination of why Muslims from West Africa rate the pilgrimage to Mecca as the most important of the Five Pillars of the Islamic faith. Finding the more common theories and hypotheses that address this issue rather unsatisfactory, I turn to Al-Naqar (1972), who explores the teachings of the various schools of Quranic interpretation and relates them to the West African historical and cultural contexts, to show how this combination has yielded forth the distinct ideas and practice of Islam. The unique praxis of Islam is then pursued into the new ethnographic context to examine how it is maintained and transmitted. The effort all the while is to show that although the pilgrimage is the central precept of West African life in the Sudan, it is mainly vicariously lived rather than actually achieved. Chapter 6 examines how this vicariousness comes about. The non-execution of the pilgrim’s actual journey is shown as related to beliefs in the inexorable course of God’s will, which shapes ideas of what it is possible to achieve in this life. It is argued that one such concept, Insha’Allah, epitomises the ontology of the pilgrims. Examples of how the world view projected by this ontology affects and shapes social action are discussed. The point is then made that paradoxically fakis (who claim to be able to control the course of future events) are not redundant in this predetermined system because they fulfil a predictive function. Their main function, it is argued, is to help the

INTRODUCTION

29

pilgrims cope with the notion of uncertainty by finding out what sort of social action is compatible with God’s design. Being on the pilgrimage constitutes one such safe alignment with divine wish; completing it would bring that to a close, and entail the beginning of a new era of uncertainty as to what God’s will is. Such ideas are shown as generating the permanence of pilgrimage. Chapter 7 gives a brief summary and discussion of some of the main points dealt with in this book, in the course of which analytical notions such as ‘mystification’ and ‘false consciousness’ are examined to see whether the processes they represent play a role in the perpetuation of the pilgrimage. The chapter ends with tentative conjectures on why the pilgrimage is perpetu­ ated as a paradigm for life. The study closes with two appendices: (1) which places the fieldworker in the context of the fieldwork on which the book is based and (2) brief bio­ graphical notes on some of the informants quoted directly in the text.

2 THE HISTORY OF WEST AFRICAN MIGRATION TO SUDAN

A NOTE ON HISTORY AND SOCIAL ANTHROPOLOGY

In the early decades of this century, even before the heyday of functionalism when academic anthropology was at an important stage of its development, history was deemed unimportant for the understanding of the social forma­ tions that were being studied with a newly acquired method, namely, field­ work. The argument was not that primitive societies - the main focus of anthropological studies - lacked a history; it was rather that whatever that history was, it was not available to the fieldworking anthropologist since it was not to be found in written documents, so as to be regarded as meeting the canons of science. Nor was it, in Radcliffe-Brown’s own words ‘of any real importance for our understanding of human life and culture’ (RadcliffeBrown 1933: p. vii). True, anthropologists often came across accounts of local events which had passed by word of mouth from generation to genera­ tion; but this was not to be accepted as history. If it was history at all, it was ‘mythical history’ (Collingwood 1946: 14-15), which was to be rejected lest one fall back into the unchecked excesses of the conjectural historians, against which the founding fathers of modern social anthropology reacted. In this manner, one might see fieldwork as having served to reinforce two academic prejudices: the predominance of the written word (with its assumed corollary that what was written was right, and what was verbal, dubious), and the supremacy of literate cultures.1 Fortunately the tide changed, arising from the efforts of some of the succeeding generations of anthropologists who had not been quite happy with the rejection of non-documented history and of efforts at diachronic analysis. Apart from epistemological reasons, they were perhaps prompted by the fact that the emerging accounts of these very peoples - supposedly without history - were fast becoming a part of the histories of such peoples once they were published.2 Nowadays, anthropologists often find that they have far too much history at their disposal when they seek to understand the genesis and the development

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31

of the social institutions they set out to study. The abundance of historical works on certain themes means that the anthropologist starts his own account with a selective assemblage of antecedent facts from a dozen or so books, in preamble to his own sociological analysis. This is a state of affairs that seems to me to be not very satisfactory. For example, we are here concerned with the movement of West Africans to the east. Ever since they began in the fourteenth century, these movements have been sporadic and minimal except at two specific points in the history of the region. The first period in which a marked increase occurred was during 1881-98, the years of the Mahdist insurrection and rule in Sudan. The second period was around 1903, the year that marks the start of colonial rule in Northern Nigeria. What can be inferred from this is that a tremendous change had occurred in the nature of these movements and that these two occurrences were somehow connected with this change. How does an anthropologist who seeks to understand the sets of factors that have contributed to this transformation go about doing so with the aid of history? Could one do this without resorting to the same accounts of chronological occurrences others have already dealt with? There are a number of sociological works on aspects of West African migration to Sudan, with chapters on the history of such movements, all of which - albeit with variable emphases on aspects of the data - recount the same macrostructural occurrence.3 How should I, as an anthropologist, proceed in order not to revert to the same mode of presenting a history of West African migration to Sudan that is yet another layer in what has already been said; how do I attain a different accent? I propose to do this in the following manner. The history of these West African movements is available to us because many West Africans left their homes in response to certain macrostructural forces - beyond their control to go to the east. Their action, in those given situations, represents the effects of history. Without their response to those particular situations there would not have been any history (of those events) to allude to. Although they were, as it were, the pawns of circumstances, they were also - in some measure - the causes of those very circumstances and thereby making those happenings possible. Therefore any anthropological account of an historical occurrence, where in addition to an abundance of documentation there are living persons who recollect those major events which historians recount, must incorporate the perceptions, beliefs and justifications that those affected by such events placed upon them. Such recollections must be regarded as a vital aspect of that particular history as a whole. Of course, verbal accounts are not without some snags: there are questions of time-depth and of accuracy. Furthermore, one must not expect an informant’s recounting of events, filtered down through several generations, to have any high degree of preci­ sion, nor are such accounts likely to stretch over a long period of time. But whatever their shallowness and scientific inexactitude, such traditions are a

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part of reality as conceived by those whose universe of discourse they belong to. Their function is to link the past with the present - even though such links may be only of a mythical nature - and they are thus vital elements in shaping the present. Collingwood (1946: 2), in defining the term ‘philosophy of history’, speaks of ‘thought of the second degree’ which entails a degree of reflexivity in which the philosopher not only thinks of historical events, but also considers his epistemological justification for the thoughts he indulges in about those events. The notion of reflexivity here need not conjure up images of - to use Parkin’s (1982) phrase - an ‘ontological hall of mirrors’ with baffling layers of introspection, but a modest problematisation of the presuppositions that underlie one’s efforts at posing and answering a set of historical questions. This leads me to two tenets of Collingwood’s idea of history which I regard as relevant here. The first is his view that history is primarily concerned with the analysis of processes, and that processes do not begin and end but turn into one another. Thus, the process P1 becomes P2 which also turns eventually into P3. There is no given point in time when P1 turns into P2 or when P2 ceases and turns into P3. Traces of earlier forms of each process are always present in the current forms, just as the present forms which gradually transform into future forms of the same process contain within themselves seeds, so to speak, of the future forms: ‘There are in history no beginnings and no endings. History books begin and end, but the events they describe do not’ (Collingwood 1939: 98). Therefore, even though the historian might write the history of a particular event as if there was a clear dividing line between this event and another that preceded it, this is a necessary methodological device rather that an actual reflection of the event as a phenomenon. The second tenet of Collingwood’s that is useful here is the notion that all history is essentially the history of thought; that is, the historian discerns what the perpetrators of a given historical event thought and why they consequently acted in a given manner. Access to such thought becomes available to us through ‘mode(s) of experience’ (Collingwood 1946: 154) of historians, by virtue of their ability to enter the true ‘experiences’ of the epoch in which a particular set of occurrences took place, and to re-enact that thought. One can deduce from these ideas what amounts in effect to a two-phased approach to history: a) history as a record of occurrence(s) from the past that have ensued from a particular social situation, and b) the relevance of these occurrences to the present by virtue of their encapsulation in present thought. This idea of history ought to appeal to anthropologists because it further entails the examination and evaluation, for instance, of a particular historical situation (its culture, concepts and beliefs), within which a given historical action (or occurrence) ensued.4 Similar notions, albeit differently

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33

phrased, might be inferred from Evans-Pritchard’s thought-provoking lec­ ture, Anthropology and History (1961), and from M. G. Smith’s (1962) ‘History and social anthropology’. I propose to adopt a similar strategy here. But instead of allowing only the philosopher (or the anthropological historian) to analyse an historical event, I shall include the ordinary people, who are the effects of history, to reflect retrospectively about the events which made them behave in a given manner, in a given situation, and incorporate these into the rich documentation, already existing, on the history of West African migration to Sudan. It is my opinion that the use of oral traditions, as well as the verbal accounts of specific events relevant to some particular anthropolo­ gical investigation, would add another dimension to our understanding of what caused those events in the first place, and why those affected by them responded in a particular manner. However, I shall first base my account on the documented history of the West African movements, emphasising aspects of events that have a bearing on my theme, before qualifying these with the life histories of two informants whose perceptions of their past are paradigmatic of the experiences of most of the immigrants. The macrostructural events I allude to here are the advent of colonial rule and the results of a complex of Islamic beliefs that proclaimed the end of the world was imminent.5 Thus it was the conjuncture of several factors, of which religion and colonial rule were most important, that caused the large-scale population movements of West Africans to Sudan. Or, to be less emphatic, it is this conjuncture of factors that transformed sporadic pilgrimages into the concerted and systematic migrations that are the characteristic of the later pilgrimages from West Africa. Before dealing with these points, let us look at the development of the movements. THE GOLDEN ROAD TO MECCA

The golden road to Mecca, like the Golden Road to Samarkand along which trudged Hassan and the pilgrims ‘in rags and rotten shoes’,6 ran from Northern Nigeria through Chad to Darfur in western Sudan, and thence across that country to the Red Sea. It was a hot, inhospitable stretch along which, not unusually, the carcasses of some unfortunate travellers, camels, cattle and other livestock (which they usually carried along with them) could be found. Early European travellers in the region recount with amazement the plight of many of the poor, wretched pilgrims they encountered along the route. They tell us that those who became ill, lame or otherwise incapable of continuing the journey, were left behind to die in the desert. James (1884) describes two such instances: Among Takroori who joined us soon after leaving the coast, were two women, one of whom was rather lame. As she could not well trudge along with the rest of the party, they simply left her behind to die in

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the desert; although her husband was with her, it appeared that he was perfectly satisfied to do so. Unfortunately we knew nothing of this until so long after she had been left behind that it was impossible and quite useless to send after her. She could quite well have ridden on one of our camels; but such is the callousness to suffering, and total disregard for life among these people, that no one of the drivers thought of asking her to do so . . .

A similar event took place when we were crossing the Great Nubian Desert from Korosko, four years before: then it was one of the camel­ drivers who had been left behind to die. We knew nothing of it for several days after; and when we expressed our horror at what had happened they considered that they had behaved in a really generous manner by leaving him a small quantity of water and dhurra-flour. (James 1884: 30) To the Europeans this was the height of savagery and callousness, but James adds reflectively:

Such deaths in the desert are doubtless of frequent occurrence, and are bound to be so, while these long pilgrimages are undertaken, as they often are, by old men and women totally unprovided with means, and frequently possessing nothing but a strong wish to see Mecca and die, which seems to bear them up and help them through apparently insur­ mountable difficulties. (ibid: 30-1)

Yet such incredible hardships which the pilgrims endured en route were only a means towards the achievement of divine grace and salvation, rewards they saw as adequate enough and which by far surpassed and obliterated any worldly discomforts flesh is heir to. They had set out to achieve the ultimate prize. All else was of no consequence whatsoever. Early records show that the pilgrimage from West Africa dates from the fourteenth century (Al-Naqar 1972: 6ff.), when some rulers from the region, recent converts to Islam, began to put the teaching of Islam into practice. These royal pilgrims appear to have travelled in style in large caravans manned by numerous slaves and warriors, carrying gifts of splendour for the rulers through whose territories they passed.7 Taken as a whole, however, the pilgrim-travellers of this period were few in number (Al-Naqar 1972: 19ff.). But gradually Islam spread in West Africa, and from around the beginning of the nineteenth century, and most certainly after the Fulani jihads, Islamisation was so widespread that its beliefs and doctrines had percolated down to the ordinary citizens of Northern Nigeria, some of whom had become devout enough to put its teachings into practice. From this period dates the large-scale movements of pilgrims whom James (1884),

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Robinson (1896), Boyd (1907), Kumm (1910) and many others have written about. Before dealing with how the pilgrimage in West Africa evolved from sporadic prestige-seeking affairs, undertaken by a few members of the ruling classes, into something popularly associated with the large-scale population movements at the turn of the twentieth century (movements that abated but continued on a lesser scale into present times), it will be necessary to give a brief account of Hausaland from the advent of Islam to the jihads. HAUSALAND BEFORE THE FULANI JIHADS

The history of Hausaland is intricately intertwined with the history of Islam in West Africa; not least because it was Islam that led to the literacy from which we have - however scanty - records on religious life in Central Sudan in the old days. Most of the primary sources available to us today on the period before the arrival of European visitors like Barth and Clapperton,8 are derived from Arabic documents written from an Islamic point of view. This has meant that there is much that we do not know - and perhaps can never know for certain - about the region’s pre-Islamic indigenous institu­ tions. Thus historians have had to reconstruct those aspects of the social institutions of the pre-Islamic era which cannot be found in the Islamic records, often resulting in what resembles conjectural history, very much of the kind that anthropologists in the past might have disdained. But such reconstruction has given rise to some conjectures, two of which appear plausible and very relevant here. The first is the view that it was Islam that contributed to the consolidation of the states in the region, turning them into centralised states (Fisher 1970: 357). By this view, pre-Islamic Hausaland consisted mainly of agriculturally based kin-groups living in villages and ruled by animist priest-chiefs, or lineage heads. Some of these villages with the passage of time - evolved into gari, larger settlements which may well be designated as towns. These settlements eventually grew into birane (sing, birni), walled cities. This development, it is argued (see Fuglestad 1978), runs parallel to the emergence of a new form of government: namely, the centralised state, with its hereditary-type kingship. Thus, for instance, garis were run by lineage heads, while the birane were ruled by sarkis, hereditary chiefs. The chiefs or kings ruled in the cities which eventually became the capitals of the states which had emerged from the surrounding countryside. (The countryside had been easily drawn into the scope of influence of - and sub­ sequently in subjugation to - the cities, because the cities, apart from being centres to which the rural populations could sell their produce, also offered them protection within their walls against slave raiders from the outside, and other enemies.) This latter conjecture is also validated by a rich documentation on the existence of city-states in what was later to become

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Hausaland, long before the emergence of a unitary state. Five of the more powerful of these city-states prior to the formation of the single Hausa state were Daura, Gobir, Zaria, Katsina and Kano, the last two being semi­ centralised. They existed side by side, sometimes in rivalry and often fight­ ing each other, as they attained such a degree of wealth as to feel their ascendency threatened. Evidence of this kind has led some historians to infer that the rise of Islam was causally related to the rise of statecraft in the central Sudan (see Fisher 1977; Fuglestad 1978). Writers on West African history generally agree that Islam was brought to Hausaland in the second half of the fourteenth century by Wangarawa traders and clerics from Mali. Our main source is the Kano Chronicle (Palmer 1908: 70). Later on, contact with Islam was to be reinforced partly through the Islamic pilgrimage and partly through the activities of ulama from BornoKanem and North Africa (Fisher 1970: 357). This brought many West Africans in touch with the vast store of Islamic ideas, written documents and scholarship. Initially, conversion took place mainly among the chiefs and the commercial classes, whose daily activities brought them into constant contact with other Muslims from far and near. The proselyte chiefs found the Wangarawa clerics useful because of their literacy. Quite soon, they turned into important bureaucrats in the daily governing of the polities, and were inevitably incor­ porated into most of the vital echelons of the secular and the religious organisations. But in order to maintain their hold, the chiefs were unwilling (or unable) to impose the strict injunctions of their newly found religion on their subjects. So traditional animistic practices were allowed, and indeed practised freely by the people of the countryside; while the chiefs, even though some of them strove to be true Muslims, were not above practising an admixture of Islamic and traditional rituals. They appear to have been aware of this dilemma. The Kano Chronicle has several good illustrations of the religious ambivalence of some of the Hausa kings of the time. It has also some instances of apologia on why this state of affairs prevailed. The eighth king of Kano, Shekkarau, for example, had to grapple with the mixers on the one hand, and on the other with his own men who wanted to destroy the former by force. The Kano Chronicle reads thus:

When he became Sarki his men said to him. ‘Sarkin Kano, what do you see in the talk of the people of this city?’ He said, 'I see nothing between us except things that we can settle without fighting.’ They replied, 'If you try to make peace with the people they will say that you are afraid. If they come to you and make smooth talk, turn away from them; then you would not be acting wrongly. If matters do not fall out thus we will fight them, and if we prevail over them we will cut the throats of all their chief men and destroy their god.’ These counsels

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prevailed. All the pagans came to the Sarki with many presents and said, ‘Sarki, and Lord over us, we have come to you to say one word: do not notice what we have done, we pray you, but put away the slanderous counsel of your advisers. If the domains of a ruler are wide, he should be patient; if they are not, he will not obtain possession of the whole country by impatience.’ The Sarki said to them, ‘Your talk is true,’ and he left them their customs and power. (Palmer 1908: 68)

Indeed, this fusion of Islamic with traditional animist practices had always been a feature of West African Islam. Fisher (1969: 128) points out that it was already a key issue in Songhay in the fifteenth century, where it was formulated as the heresy of the al mukhlit, the mixers (ibid). The Songhay ruler Askia Dawud (1549-83), for example, a devout Muslim scholar and one who did much to further the spread of Islam during his reign, was himself guilty of mixing traditional practices with Islam as recounted in the Ta’rikh al-Fattash, which Hunwick cites:

the court ceremonial was clearly pagan in most respects. In spite of being a thoroughgoing Muslim in many ways, Dawud still felt himself obliged to pay deference to pagan sentiment. Those who entered his presence prostrated and covered their heads with dust... At his Friday audience seven hundred eunuchs stood behind him dressed in silk. When he wanted to spit one of them ran forward and put out his sleeve for him to spit upon it... a celebrated Timbuktu scholar witnessed this scene one day and afterwards said to Askia Dawud, ‘when I entered I was constrained to think you must be mad, or corrupt or possessed.’ The Askia’s reply was full of significance and shows how far the Askia still felt himself compelled to lean in both directions - towards paganism and Islam. ‘I am not mad myself, but rule over mad, impious and arrogant folk. It is for this reason that I play the madman myself and pretend to be possessed by a demon in order to frighten them and prevent them from harming Muslims.’ (Ta’rikh al-Fattash, pp. 208-10, quoted in Hunwick 1966: 38-9) During the fifteenth century, Songhay and Borno competed with each other for control over Hausaland, with Songhay’s influence reaching its peak briefly during the reign of Askiya Muhammed. Thereafter it was Borno’s which controlled Hausaland, a predominance that lasted until the eighteenth century. The religious mixing described above, therefore, which sowed the seeds for the conflicts that were used by Islamic purists as a part of their justification for starting jihad, holy war, against the Hausa rulers some centuries later, were, by the accounts of some historians, learnt from Borno and Songhay (Fisher 1970: 357). At this stage, however, the whole issue was that of a struggle between Islam and the indigenous belief system;

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Islam, perhaps, at this juncture was willing to tolerate some degree of mixing, lest it impede its efforts at proselytisation. If so, it was most certainly a temporary concession, for Islam, as Gellner has noted, has never been known to render ‘unto Caesar what was Caesar’s’ (Gellner 1968: 127). It thus soon began an uncompromising struggle to uproot whatever system of beliefs existed before it; and it was eventually successful in doing so, even if the sum of its overall achievement was to remain syncretic. A further importance of the Wangarawa is that they were instrumental in drawing Hausaland into the network of trade routes of Western and Central Sudan, a process which was to bring it great wealth and power. Involvement in long-distance trading gave impetus to a local industry which was gradually becoming established and in which skilled Hausa craftsmen produced many items for export and for local use. Many of these were articles in great demand in the marketplaces of the whole of the Sudan belt: woven cloth, blankets and cloaks, various articles made from tanned leather, and cloth dyed in indigo were some of the products for which Hausa artisans became famous. By the sixteenth century the Hausa cities had become very prosperous and Kano had begun to acquire a reputation as one of the large markets or trading centres in West Africa, ‘The Manchester of Africa’ as one writer was to present it in European newspapers.9 Kano soon rivalled and eventually replaced Timbuktu in importance. THE FULANI JIHADS AND THE CONSOLIDATION OF ISLAM

As shown above, it was the Wangarawa who began the task of Islamic conversion in Hausaland. These clerics, the ulama,10 as they are known in Arabic, were not only concerned with the spiritual welfare of the people they sought to convert. In Islam, the secular and the canonical domains of social life are mutually inclusive; they are fused into one, as used to be the case in much of pre-Reformation Europe. Thus, in Hausaland the ulama, just like the clerics of old, were spiritual leaders and teachers, as well as jurists of (Islamic) law, who formed a theocratic/bureaucratic element in the governments of the region. With each conversion of a Hausa ruler, so their role and function grew in importance. Fulani ulama were eventually to replace the Wangarawa as the custodians of Islam in the Hausa states. Many of them soon began to become incorporated into the political system of the Hausa chiefs as well (Last 1987: 7) The Kano Chronicle, providing the first documentary evidence of their presence in Hausaland, places the time in the reign of Yakubu (1463-99) when ‘the Fulani arrived from Malle [Mali] bringing with them books on Divinity and Etymology’ (Palmer 1908: 76-7). Their origin before they appeared in West Africa is rather uncertain, but this much is known about them. A pastoralist people, they had begun drifting eastwards with their livestock from the areas around the Senegal valley in the eleventh century

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looking for space and grazing land, possibly as a result of displacements ensuing from the Arab invasion of North Africa (Johnston 1967: 20). They are usually divided into two broad groups: the settled Fulani and the nomadic pastoralists. 11 The latter sometimes became semi-sedentary grain farmers or lived in an uneasy symbiosis among settled groups, exchanging dairy products and meat for grain and other items. They were not very strict Muslims or tended to pursue animist practices. Quite often they tended cattle for local chiefs and wealthy farmers. Indeed, in many parts of West Africa, outside Nigeria, this cattle-tending activity of the pastoralist Fulani is the commonly known principal characteristic of the Fulani as an ethnic group. Nothing could be less true of the town Fulani who kept no cattle themselves, were bilingual, and in many respects assimilated into the tribes among whom they settled. They were also fervent followers of Islam.12 The Fulani were among the first African groups to accept Islam and had many clans of learned scholars among them. One of these was the Torodbe clan which had played a prominent role in the establishment of Islam in Futa Toro before the arrival of some of its members in Hausaland, where it was destined to play an even greater role in the course of events. From the Kano Chronicle (Palmer 1908: 76-8) one gathers that their importance in­ creased immensely during the reigns of Yakubu (1452-63) and his son Muhammad Rumfa of Kano (1465-99). The latter was a devout king, in whose days Islam became the imperial religion, acquiring an increased number of followers. Rumfa’s reputation as a champion-prince of Islam was so widespread that many scholars and teachers of Islam from far and wide came to Kano to partake of his patronage and help build a Muslim state. A considerable number of Fulani ulama from Mali were among these (ibid: 76). But by far the most distinguished scholar in Kano at this time was the Algerian Muhammad al-Maghili of Tuat, a leading theologian of his day, who, before visiting Hausaland, had been involved in the proselytisation of the ruling classes in Songhay, where he had worked at the invitation of the then Songhay emperor. In some surviving correspondence with the Songhay emperor he left a scathing attack on the fake ulama who were not literate enough to comprehend the holy text of the Quran and thus by their activities contributed to the persistence of syncretistic practices.13 Some of his views which anticipated those of the leaders of the Fulani jihads will be dealt with later in this chapter. Rumfa commissioned al-Maghili to write a treatise on how a truly devout Muslim ruler should govern, which resulted in one of the important works in Hausa literature, The Obligations of Princes.14 In the eighteenth century a number of Muslim brotherhoods sprang up in North Africa (see Martin 1976; Last 1987), among whose principal aims were to achieve a stricter adherence to the teachings of the Quran among Muslims and to attempt to proselytise the heathen masses. These movements soon

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spread to the Western Sudan, and among their ardent supporters in Hausaland were the town Fulani. As noted above, the Fulani, before their ascendency in Hausaland, were no strangers to the art of revolution, by which I mean a propensity for resorting to jihad of the Sword, to enforce the word of Allah wherever they perceived it to be improperly followed. For instance, in 1776 the Fulani of the Torodbe clan revolted and conquered Futa Toro, and succeeded in establishing a Muslim state there (Trimingham 1962: 161-2). However, it was not until Usman dan Fodio became the leading figure in the reformist movement, by virtue of his piety and teachings, that the militancy of the Fulani took on a menacing form.15 The Shehu (as he is commonly known to the Hausa) was a Gobir Fulani of the Torodbe clan, who clearly epitomised the importance of the ulama at this juncture by the fact that he had been tutor to Yunfa, the son of Yakubu and grandson of the Sultan of Gobir, whom it is rumoured he had helped succeed to the throne after the Sultan’s death. The Shehu is still the hero of many West African Muslims in Sudan, among whom he has risen to legendary propor­ tions. Even today, stories and myths about his deeds can be heard in Sudan (see Duffield 1981: 19-20; Yamba 1992). But who was this remarkable man? The facts of his early life are simple enough. He was born in 1754 and appears to have had a traditional Muslim upbringing, except perhaps for the fact that one of his tutors was a radical cleric who must have instilled some revolutionary fervour into him.16 Nonetheless, he first set himself up as a teacher and preacher, initially devoting his attention to the ordinary people. Gradually, however, the revivalist fervour of his evangelism began to attract many followers and this soon brought him to the notice of the Gobir court. This in turn led to his involvement in the tutoring of Yunfa, the heir to the Gobir throne, in an effort to put him on what was the right path of the Islamic faith. This, however, was a task which the Shehu could not be held to have been particularly successful in executing, as the subsequent course of events was to show. It is pertinent to point out at this stage that the educated urban Torodbe were not parochial clerics, isolated from the flow of ideas outside Hausaland or cut off from the world of Islamic learning. They were very well-read and often acquainted with much of the secular as well as the religious literature of the ancient world in their Arabic translations.17 Among the many factors that could have contributed to the state of affairs that inevitably led to the jihads, two of the more important were the first is the far-reaching con­ sequences of Islamic literacy and the pilgrimage. The former ‘created [. . .] a sentiment of Islamic universalism, a feeling that the whole Islamic world was one, and any divergence from the central pattern laid down in the Sunna, the “Tradition” of the Prophets was intolerable’ (Hiskett 1984: 159), while the latter (certainly related to the first) reinforced the feeling of the universalism of Islam.

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During the pilgrimage the Muslim saw ‘Islam at its most impressive and felt most strongly his identification with the world-wide Muslim community’ (Hiskett, loc. cit.). For instance, it was not unusual for pilgrims, after performing the pilgrimage, to stay on for many years in Arabia, Egypt or in parts of North Africa studying the Quran and, inevitably, becoming infused with whatever current ideas and mores prevailed outside their own homes. The Shehu did not himself make the pilgrimage, despite popular stories to the contrary among the West Africans in Sudan; but he shared the sentiments, and may, indeed, have done much to instil some of that great yearning for a visit to the home of the Prophet that exists among many of today’s pilgrims. Some of his numerous writings are suffused with references to the pilgrimage and its central place in Muslim life, which he held to be one of the highest aims for any true Muslim to strive for (Hiskett 1984: 161-2). There is also little doubt that he was acquainted with the contemporary Islamic ideas that were current in the east. He was inclined towards mysticism, believing that Allah revealed his will to a select few in the form of visions and dreams and that such revelations had to be heeded. It was in this manner that he claimed to have received his mission from Allah. It is therefore clear that apart from the initial influence his own tutor might have had on him, he was impressed by the revivalist movements outside Hausaland at the time. He was also familiar with the writings of Al-Maghili who had sought to alter the state of Islam during the sixteenth century. Shehu Dan Fodio soon started to travel around in Gobir, preaching and pestering the chiefs for not heeding strictly to Islam. His involvement in the politics of the Gobir court, as noted above, had not been very successful, since Yunfa, his former pupil, now in authority, sought to exercise the royal prerogative of an independence of mind. Dan Fodio, on the other hand, legitimised his authority by resorting to the mysticism of his faith. He declared he had had visions in which the founder of the Qadiriyya order, as the intermediary of the Prophet Muhammad, had given him the ‘sword of truth’ (Last 1987: 15) with which to fight God’s enemies. God’s enemies were now being clearly defined as the Hausa rulers who were alleged not to follow the law of the Quran. So large were the numbers of the Shehu’s followers that the King began to consider him a serious threat. The final straw was when the Muslims withdrew to Gudu on the western borders of Gobir, out of the sarki's reach. The Shehu defined this as Hijra, or withdrawal which, though on the face of it a symbolic act, was unequivocally a declaration of war, as drastic and final as any other. For it meant that the believers had withdrawn from the land of the infidels (Hiskett 1984: 163; Johnston 1967: 43). Incomplete a Muslim though he might have been, the significant parallel to the classical Hijra of the Prophet Muhammad from Mecca to Medina did not escape Yunfa. He must also have known that this Hijra was an inevitable prelude to jihad, perhaps as a result of which he did

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nothing at first. He felt compelled to act, however, when many of the followers began flocking daily to Gudu to join the Shehu. Yunfa set out to bring them back under his authority and this set the jihad into motion. The year was 1804. By 1812 the wars were mainly over; the Shehu’s forces had conquered the whole of Hausaland and created the Fulani Caliphate of Sokoto: an empire that was to last for nearly a century until it in turn succumbed to the superior might of the British imperial forces. Three kinds of questions are worth posing at this stage. The first two are interrelated and concern the reasons for the jihad, while the third concerns the consequences and relevance of the jihad to our theme. What were, indeed, the real causes of the jihad, and what kinds of people rallied to the Shehu’s cause? How could a motley coalition of religious ulama, pastoralists, peasants, fortune-seeking Tuaregs and their various allies succeed in routing the strong and wealthy city-states of Hausaland in less than eight years? And, finally, what relevance had the Fulani jihad for our theme? We may perhaps never know the true causes of these wars. It is not easy to give a balanced view here, since much of what we have today are facts derived from a history written by the victors, which is mainly a retrospective justification of why they felt compelled to revolt. Many of the sources give the received version about the state of affairs that led to the jihad. But as M. G. Smith has noted: ‘Traditionalists, both Muslim and British have tended to see the jihad as a genuine attempt to purify and spread Islam in [the] region’ (1966: 216). The received version thus paints a less complex and a fairly straightforward picture. That Islam, at this stage, was predominantly the preserve of the towns, whose inhabitants were not averse to syncretism, while an even more lax form and animistic practices prevailed among the rural peoples. That the rulers condoned the syncretic practices and imposed non-Islamic taxes on the people. The fact remains, however, that these Hausa rulers were Muslim. Other factors besides the insufficient piety and non-Islamic practices of the rulers must be enumerated to give us a fuller idea of what contributed to the discontent and the eruption. First, we have already seen that the state of Islam in Hausaland left much to be desired for those who adhered to a puritanical form of the religion. Dan Fodio could thus with good reason count among his followers most (if not all) of those Muslims and Islamic converts who were dissatisfied with the prevailing pagan practices. Second, by the time Dan Fodio was a young man, Gobir had become one of the strongest of the Hausa states, competing with its neighbour, Katsina, for the caravan trade of western Hausaland. In 1777 Bawa Jan Gwarzo succeeded as Sarkin Gobir. A warring king whose victories in battle added many laurels to the glory of Gobir, he was also a cruel and uncompromising man. It was he who enforced jangali, the tax on cattle, which the pastoralist Fulani, in particular, found oppressive. He even ordered the seizure of the

M ap 3: Hajiya and Abubakar ’ s journeys.

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Map 4: The Gezira Scheme in Sudan.

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cattle of those who tried to evade this tax and this was duly resented by the pastoralists. Conceivably, many Fulani pastoralists rallied to Dan Fodio’s banner because he condemned this tax. It is perhaps also conceivable that later they defined their allegiance in ethnic terms, although, as we have already noted, their initial motive might have been economical.18 Third, and this must be regarded as a very important factor, there was a great cleavage between the rich and affluent of the towns and the rural farming populace, who were poor. The latter had to pay taxes they could hardly afford and were occasionally raided and taken as slaves for the Hausa chiefs. The extent to which slavery might have played a part in the conversion of many a Hausa peasant may never be known, but it is probable that a considerable number of Hausa became Muslims to be protected from such enslavement, apart from whatever resentment they had against excessive taxation.19 In his book Kitab al Farq,20 a work in which the Shehu discussed his views of what constituted proper government according to sharia, the Shehu himself cited jangali as among the list of the more serious offences against Islam by the chiefs. Such factors served to create a formidable coalition against the Hausa rulers. But, finally, whatever reasons one might give for the success of the Muslims must be added the following. The Hausa chiefs were divided where the Muslims were united. Each city-state stood alone, throwing itself at the Muslims only after its neighbour - which functioned, as it were, as a buffer against the Muslims - had been routed and the menace perceived as being too close for comfort. News of the increasing victories of the Muslims seemed to signal local Muslims to rise and become actively involved. By 1806 war flags had been distributed to supporters in the regions (Last 1989: 559). These local commanders then became flag-bearers of the Shehu and declared a jihad against their local ruler (who might or might not have been guilty of the infractions of Islam that had caused the initial revolt in Gobir). Thus the conflict spread in Hausaland. So, although the Hausa chiefs must have realised before long they had a mutual interest in facing the Shehu’s forces together, they did not appear to have fought him as allies, co-ordinating their efforts. Even if the Reformers too did not fight a unified front against the chiefs, and even if they faced famine and disease as well and were on two occasions nearly wiped out, with them things were, on the whole, propitiously differ­ ent.21 Not being professional warriors they used guerrilla tactics and weaponry with some success. They could also deploy a disciplined and effective cavalry, a suitable fighting force for the flat terrain of Northern Nigeria. Moreover their familiarity with classical Arabic manuals of warfare is said to have given them considerable advantage over their Hausa adversaries. Such skills, together with the fierce zealousness of those convinced that they strike in the name of God, must have made the jihadists a very formidable force to

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overcome (Last 1989: 559).22 Many Muslim scholars and students fell in the battles which ensued; but in the end the Muslims won. The Shehu divided his vast empire into two halves and then retired to devote his time to reading and writing. The western half went to his brother, Abdullahi. It was ruled from Gwandu. The eastern and larger half was to be controlled from Sokoto by his son and heir, Muhammad Bello. SOME CONSEQUENCES OF THE FULANI JIHADS FOR OUR THEME

Not long after their victory, the Fulani could refer to their new empire as Dar al-Islam, the land of Islam. Now, how could a country in which a majority of the inhabitants were animists be transformed overnight into a land of Muslims? But, by their reckoning, posing such a question would have been beside the point: what they meant - and they made this clear in their condemnations of the Hausa chiefs - was that the religion of a country was classified according to that of its rulers. Therefore, Hausaland was now a land of Muslims because the new rulers were true Muslims. The real situation was different and obviously something had to be done to convince the masses of the superiority of Islam over their own religious beliefs in order to proselytise them. A detailed survey of proselytisation, or the overall implications of the Fulani jihads will, however, be outside the scope of this book. Excellent accounts of this already exist.23 I propose to restrict my presentation to a cluster of events I postulate as being directly relevant to the rise of the Islamic pilgrimage to Mecca. These being, namely: 1. a wide degree of Islamic literacy that emerged with the conversion of the Hausa masses, leading to a familiarity with current popular litera­ ture, much of which extolled the virtues of the pilgrimage 2. beliefs in the coming of the Mahdi as an event heralding the End of Time, and 3. the incursion of colonial rule into Northern Nigeria. One important query that comes to mind in connection with the overall consequences of the Fulani jihads is whether or not the Shehu’s heirs were able to establish the ideal Muslim state by reforming the non-Islamic aspects of society, and whether they had been able to stamp out pagan and/or syncretistic practices, the pursuit of which had led them to revolt in the first place. Historical evidence arouses scepticism here as is clear from the numer­ ous studies that have emerged and are still emerging of the consequences of the jihad. West African Islam has retained many features of non-Islamic practices.24 It has been argued that although the Fulani conquerors appear to have succeeded in establishing a more ordered society, the evidence suggests that ‘reform did not long survive the second generation of the Shehu’s descendants’ (Hiskett 1984: 295). Great advances, however, appear to have been made in the area of Islamic

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literacy which spread to remote areas in Hausaland during the Caliphate. It might seem dubious to hold that every inhabitant of the region learned to read and write at this period, but it would be safe to assume that most people were now aware of the power of the written word upon which Islam appeared to be based. Literacy is an important factor in Islam: its role can never be overemphasised in this respect. It was always paramount in Islamic proselytisation. What Gellner (1981: 22) has termed the ‘Quranic Platonism Mark 2’ which he saw as attributing ‘a carefully delimited set of normative propositions to the deity’ leading ultimately to ‘a reification of the Word’ (ibid: 23), was socially effective in Hausaland, above all because the Word itself soon acquired, or was attributed, magical properties. So many strove to learn to read and to follow its injunctions so as to be protected by it. If they were unable to read, they turned to those who could, asking them to copy Quranic verses for them. They carried these in small amulets for their personal protection, or they washed such verses off slates to imbibe (Goody 1968: 230). The written Word had acquired a force unmatched by their old religions.25 Had not the propagators of the Word been powerful enough to rout their leaders? Many West Africans embraced the new religion and learned to read the Quran. One could, therefore, imagine an animist turning to Islam because it made him one of the fold, protected and franchised through the teachings of the Quran, and privy to a welter of metaphysical ideas and verses in Hausa, all of which revered Allah and praised his Prophet through whom one could reach salvation. As to hopes for a reformed society and a more equitable existence, supporters of the jihad must have been very disappointed indeed with the postjihad society that emerged. The new historiography of Nigeria deals extensiv­ ely with such issues (see, for example, Mahadi 1985; Last 1987 and 1989) The type of polity that emerged from the jihad has, of course, great relevance for the movement of West Africans from their homes to the east. Modern sources call attention to the fact that the inhabitants of Hausaland must have soon discov­ ered that things were pretty bad even in post-jihad society. Examples are the strengthening of the Sarauta (kingship) system, in which an expanding ruling class emerged that was exempted from taxation, and the subjection of the ordinary people of the countryside to slave raids. Mahadi writes: ‘Apart from forcing people to pay all kinds of taxes, many of which were clearly illegal, series of raids were launched into the countryside for the purpose of acquiring slaves for exchange with cowries and other commodities needed by the rulers. At this time also, wasau, through which the King and princes simply seized private property was introduced’ (Mahadi 1985:120). It would seem therefore that for a great many inhabitants of Hausaland, the ideals for which their fathers and grandfathers fought had crumbled long before the events that routed the Caliphate.

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MAHDISM, COLONIAL RULE AND MILLENARIAN BELIEFS IN NORTHERN NIGERIA AT THE END OF THE NINETEENTH CENTURY

The Quran contains no reference to Mahdism, yet in Islam it is common to find beliefs in the appearance of the Mahdi (the Enlightened One), a longawaited deliverer who would appear at the End of Time to redress wrongs that have been committed by men and would ‘fill the earth with equity and justice after it has been filled with tyranny and oppression’ (cited in Biobaku and Al-Hajj 1966: 226). Every once in a while, someone has appeared to claim this title, only to be declared an impostor by members of rival sects. According to Biobaku and Al-Hajj, ‘there was a strong tradition about the approaching end of time preceded by the Mahdi’s appearance’ early in the Shehu’s life time (Biobaku and Al-Hajj 1966: 229). One important factor that added credence to these beliefs was that the period coincided roughly with the thirteenth century of the Hijra, which early Muslim writers had chosen as the time in which the world would end (Al-Naqar 1972: 83). Mahdism, therefore, played a very important role in the Fulani empire (Biobaku and Al-Hajj 1966; Hiskett 1984: 180). The Shehu’s followers would have preferred him to declare himself the Mahdi, but his modesty would not permit him to do so: ‘know, Oh my Brethren,’ he wrote in one of his books, ‘that I am not the Imam-al-Mahdi, and that I never claimed the Mahadiyya - even though that is heard for the tongues of other people’ (quoted in Biobaku and Al-Hajj 1966: 228). Instead, he claimed to be only the mujaddid, by comparison, a less august - if no less fearsome - figure, whose appearance in turn heralded that of the Mahdi. Not only did he claim this, but he appears to have hinted that he was the last of these renewers, after whom the Mahdi himself would appear (Hiskett 1984: 163). The appearance of the Mahdi is itself a sign that everything is about to end. However, certain other signs were believed to precede this momentous event. There would, for instance, first be a number of lesser catastrophes like droughts, famine and wars. In Hausaland, the period from the Fulani victories (that is, from the establishment of the theocracy to the advent of the British conquest in 1903) appears to have been one long epoch of strife, not unlike what was expected above. This was seen as validating and reinfor­ cing the beliefs in impending doom. However, the ultimate sign and catalyst was Lugard’s conquest of Northern Nigeria (1903). By then, of course, a Mahdi had already appeared in Sudan, even if there was some dispute as to whether he was really the ‘Enlightened One’ or an impostor. This Mahdi had himself, after initial victories against the British, met with what was certainly a subjective end - before the expected End of Time - and his own chosen successor, had fallen to the British. Yet many West African Muslims,

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particularly from Hausaland, flocked to Sudan to support and pay tribute to the Mahdist cause. Undoubtedly these people considered the sequence of contemporary events at the time as affirming the truth of their beliefs. The Sokoto Caliphate’s contacts with the outside world were of two kinds. First, there was a symmetrical contact with other Muslim nations across Africa, to Arabia and, possibly, as far away as India. This might, more or less, be viewed as involving contact (and interaction) within one cultural commonwealth, held together by Islam and the Quran. Islamic ideas, information and values percolated to all parts of the system. Learned Malams moved around in this commonwealth, teaching the Quran in places far away from their own homes or offering their services to local rulers, while many trader-travellers whose affairs carried them about also contributed to this diffusion of the commonality of Islamic culture within it. We must bear in mind that, unlike other systems of this kind, there appears not to have been any conception of a centre or a periphery, thus the notion of symmetry. The holy cities of Mecca and Medina belonged equally to all of Islam, and all Muslims were brothers and sisters. This construct is correct even though the Shehu carried the title of ‘Commander of the Faithful’ and ‘Caliph’ (alluding vaguely to leadership of all Muslims), while at the same time most Muslims, West Africans in particular, looked to the east as the holy centre of their faith. Second, there was contact with Europe. Initially, contact was through the exploring Europeans who appeared on the scene - by turn as friends and traders, and later as representatives of their governments, which sought to bind local rulers in treaties pledging friendship and trading rights (Adeleye 1971: 117-64). This was contact of the asymmetrical kind. These visitors came bearing gifts and greetings from their rulers, but they imparted very little about themselves or their homes to the natives. Little did the Fulani rulers know that the true aim of these visitors was not merely to secure trade concessions but, ultimately, something much more drastic. It was furthermore an ill-starred encounter from the point of view of the Caliphate, because it marked the beginning of its demise. This contact was the forerunner to colonial domination. The explorers were soon followed by (and were themselves often) Christian missionaries, and they had not the smallest doubt that their religion, Christian­ ity, was morally superior to the religion of the Africans. The visitors together paved the way for the legitimation of claims later on by respective European governments that particular areas were within their ‘spheres of interest’. Military might was then employed to back this claim. Hausaland knew her share of explorers and missionaries. Their activities and those of the trading companies are well-documented (for example Flint 1960; Ajayi 1965), as are the events leading to the fall of the Caliphate (Adeleye 1971; Last 1967; Johnston 1967). These do not concern us here. What concerns us are the

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events that followed those ill-fated days in July 1903, when the British forces stood poised before the remnants of Caliph Attahiru’s forces at Burmi, in the last of the major battles before the fall of the Caliphate. The Fulani rulers, through a series of uncomprehending double-dealings, had signed treaties that were now being interpreted as involving an acceptance of the sovereignty of the British. And Britain, the protecting power, whose interests were now personified in the private principles, ambitions and vanities of Captain (later Lord) Lugard, faced the Muslims with a few British officers and their Hausa soldiers in the last of the battles before the fall of the Fulani empire. If Attahiru had remembered his history well, he might have known that this was an uncanny re-enactment of a situation his ancestors had been involved in nearly a century ago, when they had met and destroyed the scat­ tered remnants of the Hausa chiefs’ forces. Now, of course, the situation was reversed. The British had eliminated the emirates one by one, until what now remained was the central Caliphate itself, and they were ready to strike the final blow. Again, just as a century ago a superior grasp of warfare and better discipline had rendered the Hausa chiefs ineffective, so the disciplined troops of the British with their 75-mm field guns, machine guns and repeating rifles, were infinitely superior to the Fulani. As one writer has aptly observed, it was as though the warfare of two different epochs in history had collided (John­ ston 1967: 251). The issue was never in doubt. But more than that and worse than that was the fact that a century ago, the Fulani were fighting a jihad. Now they saw themselves as the impotent cogs in the fulfilment of God’s will. It was written that the day would come when Dajjal (Antichrist) would invade their land and destroy them, and this was the day. Thus they found themselves grappling with three options which resulted in a collective paralysis of indecision. 1. Should they emigrate en masse (since the Shehu had foretold this)? There was certainly strong support for this alternative, as is clear from the following lines from the Emir of Kano to the Waziri Buhari before Kano fell: I have received your letter and I understand from it that my advice commends itself to you. Both of us are seeking what will serve our religion best in the long run. As I said in my last letter, I still believe that, as these dogs have surrounded us and now threaten to overwhelm us, the best plan is for all true Moslems to abandon this country. That is my firm conviction and I pray that your eyes too may be opened to this reality. May God help us and lighten our burdens. (Blackwell 1927, letter 125, also quoted in Johnston 1967: 242)

Or 2. should they attempt to negotiate with the British, which would, in effect, have amounted to yielding to the British terms?

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Or 3. should they choose to make a stand for it and fight? Being what they were, the second option was out of the question; the third, they must have regarded as folly - tales of the invincibility of the British and their victories in India, Asante and elsewhere were then widespread (Johnston 1967: 275). They found the first alternative the most attractive. The British, however, could not be expected just to stand by and allow the Caliph and his commanders to escape and perhaps rise against them in the future, so they chased him and cornered him at Burmi. And this was how the two forces came to face each other at Burmi on 27 July 1903. The Caliph fell, as did a great many of his followers in the ensuing battle. Some of the survivors returned to their homes to make peace with the new rulers; but for many this was unthinkable. They gathered whichever of their followers would heed their call and made for the east to fulfil the prophecy attributed to the Shehu. So large and effective was this population movement that one cannot help but paraphrase the words of a great Roman general26 that before Lugard’s commanders could make peace, they found they had made a desert. Thousands of the inhabitants were leaving their homes with their leaders, or joining them to go east. There were some half-hearted attempts by the authorities to stop them. By and large, however, the exodus remained unchecked. Until now we have followed what I have termed ‘macrostructural events’ and how they have affected the inhabitants of Northern Nigeria. Such events are, in much of history, occurrences that stand out like landmarks in the lives of great men, whom the ordinary people follow and heed, thus enabling such men to move mountains, as it were. But these events would not have occurred (nor achieved their particular magnitude) had not hosts of insignificant and faceless individuals found themselves compelled to act in a certain manner, in accordance with the dictates of events beyond their control. So while they themselves were involved in the making of history, they were unknowing of this, perhaps beyond the fact that they felt they were fulfilling the demands and imperatives of their society. Within these tempestuous times, each individual was also pursuing action that satisfied the demands of the social organisation while at the same time carrying on with action that fulfilled the everyday pursuits of feeding and fending for himself and his dependents. Motives are sometimes not clearly defined even to the perpetrators of the action that ensues from them. But a retrospective account in which motives are examined is needed if one is to shed light on the given action of individual actors in the context of history. Most of the Muslims of Northern Nigeria followed their leaders to go east because the prophecy predicted it and faith demanded it. It is doubtful whether at that stage they saw their migration as a pilgrimage, although it was directed towards the holy centres of their faith. Religiously it was Hijra and, as such, it was supremely meritorious. If

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it led to the Haj, pilgrimage, that is, if it could be combined with a visit to the home of the Prophet, so much the better. It must, however, be emphasised that the movements to the east were initially prompted by a desire to emigrate, to perform the Hijra, rather than to go on the pilgrimage, the Haj. That this important distinction should have become fused in the perceptions of the pilgrims is one of the fascinating things about this whole story. I must again emphasise that I have not set out to write the history of the events that engulfed Hausaland and precipitated the vast movements that were the forerunner to a particular mode of the pilgrimage to Mecca. I am fully aware that there are a multiplicity of interpretations as to the causes (and consequences) of the jihad, the Caliphate that was established, the type of polity that ensued and whether or not it succeeded in realising the ideals it professed. As mentioned before, these are themes the present-day histori­ ography of Nigeria has begun to debate. Such issues are, however, outside the scope of this book. My task here is to present a history, a situational history, recounted through the eyes of those about whom that history is concerned. I have only resorted to the ‘written’ history of the period and made some reference to the contending schools of interpretation in order to contextualise the subjective experiences of the West African pilgrims and to locate those experiences in the wider structures of which they were (and are) a part. In the rest of the chapter, I will turn to two of the ordinary people whose heritage is a part of these actions and the situations that ensued. As I have stated before, it is the ordinary people who made those occurrences possible in the first place. As we shall see, the West African pilgrims in Sudan are acutely aware of their past, and it is that past that gives meaning to their lives in their adopted country. One is thus faced with questions such as: how much of these overall, antecedent events were the people of Northern Nigeria aware of and how did it affect their lives? To what extent were they aware of the fact that they were involved in events that were to have wider structural implications? The quest of answers to such questions brings us to look at the lives of two of the immigrants. TWO COGS IN THE WHEELS OF HISTORY

Case i

Hajiya is frail now. Her once tall, imperious structure is bowed with age. And although her features are very wrinkled, and her toothless gums dark red from years of chewing kola nuts, one is left with little doubt that she must have been a determined and a very attractive woman in her youth. On the wall of her stall, which she rents in the market place, is a rather faded photograph of herself: a proud mother, her arms on the shoulders of her two sons - six and three years respectively - staring straight into the lens of the photographic contraption that took the picture. The year 1921 is printed

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on the back of the photograph. She recalls it was taken by a white photographer in one of the French territories they had passed through on their way to Mecca. The year 1921 was the year she left home to undertake the pilgrimage. Her reminiscences are anchored around two events which remain indelibly ingrained in her mind: the establishment of colonial rule and the First World War. It is to these two events she relates the chronology, rather than dates, of anything that happened in the past in which she was involved. The following are a summary (and some excerpts) from a recorded interview with her in October 1983: I remember when colonial rule27 came to Hausaland. One day during the rainy season a horse came into our village with my father slumped across its back. He was covered with dust and blood. My father was Sarki of our village. He had been away with the Fulani leaders to fight the Europeans. When we saw him we knew the war was lost. All the people ran alongside the horse wailing as it was led into our compound. We thought that my father was dead. But the Malams said that he had only been poisoned. They bled him many times, and tried with various medicines to save his life. He got better but never completely recovered from his illness.

Hajiya was her father’s favourite daughter. He allowed her to sit with him when he held court and she recalls hearing many stories of the events that were taking place in the world outside their village. She heard of the last great battles in which her father had taken part, of how the Sultan had fallen at Burmi and of how people were leaving their homes to join the rest of the Sultan’s commanders to go eastwards. Hajiya believes that most people would have liked to follow their leaders to the east, but quite often it was just not practical. She heard of cases everywhere in Hausaland, of people fleeing from the new rulers, how some people even left behind their ripe dhurra in the fields to join the new Hijra to the holy land. In the case of her own family, they were unable to leave, partly because her father was lame and sickly and partly because they believed that the blessings and the grace attained by those who left were to be shared by all of those who desired to leave but could not do so. So her family stayed behind to await the will of God. Sometimes they heard of how the Europeans intercepted and forced the migrants to return to their villages because they feared that these people would join the forces of the remaining leaders and fight them again. Around this time Hajiya was already betrothed to the son of the chief of a neighbouring village, a religious man who had abandoned his village to join the great numbers of people moving east. Her fiancé had evidently been influenced by his father, because shortly after the betrothal he made up his mind to make the pilgrimage to Mecca before settling down to married life.

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Hajiya neither saw nor heard from him again. She remembers hearing of the incredible bravery of the Hausa as they faced the Europeans in battle, of the powerful Malams with their charmed smocks which no European bullets could penetrate. And of how despite such bravery and resources the Europeans had won. This was not because they were greater warriors - the Hausa were braver and much more numerous - but because it was written that they would win: They used to say that in the past whenever we had become degenerate and lax in the practice of Islam, the true religion of our people, we were ourselves subjugated and ruled by strangers. But since the time of the Shehu, ours has been a land of true Muslims. So the Europeans defeated us only because it was the will of Allah. The coming of the Europeans was only a sign to show that we were approaching the end of everything. The Shehu had predicted that this would come to pass. He had also said that when the time came, we were to abandon our homes to the unbelievers and leave for the home of the Prophet.

Time went by. When after several years of waiting her betrothed did not return from Mecca, her father decided to give her away in marriage to another man, a Malam, who was also his personal Marabout (diviner). Thereafter, she gave birth to two sons. Her first boy was nearly three years old when her husband asked permission from her father to go on the pilgrimage. He agreed and her husband left with a group of pilgrims the same year the First World War broke out in Europe. Shortly after their departure news arrived that the Europeans had intercepted a caravan. They had arrested some pilgrims on the route and the men were being used as forced labour. She worried about her husband: I made sadaka (offered alms), and prayed all the time that he should be well. But my father said that although there was nothing wrong with my praying and making sadaka, this was not necessary at all, because it was my husband - wherever he was - whose prayers we needed, since he was on the Haj (pilgrimage), and that holy undertaking made his prayers more powerful than ours. That there was not much we could do. If it was the will of Allah that he should return safely to us, that will come to pass. Not long after this my father died and my elder brother became Sarki in his place. Eventually peace and quiet returned to our land again. The Europeans built roads and brought powerful medicines which could cure all kinds of diseases. And food was plentiful again.

Five years passed but still her husband had not returned from Mecca, and she had not had a single message from him. It was then that she decided to go on the pilgrimage herself.

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I went to my brother and said: I have lost two men to the pilgrimage. It is written that I should myself undertake the journey. Besides, perhaps, I will find out what has become of the father of my son. My brother worried for me. He said: sister you are only a woman, and a mother. But I cannot stop you. If you must undertake this hazardous journey, then you must take Sani along.

Together with Sani, her younger brother, her sons and two servants of their house, Hajiya began the long journey to Mecca. They left after the harvest that year (1921). Her brother the Sarki followed them to Kano and upon his recommendations they were given travelling documents for the pilgrimage. The first leg of the journey brought them to Maiduguri where they joined a large caravan, consisting of about a hundred people, seventy-five of whom were professed pilgrims on their way to Mecca. Some rode on camels, others on horses, but Hajiya and her group had to walk all the way until they reached El Fasher. Sometimes they would stay in a town or a zongo to work to replace dwindled funds and to furnish the next leg of the journey. In some of these places, she prepared and sold cooked food for the predominantly male travellers and soon acquired a reputation for her tasty groundnut stew and rice-balls. So successful was she in this occupation that it was to take them about three years to reach El Fasher. Hajiya does not remember much else of the journey through the towns in Chad except that one of her servants who had been with her family since she was a little girl died of fever near Fort Lamy. The French authorities declined to allow burial in the town and insisted that they leave the town with the corpse immediately: They said that this was because we had not the right papers. We walked very fast until we were some distance outside Fort Lamy. Then we stopped and sent a message to the Sarkin Zongo (chief of the zongo) of the nearest town to explain what had happened. He sent some people to take Amina (the dead girl) away and, claiming that she was one of their own, they were able give her a proper Muslim burial before sunset that same day, in accordance with our custom.

Hajiya’s excellent cooking and her background as the daughter of one of the chiefs who had fought the Europeans made her very popular with the Hausa communities in the zongos. It was at this time she was given the name of Hajiya even though she had not yet completed the pilgrimage. All along the road she inquired after her husband, but nobody had heard of him. She does not recall any serious hazards of any kind along the road, except that sometimes they had to pay local chiefs for assistance to get through. This posed no difficulty, however. She could afford this, as she was earning

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considerable funds en route, and she had carried what she referred to as a ‘lot of presents’ from home with her. It was after El Fasher, too, that they first travelled by lorry. It was in El Fasher, too, that she had the first news of her husband. She learned that he had already completed his pilgrimage and was on his way back home. ‘Unfortunately, I had progressed so far on my own pilgrimage, that I saw no point in returning home. It was the will of Allah that I should have reached Sudan, and already close to the holy land. So I decided to continue.’ In one of the zongos she learned of some relatives who were living in a Hausa community in the Gezira; she decided to visit them before making for the Red Sea. Of the seventy-five pilgrims who banded together at Maiduguri, only fifteen reached Sudanese territory with Hajiya - almost three and half years after leaving Hausa soil. Hajiya considered this a very fast journey.28 Of Hajiya’s fellow travellers, ten had died en route and the rest had remained at various stops they found congenial to work, or to recover from illness before continuing. My feelings when we reached Sudan were those of great exhilaration. We had finally arrived in a country in which the Prophet’s own tongue could be heard all around us. We also knew we were close to the Nile Valley, where the Shehu had promised that a new Muslim community of Takari would flourish. All the Hausa men who lived here seemed to be great Malams. They had a great command of Arabic;29 not only the Quran verses which were all we knew back home. Another feeling of joy was the knowledge that we were near the holy land. Hajiya, her sons, her brother and servant, all spent some time in this village, a West African village which the authorities designate as a work camp (see Chapter 3). The European commissioner of the district soon decided that she would be a desirable member of the West African community there. He tried to get her to accept a tenancy in an effort to get her to settle down, but she declined. After a few months’ respite, recovering from the fatigues of the journey, she left by train for Suakin on the Red Sea. There she discovered that the authorities would not allow her to travel across to Mecca with two young children without a male companion. She was bitterly disappointed and decided there and then to return to the village in the Gezira. However, her senior son, now nearly nine, saved the situation by saying ‘Mother, you should not break your journey after coming this far because of us. You continue with my little brother to Mecca. I shall go back to the village and wait until your return.’ Hajiya went across to Mecca. She recalls it as the most memorable experi­ ence in her life, as well as the most frightening. Until Mecca she had always felt like an individual with desires, feelings and whims, which her social

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standing compelled others - her servants, for instance - to heed. As she approached Mecca, she felt engulfed by sheer humanity, just one of myriads of insignificant souls, all of whom sought to be noticed by the Prophet and through him by Allah. She claims that it was as she approached Mecca that she learned the meaning of suffering and humility and the reality of true belief. She also learned that there was a universal brotherhood of man. Paradoxically, she claims that it was during this last phase of the pilgrimage that she recognised that some people accorded her a lower status solely because her skin was darker than theirs.30 Yet, she stayed on in Arabia for three years after the pilgrimage. While Hajiya was approaching Mecca with her fellow pilgrims, her son, then a boy of nine, had begun his own tedious walk back from Port Sudan towards the Gezira, a distance of several hundred miles. The boy managed to reach Khartoum and also managed to find employment as houseboy in the home of an Egyptian Copt, who had been very impressed by his heroic story and his resourcefulness. The boy stayed with the Egyptian for two years, occasionally finding out from returning West African pilgrims about his mother’s sojourn in a village near Mecca. When the time came for the Egyptian to return home to Cairo, he expressed a desire to take the boy with him. But the boy declined, saying that it would break his mother’s heart if she returned to find that he had gone to Egypt. He took his leave and continued his journey from Khartoum to the village in the Gezira in order to wait for his mother. For three years, Hajiya pursued her occupation of selling cooked foods in a West African pilgrim community near Mecca:

During my third year in Saudi Arabia, I heard that my husband had died suddenly after his return. There therefore appeared to be no pressing reason for me to return home. So I decided to return to our Gezira village to stay there for a few years. The European repeated his offer of a good piece of land for me to farm. But I again refused. I was still set on returning to Hausaland and did not want to be attached to a piece of land in a country in which I was a stranger. I began to trade and save up for my return journey. After some time, Allah asserted his will. I found a husband, and gave birth to a girl. I was able to save enough money to send my sons on their first pilgrimage. Then I found wives for them. I became a grandmother - I have now over thirty grandchildren. We lived in the West African village until twenty years ago when we moved to our present village. This village has become our home. We are in a community of true believers, and every believer is a kinsman. I have made the pilgrimage twice. My senior boy is a renowned Malam now. He runs a Quranic school for adults in this community. He has made the pilgrimage three times.

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Hajiya, who now resides in an Arab village, still commands some respect in her first village. They remember how, in the past, only she could bail out a detained immigrant from the police cells and how a word from her to the white officials of the Gezira could ensure a job for an immigrant. Her background as the daughter of a respected chief made her eligible for leader­ ship in the eyes of the authorities who, at that time, needed the support of the leaders among the immigrant groups to counteract a resurgent dose of Mahdism which had begun to appear in Sudan (cf. Duffield 1981: 22). While the Gezira was still under European management - if not control Hajiya’s position as the most respected member of the West African commun­ ity of Wad Ahmed remained unquestioned. Arab tenants approached her whenever they wanted to convince some West African labourer that the terms of a share-cropping arrangement or a casual labour contract were fair. Her word in such cases, or her adjudication in minor local conflicts, was accepted as final and led, ultimately, to a satisfactory solution to any discord. Hajiya does not believe the fact that she had completed the pilgrimage had anything to do with her social standing in the community. She rather stresses that her background as the daughter of a chief who had fought the British, plus the reception given her by the authorities in colonial Sudan, reinforced whatever respect people had for her. She is always ready to point out that the village had a formal leader, a West African Sheikh, a male, who had also been to Mecca. (The movement of Hajiya from her former village to an Arab village is discussed in Chapter 3.)

Caseii A bare fifteen miles or so from Hajiya’s village - although if one drove on the bewildering maze of vehicle roads along the canals, the distance would probably be double this - lies the village of Wad Fellata. It is a West African village founded in 1947 by, and named after, its current Sheikh. Its official designation by the Gezira authorities is that of a ‘work camp’, alluding to the fact that it is a station from which a never-ending pool of workers can be drawn for various jobs on the cotton plots (see Chapter 4). In this camp lives Malam Abubakar Faki Ahmed. He is in his mid-eighties. His features are marked by lines of deep thinking. That, at least, is the constant impression one gets when an occasional frown sets on his dry face, disfigured by old scars of smallpox. His eye - the only one he has, the other having been destroyed by disease - never looses its twinkle nor ceases to hold one in its orbit as he tries to consider what answers to give to the naïve inquiries of the anthropologist. He wakes at dawn each day, buys fresh vegetables from an Arab whose gardens are nearby and catches the first lorry to Wad Medani market. He returns to Wad Fellata around noon for his siesta. At five in the afternoon, or thereabouts, when the glow of the sun begins to fade, he goes to the village Quranic school for adults to discuss the meaning and implications

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of some line or passage from the Quran. Malam Abubakar regards this as the highlight of all the events of the day. He has followed these classes for the past fourteen years. It was fourteen years ago he returned from Mecca after having left Hausaland (in 1960) for his long pursuit of the pilgrimage. He was born Amadu Hakin in Jega, a small village on the Zamfara river in the district of Gwandu in Sokoto Province in present-day Nigeria. The youngest of sixteen children in a family with many generations of fishermen, he had early on been earmarked for the fishing trade. He claims to have been toughened by a very devout uncle who taught him how to trap croco­ diles, taught him the Quran, as well as the art of finding the most delicate river fish.The world of his youth was saturated with stories of the coming of colonial rule, and how it had changed the whole of Hausaland. Like Hajiya, he too heard stories of the great masses of people who had left Hausaland to escape the rule of the Europeans. Colonial rule had remained for some time, but now they were being told by the politicians (in the 1950s) that Hausaland and Nigeria were to become free. No member of his family had been involved in the jihad against the Europeans, but from his uncle he had learned that some distant relatives of theirs had been among those who heeded the call to migrate to the east after the fall of the Caliphate. Years later, just before the second Great War, a sister of his had left for the pilgrimage and had not been heard from ever since. He recalls that since childhood he had dreamt of making the pilgrimage. It was something he knew he would have to undertake some day, but he only decided to act upon this when, during his fifty-second year, he went to consult a Malam-diviner who told him that it was the will of God that he undertook the pilgrimage, and that wherever he decided to make a home he would be blessed and happy. Malam Abubakar is proud of the fact that he left home with as much as £150 (sterling). With that sort of money, he pointed out, he could have travelled by aeroplane but he did not do so because he was a proper Muslim and knew that the proper way to make the pilgrimage was to go by land. Thus he set out with his wife and five children for Kano to get passports for the journey. They went from Jega to Argungu and then made their way by a combination of hikes and lorry rides, until fourteen days later they arrived in Kano. In Kano they applied for and received passports for pilgrims valid for ‘British and French territories in West Africa, French Equatorial Africa, Fernando Po and Saudi Arabia’. The passports further give the following facts: ‘Name: Abubakar Faki Ahmed; Nationality: Nigerian; Occupation: Fisherman; Col­ our of eyes: Brown; Distinguishing marks: Tribal marks on both cheeks.’ In place of his signature: a thumb print. Three photographs are fixed to the passport, with the further endorsement: ‘Accompanied by two sons: Gariba Amado: born 1950. Umaro: born 1956.’ A cross in red ink appears on the

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passport picture of each of the boys. His wife also got a passport with the photographs of two girls stuck to it beside her own. The girls were two and eight years of age. Similarly there is a cross on each of the photographs in this second passport. And last, a passport issued to a daughter who was ten years old. Each of the passports is stamped in red ink with the word ‘Pilgrim’. These passports are prized relics for Abubakar. He recalls that they spent a further ten days in Kano before they could get all the necessary documents for the journey. The price for a passport was only £2 and he had no difficulty in obtaining these, as all the authorities required was to see how much money he had for the journey. They appeared to be satisfied with what he showed them. From Kano they caught a lorry that was carrying forty pilgrims to Fort Lamy in Chad. The driver of this vehicle was a white Arab (Farin Balarebe), whose wife acted as co-driver. He remembers that she did not pray and drove faster than her husband. Usually they broke journey at dusk and rested until dawn when they started again while the weather was cool. As they neared the little town of Kassola in Chad, personal disaster struck Malam Abubakar. His six-year-old daughter died from dysentery:

The Arab driver drove us straight to the zongo. I said to the local sarki. ‘I have a dead child in the lorry.’ They took the child, washed it. And we dug a grave for her. All the passengers of the lorry waited until the burial rites were finished and then we continued on our journey. My heart was very sad. But I considered myself then to be fortunate. I had after all only lost one child. Others had lost children as well, during the short trip from Kano to Fort Lamy. One family lost their twin babies because the mother’s milk dried up. Another family, which joined us in Fort Lamy, lost three children before we reached Sudan. So I was lucky. It took us four days to reach Fort Lamy. Two more days to reach Abeche. At Abeche we said goodbye to our driver and stayed in the zongo until we could find a suitable lorry for El Geneina in Sudan. A lorry agent found one for us and we were able to reach El Geneina in one day. At the border they examined our passports. They looked at the picture of Aysha my deceased daughter who shared a passport with my wife. The official looked at the photograph and asked. ‘Where is Aysha?’ I said ‘She died in Kassoli.’ And he put a cross on her photo­ graph. They spent about a week in El Geneina before moving southwards to Nyala, where they had heard that conditions were good for Nigerian pilgrims who wanted a place to rest before continuing their journey. At Nyala they found that the Sarki Zongo had built a pilgrim camp outside the town because he

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thought that if pilgrims were housed in the zongo proper, they might be open to temptations which might distract them from their intention to reach Mecca. Of the forty-eight pilgrims who set out from Kano, only four reached Sudan together with Malam Abubakar’s family; all ten of them made it together to Nyala. At Nyala Camp they stayed in the same house as a pilgrim who was seriously ill. Abubakar learned that the man was looking for someone he could trust to undertake a task for him. He needed someone to go to a village near Kassala and bring back his son to him. He wanted to see his son before he passed away. Although he was wealthy and had promised to pay handsomely for the task, he had not yet been able to find someone whom he could regard as reliable enough. Malam Abubakar called on him and offered his services which the sick man readily accepted. He then left his wife and four children in the zongo and took off by train to Kassala. After thirty days he returned to Nyala with the dying man’s son. Fortunately, the man lived long enough to meet his son and to pay for the assignment before dying. Malam Abubakar then collected his family and set off by train towards Wad Medani, the principal town of the Gezira region. We arrived at Wad Medani train station. I felt completely lost. I still then did not understand a word of the Arabic the people spoke. Suddenly in the midst of all the noise, I heard a man speaking Hausa. I went to him and I said: ‘Where is the land of the Takari?' He said: ‘What province in Nigeria?’ ‘I said Kasar Gwandu.' He said: ‘If you are from Gwandu then you must go to Sheikh Ahmed’s village.’

The Hausa man helped them with their luggage and directed them from the station towards the village. They left Wad Medani station on foot and walked the twelve-mile distance to Wad Fellata, arriving just before sunset. They were directed to the Sheikh’s house where they put their luggage down:

Many people gathered around us, but no one said a word. The Sheikh came and sat down. He repeated the enquiries. ‘Where in Nigeria?’ ‘What village of Gwandu?’ I answered him, and when I said I was from the village of Jega, he said: ‘Then you have a sister living here. You must be the brother of El Hassan.’ Then he said: ‘Maraba!’ (Welcome!) And all the people started chanting ‘Maraba! Maraba!' And they brought us water to drink.

Malam Abubakar knew he had a sister somewhere in the east and that it was possible she lived in Sudan, but he did not know anyone by name of El Hassan. They sent for El Hassan. When she came he found to his great joy that she was the sister who had left for the pilgrimage many years ago. She and her husband bade them welcome. They slept in the compound of the Sheikh that night. The next day the

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Sheikh and the elders of the village called on Malam Abubakar and offered him a house for the symbolic sum of one shilling. It was a house that, until a few days before, had belonged to an old pilgrim who had decided to return home to Nigeria to die in his place of birth. ‘Kama chauta su ka bane ta’ (it was like a gift, they gave it to me). The family stayed in Wad Fellata for two years, during which they worked as temporary labourers in the Gezira, picking cotton during the peak seasons and weeding on the plots of Arab Tenants. Between the peak agricultural seasons, Malam Abubakar’s old talent as a crocodile-catcher proved useful when there was little agricultural work. He went for long treks on the White Nile with other Hausa trappers to catch crocodiles for their skins, which they sold to a white man from Khartoum.31 After a couple of years in Wad Ahmed, Malam Abubakar left his two sons in the village and set out with his wife and daughters for Port Sudan in continuation of their pilgrimage to Mecca. Their meagre travelling fund ran out at Port Sudan. It was then only three months left for that year’s pilgrimage to take place. He thus chose to send his wife and daughters ahead to Mecca. He would find work to earn some more money and follow them later. He set himself up as a faki32 and began telling fortunes and writing charms for Arab clients. He was unable to make the pilgrimage that year, nor did his wife. She died suddenly outside Mecca. The small girls, six and eight respectively, died some three weeks later due to lack of food; they had been suffering from malnutrition for many months. News of their death reached Abubakar in Port Sudan through returning pilgrims, some of whom had helped to bury his daughters in Saudi Arabia. These people were kind enough to bring back the passports and the worn-out Quran that his wife carried with her. He never found out the cause of her death, nor was he able to find out where his wife and daughters were buried. Overwhelmed with sorrow, he crossed the Red Sea to try to find out more about what had happened. Once in Saudi Arabia, he himself had the attack of smallpox that was to disfigure his face and destroy his eye. He was detained by the health authorities for many months until he was sufficiently recovered and certified free from contagion; then he was released. Now so close to Mecca, he finally completed his pilgrimage and set out for the village of Wad Ahmed to his two remaining sons. As he walked slowly in the heat towards the Gezira, his heart was heavy; for although he had finally achieved the ultimate glory for which he had paid so dearly, he dreaded the prospect of having to tell his sons about the death of their mother and two sisters. He need not have worried. When he arrived, he found that his two sons had died in a cholera epidemic which had swept through the village the year before. His grief knew no bounds but he did not despair. He settled in the village and, eventually, married a young widow whose husband had died suddenly from cerebro-spinal menin­

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gitis. His new wife gave him a daughter who lived and grew up to marry the son of the Sheikh of the village. He has now several grandchildren of whom he is very proud. Malam Abubakar does not understand anyone who frames questions as to whether or not the price he has paid for the pilgrimage was worth it. He looks at the little red crosses in ink on the faces of the loved ones he has lost to the pilgrimage, and expresses not the smallest doubt that what has happened to him was only the fulfilment of God’s will: They are all with Allah now. It is Allah’s way. I remember someone who was able to see the future telling me that wherever I made my home Allah will bless me, and I will be comfortable. Who am I to question Allah’s will? I am very comfortable now. At first, I used to look at the photos of all these dear ones I have lost and I was bitter. I thought sometimes: ‘Why me?’ But death is for all. What one should be frightened of in this world are the problems of this world.

The two cases presented above read like a composite of the life-histories of West African pilgrims in Sudan (cf. Birks 1978: 84ff.). They have been chosen not for their uniqueness or particularity, nor for any reason other than for the fact that they are so commonplace as to be prototypical of the experiences of the West African immigrants in Sudan. If one were to recount these two stories to an audience of West Africans in a Sudanese village, even listeners who were born there, there would be nothing in them they would regard as extraordinary. They would have heard similar accounts before from their parents, grandparents, or from some other relatives, and would regard these stories as clear indications of what their heritage is and what future task they have ahead of them - as pilgrims still on their way. We have so far dealt with a specific sociocultural climate in which a particu­ lar kind of emigration has taken place. We have seen how it first began as the fulfilment of the demands of religious belief and increased immensely at cer­ tain points in time due to factors associated with the same belief. It is now time to say something about the recent forms of these movements which may well have been sustained by a number of factors other than religious ones (although their immigrants still invoke religion as the reason for migrating). If the coming of colonial rule to Northern Nigeria was the prime catalyst to the large-scale migrations of West Africans to Sudan, it was the consolidation of the same colonial rule in the whole of the Sudan belt that helped sustain the movements, because it brought a general improvement in the infrastruc­ ture of the region. Roads were constructed and railway lines were built, thus making travel less hazardous33 and, likewise, expanding economic oppor­ tunities afforded the immigrants livelihoods in various niches at a time when an almost acute shortage of manpower in the various sectors began to be felt.

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Balamoan (1976) puts forward the view that the ravages of the Mahdist years (1884-99) had drastically depleted the local population of Sudan and that the colonial officials found it prudent to follow a policy that would facilitate the settlement of immigrants in the country if it was to have a chance to develop its potential resources. He suggests, therefore, that there was a conscious policy of encouraging West Africans to settle in Sudan at this time. There is much documentary evidence to sustain such a contention, but this is by no means unambiguously so. I am of the contention that the authorities, both in Nigeria and Sudan, also regarded the Muslim pilgrims as something of a nuisance. The authorities were constantly faced with having to find funds to repatriate pilgrims who were stranded or had to be kept in quarantine because of contagious diseases.34 However, we can infer from the reception individual colonial officials gave the immigrants arriving in Sudan at this time that a tacit policy of some kind was being applied which favoured the settlement of immigrants.35 This policy, in so far as it existed, became very marked in its application when a series of agricultural projects culminating with the establishment of the Gezira Scheme in 1925 (Gaitskell 1959), increased the demand for manpower. Labour shortages have been one of the Gezira Scheme’s greatest difficulties since its establish­ ment. As a result of this, many immigrants, who were willing to toil on the cotton plots for wages, could quite easily find work. West African immigrants have thus had a long-standing relationship with the Gezira Scheme (see Gaitskell 1928; Hassoun 1952). It is not surprising that Hajiya found herself being offered land to induce her to settle, presumably as a tenant in the Gezira. In the next chapter we shall examine the role the West African immigrants have played in the Gezira Scheme by tracing the movements of the pilgrims from their points of entry into Sudan in order to find out how they followed the twin tasks of fending for themselves in contemporary Sudanese society while at the same time nurturing hopes of their ultimate pilgrimage to Mecca.

P late 1: For a West African pilgrim, a horse and cart is a symbol of Arabness and a sign of social mobility in Sudan.

P late 2 : Interviewing the Sheikh of Wad Fellata.

Plate 3: West African Muslims in prayer.

Plate 4: A Quranic school in Wad Fellata.

Plate 5: The streets of Wad Fellata.

3 THE RURAL DWELLERS Moral virtues, secular constraints

In this chapter I shall show how most of the West African pilgrims gravitate to the immigrant villages of the Gezira, and examine the manner in which they become integrated into the economic structures of the region and ultimately in Sudan.1 Their connection with the irrigation projects (particu­ larly with the Gezira Scheme as a reliable source of agricultural labour) which has been briefly touched upon in the previous chapter, will be ex­ panded. The pursuit of a rural livelihood in villages which the authorities designate as ‘camps’ will be examined. The camps will be presented as appropriate stop-overs, befitting the pilgrims’ idea of themselves as not belonging to the contemporary social structures which surround them. The argument will be that they see country life as epitomising a wholesomeness that pilgrims must strive for, in order to kindle and retain their motivation for pursuing the pilgrimage. As a result of this view of themselves the ‘camps’ have turned into (and exhibit all the fleeting characteristics of) half­ way abodes. Thus, while their inhabitants are occasionally subjected to certain restrictions and movements by the authorities (and this has resulted in their feeling alienated and suspicious of anything official), these same restrictions provide West African Muslims with something that amounts in effect to a legitimisation of their status as ‘pilgrims’ in Sudan as opposed to other types of immigrants. Finally, I will argue that in these camps, the pilgrims are drawn into a complex web of debt relationships with such ramifications as to make them become both physically and mentally con­ strained, thus unable to disentangle themselves for the continued journey towards Mecca. ENTERING AND LEAVING SUDAN FROM WEST AFRICA

The official view is that these days there are no West Africans entering Sudan from the border with Chad.2 The authorities attribute this partly to a more effective patrolling of the borders, and partly to the fact that the civil war in Chad in recent times has rendered travel through the country less safe than was the case in the past. In so far as this claim could be held to be

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true, it must in part also be attributed to the fact that Nigeria, too, since the early 1970s has discouraged the overland pilgrimage. No doubt such measures have had some effect on the numbers of Nigerians who chose this mode of pilgrimage. But as I will argue, the purported reduction in numbers has not been very significant; the overland pilgrimage continues as it has always done. Sudan in particular has had cause to be concerned with trying to control her borders effectively, in a vital effort to maintain her sovereignty. Territori­ ally Africa’s largest state, Sudan shares borders with eight countries. Most of these surrounding neighbours have in recent times been belligerent and unstable. Indeed, it would be appropriate to regard her national boundaries - all except for those with Egypt - as frontiers, if by frontier we mean a demarcation between two states that is unstable because of widespread unrest in one or both states, or because of the declared hostility of one state towards the other. Either the demarcating region of the frontier is character­ istically unstable because there is an influx into the one country of refuge­ seeking inhabitants from the other(s), or there are agents who might sneak across to commit sabotage. The unfortunate policies of most of Sudan’s neighbours in recent times have driven hundreds of thousands of refugees into Sudan, thereby threatening her stability. For example, at one stage during the past decade there was a hostile Libya to the north-west, to the west the war-torn state of Chad, and in the south-west Central African Republic reigned the megalomaniac Bokassa, whose despotism and crimes could only have been rivalled by those of Idi Amin on the southern border. Further, to the south-east were the unhappy tribes of northern Kenya; while in the east proper lay Eritrea, engaged in several years of struggle against the Ethiopian government. Hardly a month went by in which floods of refugees from most of these nations could not be found entering Sudan where local hospital­ ity made them feel welcome. The West African pilgrims merged with this flow of people. One of the unfortunate consequences of this unchecked entry was that some of the immigrants usually entered with their livestock without having the necessary vaccinations or inoculations, as a result of which they have been known to cause the spread of serious illnesses like smallpox and rinderpest (see Birks 1978: 134; el Nayal 1969).3 Thus the whole question of the illegal entry of immigrants is a touchy one; hence the claim by the authorities that it has ceased in the west of Sudan. The truth, however, is that there are still many immigrants entering the country every month without travel documents of any kind. On the southern borders where rebel activity has weakened governmental control, flows of immigrants and, recently, emigrants escaping from the cross-fire of government and rebel forces are common. In the west, contrary to the claims of government officials, the civil war in Chad has actually made travel safer than before. West African Muslims, who are able and willing to

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pay safe conduct, are generally guided by one warring faction and delivered safely into the care of another until they arrive at the border with Sudan. Pilgrims often remark that while in the past they sometimes fell prey to robbers and raiders of various kinds, this rarely happens these days. Now they find they can travel quite safely in Chad, amid all the fighting, often with troops escorting them. When the pilgrims arrive at the Chad-Sudan border, those without docu­ ments leave the vehicles they are travelling in and cross the border on foot, doing so out of the vicinity of the border posts (cf. Birks 1978: 48). After customs’ formalities have been completed the vehicles drive away from the border post and collect the illegal migrants some distance away. Sometimes this is even done in full view of the border post. There are about 2,000 miles of border between Chad and Sudan, with only two border posts along this distance which are supposed to check the documents of those passing through (el Nayal 1969). Slipping through is therefore quite easy. However, it is not only the lack of border stations that makes effective control difficult; an equally important factor to be taken into account is that land-locked Chad, with an economy weakened by several years of civil war, has great difficulties in importing basic items like soap, sugar and other necessities from the industrialised countries. So whether by design or inability it is lax around the borders, enabling a flow of such goods into Chad to take place. Lorries from the west carry immigrants into Sudan and return with sugar, soap, cigarettes, medicines and other contraband (see el Nayal 1969). During a period of five weeks spent on the Sudan Chad border near Nyala, I recorded 35 arrivals of Hausa-speaking West Africans, all of whom had entered without documents. They hoped to proceed to the Gezira and from there to Mecca. However, I was able to record only three westward movements of West Africans. These were men in their late thirties, all born in the Sudan, who had not yet completed the pilgrimage although they too hoped to reach Mecca. One was going to visit some relatives, while the others said they were only going into Chad ‘to sell some things’, before returning to Sudan. Informants (in Nyala) described these men as ‘smugglers’ who went back and forth across the border to do business. In four weeks, I did not record a single instance of a West African leaving Sudan through Chad after the pilgrimage. Informants said that nowadays it was very un­ usual to see pilgrims returning to Nigeria by way of the Chadian border after a successful pilgrimage. They imputed this to the fact that the authorities had become increasingly strict with returnees, a fact denied by police offi­ cials, who said that it was in accordance with governmental policy to allow West Africans leaving Sudan for Nigeria to do so with as little difficulty as possible. Despite the lack of first-hand evidence, it is nevertheless signific­ ant that despite the fact that the influx of migrants into Sudan from the west continues, few of these appear to be returning. Slightly more than a

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decade or so earlier, Birks (1978) was able to record several instances of returning migrants, some of whom claimed to have successfully completed the pilgrimage. WEST AFRICANS AND THE GEZIRA SCHEME

Soon after arriving in Sudan, most of the pilgrims make their way to the immigrant villages and the urban centres of the Gezira region. It is here that their gradual integration into the economic structures of Sudan begins. The urban-dwelling pilgrims will be discussed in the next chapter. Here we shall concentrate on the rural dwellers, in order to examine how they make a living for themselves. As mentioned in the previous chapter, the Gezira Scheme and similar agricultural projects came into existence at a period when there was an acute shortage of manpower in Sudan. Balamoan (1976), a population expert, has convincingly argued that at the turn of the cen­ tury Sudan was still suffering from the turbulences of the Mahdist years. Contingent disasters (man-made as well as natural calamities such as the wars with the British, internal conflicts, diseases and droughts) had laid waste large portions of the land. Therefore, when the construction of the modern Sudanese state began, the replenishing of the population was a key issue. Much was done to attract immigrants from outside. This notwithstand­ ing, not all immigrants were welcome. For example, Balamoan (ibid, 173) shows how there was at one stage a distinct attempt by the colonial authorities to keep Sudan black. Egyptians, some whites, as well as residents regarded as ‘tainted’ immigrants were expelled from the country, while immigrants from black Africa, in this case mainly West and Equatorial Africans, were received with some warmth (loc. cit.). The construction of pump and irriga­ tions schemes, which culminated with the opening of the Gezira Scheme in 1925, as mentioned before, made the demand for manpower even greater, a welcome situation for immigrants. The Gezira Scheme hardly needs any detailed introduction here. It has been subjected to the scrutiny of more scholars than almost any other development project anywhere in the world. A good many works have emerged, and are still emerging, all of which still attempt to understand its general ramifications, particularly economically and socially.4 Much of such research has been framed in terms of labour problems, and numerous projects and scientific papers have emerged from both local and foreign scholars on this issue. However, with a few exceptions,5 none of these works have dealt with the West African workers, who constitute by far the largest group of workers employed in the Scheme. Conceived primarily as a project to produce long-staple cotton for export through the irrigation of nearly two million acres between the White and Blue Niles, the Gezira Scheme is the largest farm in the world under one single management. Its original organisation involved a tripartite partnership

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between the Government, the Sudan Gezira Board (henceforth the SGB) and the Tenants. The government provided the land (by buying it for a nominal fee from the original owners, semi-nomadic farmers residing in the area). The SGB provided the agricultural and managerial expertise for running the project. Finally, the Tenants were expected to provide the labour required for working the farms effectively. A complex arrangement was worked out between the partners specifying how profits accruing from the partnership should be shared (see Gaitskell 1959; Barnett 1977). The SGB - like most large bureaucracies - has a pyramidal structure. At its pinnacle is the managing director followed by the Group Inspectors, heads of the largest units in the division of the scheme. Beneath the Group Inspectors are the Block Inspectors, Blocks being the next organisational sub-division within which are the Tenancy plots proper. Under the Block Inspectors are the Field Inspectors, whose main function is to oversee the cultivation of cotton. An organisation of such a large scale was bound to have some structural difficulties and the Gezira Scheme has had more than its fair share of problems since its inception. Although it has had decreasing yields in the past decade or so, and its Achilles heel might well be, as Barnett (1977) has pointed out, its having been conceived as a one-crop project, it is still the largest single hard currency earner for Sudan. The Gezira Scheme alone generates 10 per cent of the GNP of Sudan, over 70 per cent of its long-staple cotton exports and in the region of 85 per cent of the wheat and groundnuts produced in the country. Some of the fruits of this vast achievement has trickled down to the inhabitants of the Gezira. Consequently, the area has more electrified towns, piped-water supply and medical clinics than elsewhere in Sudan. The inhabitants enjoy a higher standard of living than the rest of the country. And the SGB, operating from its neat headquarters at Barakat, could well be one of the most efficient organisations found anywhere in the Third World. In the beginning it was not the shortage of population alone that resulted in problems for the Gezira Scheme. The first Tenants were recruited from the local population from whom the government had purchased the land. These were more or less semi-nomadic free agents who were expected to become regimented producers of cotton overnight. As could well be expected, they did not quite live up to the demands placed upon them. Nor were they able to work forty acres (the size of the original Tenancies) with a single­ family labour unit as was originally planned. As a result of this, West African Muslims became involved in the Scheme early in its history (see Hassoun 1952), starting as workers on the plots of Tenancy holders. The steady wealth that the Tenancies brought gradually created a class of land­ owners who moved into the nearby urban areas, entrusting the running of their Tenancies to the immigrants (this was the beginning of the Wakil (agent) system which will be discussed presently). Although many Block

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Inspectors were satisfied with the involvement of the West Africans immig­ rants - some even claimed to have steadily achieved higher yields because they had West African workers on their Blocks (Hassoun 1952: 100) others regarded this as an unsatisfactory trend. Arthur Gaitskell, for example, (who was later to become one of the most prominent men connected with the Scheme) then a brash, young Block Inspector, wrote a memo in 1928 pointing out that the Gezira Scheme was slowly producing ‘a class of idle rich’, hiring other people to do their work. He pointed out that ‘absenteeism [was] far too general. A system of wakils [agents, or managers of farms] once (and rightly so) anathema, has permeated everywhere’. He continued: 'In many Tenancies some wild West African is left in charge, incapable of understanding the Inspectors’ advice or orders.’6 By this time West African workers had already become the largest group of workers in the Gezira Scheme. Gaitskell, however, undoubtedly regarded the increasing involvement of the West Africans as a bad sign. It is not clear whether this view was shared by his superiors at the time; but they had to accept the fact that without the West African workers the Scheme would have ceased to function efficiently. This soon became very clear from the ramifications of the global depression of the 1930s. The season 1931/32 was the worst in the history of the Scheme. Not only did the Tenants have extremely low yields, but also the price of cotton fell because there was little demand on the world market. Several Tenants, finding their efforts not sufficiently rewarding, simply left their Tenancies and returned to their former occupations or took other jobs altogether. The authorities of the Scheme needed to fill the vacated Tenancies and therefore turned to the West African labourers, who readily accepted. This marked a new phase in their long relationship with the Gezira Scheme. A number of these people now ceased being just farmworkers or farm managers and also became legal Tenancy holders. Gradually the global depression abated. By 1946 the situ­ ation had markedly improved and cotton began to fetch good prices again. Gezira Tenancies were once more attractive and the immigrants who had helped rescue the Tenancies from neglect became the focus of local agitation for the return of their holdings to locals. This pressure soon resulted in legislation that decreed the return of Tenancies by non-Sudanese nationals on their death, vacation or incapacity to run a Tenancy adequately. Hence­ forth, the West Africans once again found their role in the Gezira demoted from that of owners to sharecroppers, or, in simple terms, labourers. RURAL LIFE IS GOOD FOR PILGRIMS

Islamicists of differing shades and inclinations agree on the vital role city life has played and still plays in Islamic societies. The city is seen, above all, as providing an environment conducive to the preservation and spread of the written Word, as well as a centre for the development and diffusion of

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culture (see Gellner 1981: 22). To the West African pilgrims in Sudan, however, it is rural life that is important; they see it as enhancing qualities in rural dwellers that are ideals pilgrims must aspire for. To hear informants extol the virtues of rural life, one is struck by the strength of their conviction that the rustic simplicity of life in the country is superior to life in an urban setting and, therefore, the more desirable one for pilgrims. They say that it is purifying because one’s daily toils of tilling the land, planting crops and watching them grow, brings one into close daily contact with nature, the epitome of purity. They claim that the hardiness resulting from working close to nature strengthens one’s resolve, thereby making one less likely to become corrupt. Furthermore, living in the comparatively small, spatial confines of the village keeps one close to one’s family and elders, thus subject to the coercive supervision of tradition. There is also the fact that it offers the diligent worker a chance to feed a family and to save for the rest of the journey in occupations that are ‘untainted’ - in contrast to most urban occupations which they regard as banza, polluted (literally: worthless). All the virtues associated with the West Africans in Sudan are seen - by the pilgrims themselves as well as their hosts - as virtues arising from rural life: pilgrims are hardworking and trustworthy (so as to be deemed reliable farm managers for Arab Tenants of the Gezira Scheme). Then again, pilgrims are pious and are believed neither to drink, nor gamble, nor smoke bongo (marijuana). Also they are thrifty, although this carries an ambivalent connota­ tion of being at once a virtue and implying some degree of avarice. Conversely, all the negative things one hears about the West Africans in Sudan - that they are undesirables, criminals, black marketeers, beggars, etc. which have served to make them a stigmatised group - are all labels acquired through life in urban areas. The pilgrims themselves generally affirm this negative feature of urban life. They quite often regard any young unmarried pilgrim who leaves the village for life in an urban centre as someone who is a potential rejector of the pilgrimage and the pilgrim-intent. Yet urban life, though it might be corrupt and distract, is still indispensable to the West African pilgrim. Hence, in Sudan, the urban centres set the pace for West African pilgrim life. (This theme will be expanded upon in the next chapter.) In the context of Islamic discussion one cannot help but note that such views are reminiscent of one of the central tenets of Ibn Khaldun’s philosophy of history. He, too, saw rural life as superior to life in an urban setting, simply because it was more able to forge a greater group solidarity, a prerequisite for survival under hostile desert conditions. He saw city life with its luxuries, its inhabitants atomised, as it were, into interreacting monads, as lacking a higher degree of solidarity (asabiya) and thus wanting in the conditions that produced hardiness in rural groups. Hence Khaldun noted that the Bedouin were able to plunder cities and establish dynasties in

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them until they too eventually - after four generations, he thought - became corrupted and weakened by the luxuries of the city and fell prey to new invaders from the rural areas (see Ibn Khaldun 1958 Vol. 1, Chapter 2; see also Gellner 1968). The similarity with Ibn Khaldun’s views notwithstanding, the pilgrims’ preference and their claims of superiority for a rural existence seem to have more in common with a naïve pseudo-Rousseauesque sentiment than with Ibn Khaldun. They talk lyrically about village life, but even the most literate ones do not cite Ibn Khaldun to legitimate their preference, despite the fact that they would quite frequently cite some works or texts of Islamic scholars from the past to illustrate a point. Furthermore, unlike Khaldun’s rural dwellers, who have as their goal the attainment of urban sedentary life (Ibn Khaldun 1958, Vol. 2: 291), the pilgrims repudiate urban life. By the view of the rural dwelling West African pilgrim in Sudan, only failed pilgrims strive for a life in towns. They would never be able to impose themselves on the urban dwellers, nor have they any desire to do so. A degree of asymmetry will always permeate their relationship with the nearest urban centre(s). They disparage life in towns, but they still need the towns and are tied to them (in symbioses that will be treated more fully in the following chapter). WAD fellata: a pilgrim work camp in THE GEZIRA

Wad Fellata is the name by which the Sudanese authorities know Tsofon Gari (‘Old Town’ in Hausa). This is a West African pilgrim community on the Gezira Scheme, about three miles from Wad Medani town. Its local name has changed many times since it was founded in 1939 on the plot of a Sudanese Arab who was willing to forgo the dhurra he might have earned on the ten feddan (c. ten acres), which formed the original site of the settlement. At any given point in time it has two names; the official name which is constant, and the local name which changes with the emergence of each new Sheikh whose name it then carries. Many of the West African communities in the Gezira apply a similar system of naming and this causes some confusion when one attempts to follow the historical development of a specific community and needs to relate the names informants give to those found in the archives. Although the immigrants have adopted this system of naming villages from their hosts, I maintain that its application gives an innermost significance to the pilgrims, since it conveys the impression that a progression of sorts has taken place towards the achievement of their ultimate goal. One gathers from informants’ accounts that the accession of a new Sheikh is usually followed by a period of high influx of people into the village. In Wad Fellata some pilgrims who came in the wake of the current Sheikh’s accession said they had come to the village because the new leader had a great reputation for piety and that they expected his leadership to enhance the pilgrimage of many of the inhabitants. This meant, they ex­

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plained, that his devotion to Islam would, on the one hand, discourage nonstrict Muslims from coming to the village - some Sheikhs were known to forbid alcoholic beverages and cigarettes in their villages - and on the other, that his example would make others strive harder to complete the pilgrimage. The persona of the Sheikh thus reflects, as it were, the religiosity of the entire community. The constantly changing names of the pilgrim villages symbolically express a collective progression towards Mecca which is believed to occur each time a new leader takes the helm. This is so, notwithstanding the fact that an individual’s choice of a particular village might well have coincided with (or indeed been prompted by) the availability of good share­ cropping contracts, the possibility of a better dhurra or groundnut cultivation, or some other material incentive. Such incentives, however, are believed to derive partly from the baraka of good leaders. They are regarded as con­ sequences of a leader’s piety, rather than qualities independent of him. There is no perceived opposition between success in secular life and distinction derived from holiness. Indeed, the secular success of the Sheikhs is seen as a sign of holiness. Even where there is a clear case of clustering by kinship or home-village affiliation, these are usually subsumed under the charismatic attraction of a current Sheikh. The inhabitants of the pilgrim villages thus conceive of their universe as progressing towards higher and higher stages of piety, brought on by the choice of exemplary Sheikhs. Therefore the method of naming villages is a significant ingredient in their whole undertak­ ing and it serves to convey the impression that the spatio-temporal environ­ ment at any given stage or time is not the same. This is an important fact; it reflects an attitude that is fundamental to an understanding of their whole quest for the pilgrimage. The current Sheikh of Wad Fellata is a Hausa in his mid-seventies, who arrived in Sudan before the outbreak of the Second World War. He chose to settle in Wad Fellata because his uncle was the Sheikh there. He is one of the few West Africans who have not only successfully completed the pilgrim­ age once, but have repeatedly returned to Mecca. Although his uncle had been Sheikh before him, he appears to have attained the position in his own right in his capacity as a successful entrepreneur. He first distinguished himself as a farm manager for Arab Tenants and on some occasions had been appointed as a temporary Tenant by Block Inspectors of the SGB, in cases where they urgently needed to fill a Tenancy vacated by someone with no apparent heirs. His uncle’s as well as his own patronage brought many new pilgrims to the village from the Sokoto province of Nigeria. Very soon he had built up a large group of devoted followers on whose behalf he negotiated work contracts and agreements with Tenants in need of workers. With such credentials, coupled with a growing reputation as a successful faki (see Chapter 4) and trader, his accession to the position of Sheikh was undisputed after the death of his uncle. The close proximity of Wad Medani

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town, and the Sheikh’s ability to arrange lucrative sharecropping contracts with the Tenants of the surrounding plots, attracted yet more West Africans from other communities. The village began to thrive and eventually became one of the larger West African settlements in the Gezira. Hausa and Fulani live cheek by jowl in the village, and although all around one hears the chanting of Quranic verses and the repeating of Islamic proverbs and expressions, Hausa is the lingua franca everyone uses. Even a number of Burgo (Chadian) families also speak Hausa, although they do not stress their identity as pilgrims in the same emphatic manner as the other West Africans. According to the Sheikh, the village currently has about 7,500 inhabitants, although the real figure probably comes closer to the estimate of the SGB which places it at around 4,000. Also according to the SGB, some 60 per cent of the inhabitants earn their living by sharecropping or as a part of the much sought-after casual and/or seasonal labour on the cotton fields of the Gezira Scheme. The remaining 40 per cent consist of labourers of various kinds. All the adult population describe themselves as pilgrims, whereas only five of them have successfully completed the pilgrimage. All five have repeatedly returned to Mecca and performed the pilgrimage several times over. Two pilgrims have performed the pilgrimage three times, while the remaining three claim to have lost count of the number of times they have been to Mecca. Around 60 per cent of the adults were born in Sudan. The remaining 40 per cent were either born in Nigeria or Chad, and of these only three have revisited Nigeria since coming to Sudan. It is interesting to compare this with the findings of a Sudanese researcher, Alih Suleman (included as an Appendix III in Culwick 1954). In an interview conducted nearly twenty years before with thirty-three male pilgrims in a small West African village with a population of ninety-five, twenty-one of the males claimed to have been to Mecca. Of these, four had performed the pilgrimage a second time. All these successful pilgrims expressed a desire to return to Mecca. There are eight mosques in Wad Fellata built from dried mud in the same manner as other mosques in the Muslim Sahel belt of West Africa. The main mosque stands in the centre of the village. The site is significant because it constitutes the heart of the settlement. The buildings closest to it are the houses of the Sheikh and those of his chief advisers. The further removed from the main mosque a house stands, the less prestigious the status of its owner in the village. Thus newcomers, unless they have obtained houses vacated by departed pilgrims or been offered accommodation by the already-established ones, would quite simply put up the most temporary structures, usually from rags, cardboard or straw. Such shelters are usually found on the outskirts of the village, farthest from the main mosque. As a contrast, in the urban areas one sometimes finds the most destitute pilgrims,

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particularly disabled ones, sleeping at the foot of the mosques with their entire possessions spread around them. The mosques in the pilgrim villages offer no such refuge. In Wad Fellata the space outside the mosque is where the Sheikh and the village elders meet strangers, relax in the evenings after prayers and generally hold court. The whole of Wad Fellata is made up of mud houses which are polished with cow dung and have roofs of either straw or mud. There is not a single brick house in the village, although building with bricks is the main Sudanese style of house construction. Some pilgrims explain that they do not put up lasting houses because this is not their home and it suits them to keep this in mind. But the fact is that even if they could afford to do so, those who live on sites designated as ‘camps’ are not allowed to build houses that could be regarded as permanent structures, since the sites are still - legally - the property of the SGB. Sometimes, when a piece of land on which a pilgrim­ village stands is required for some other purpose, the inhabitants are given another site in return and their homes are bulldozed to the ground.7 Pilgrims recall many instances like this with some bitterness - not so much for the destruction of their homes as for the arbitrariness of their relocation. Such experiences have resulted in a latent fear and suspicion of the authorities by most West African immigrants in Sudan, reinforced, undoubtedly, by the fact that most of them have no legal status in Sudan. That they have opted for temporary abodes might be seen as symbolic and meaningful in two ways. On the one hand, it reinforces their liminal status as existing beside and outside of the social structure(s) of their hosts, since they see themselves as being on their way: the stopping at a particular geographical spot is merely a sojourn, irrespective of duration, induced by necessity. On the other hand, it is also a strategic response to the circumstances under which they reside in their adopted country. They are wont to point out that they live as they do because their ambitions are geared towards something much more important than the worldly comforts of the present (thus diffusing the question of whether they could have afforded other types of shelter). In either case the ambivalent circumstances under which they live inevitably result in a general feeling of insecurity, further increasing their suspicion of the authorities. Although they would rather prefer to emphasise that they live harmoniously with the encapsulating structures, the insecurity and suspicion I impute to them are factors that are empirically ascertainable. General scepticism encoun­ ters any visitors arriving in the village with a vehicle. No one would exchange words with such a visitor beyond the customary salutations, until they discover the person has nothing to do with the official Sudan. There are other con­ sequences to their status as illegal immigrants on sites not recognised as villages: they generally do not qualify for such amenities as piped water, electricity and clinics which Gezira villages of a stipulated size may receive.8 Wad Fellata is fortunate in this respect because it has piped water that is drawn

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from Wad Medani. None the less, there is much to be desired as far as public health is concerned. Malaria, bilharzia and many other diseases are endemic. According to the health authorities, about one-third of all infants in the village die before they reach the age of two.9 A midwife visits the village occasionally to instruct the inhabitants how to improve their hygiene. Such efforts are rendered futile by the fact, for instance, that there is not a single latrine in the village. The area outside the village serves this purpose and literally scores of people can be seen attending nature’s call at dawn. The working day in Wad Fellata begins at dawn. After the first prayers the whole village comes alive with myriads of activities: men go to their plots in the cotton fields, women sweep and cook, young girls carry their roasted groundnuts and other wares to the market place in nearby Wad Medani or go to the houses of the better-off Sudanese where they are employed as maids. By noon the only persons left in the village are the aged, the disabled and the pupils of the khalwas, the Quranic schools. Between two and four in the afternoon, when the heat of the sun has reached its height, streams of people can be seen on the footpaths, coming from all directions and making their way wearily towards the shelter of the village houses. After lunch and the siesta, activities begin again and continue until nightfall. Towards evening the village market springs up and the buying and selling begins. Sellers of agashe (a hotly spiced meat grilled on sticks, a special favourite of both immigrants and Sudanese) and women selling various cooked foods catering for the bachelors in the community begin trading. About this time the Quranic schools for adults begin their protracted discourses and discussions. In various parts of the village, small groups of people sit around hurricane lamps pondering on the day’s activities or listening to passing strangers recount their experiences in other West African commu­ nities they have passed; others tell each other stories of past deeds connected with their migration. Strangers are a common feature of pilgrim-village life. Indeed, they are not only an institution in West Africa but have also become an institution in pilgrim life in Sudan. Strangers are the main source of information about other pilgrim communities in Sudan, as well as news about ‘home’. This is vital for the pilgrim’s ability to move to other areas which offer a better livelihood (whether this be defined in terms of the attraction of pious Sheikhs or economic gain), should he require travelling documents for the continued journey to Mecca (see Chapter 5). Strangers can always find food and shelter in the house of the village Sheikh, who has rooms for this purpose. Thus, despite the fact that one of the standing regulations of the SGB requires the Sheikh of a pilgrim-village to report the presence of any strangers to the Block Inspector within whose Block the village is situated, this seldom happens. Visitors come and go as they please - and they are always welcome.

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In the evenings, too, the Arab Tenancy-holders start arriving in their Toyota trucks to look for workers for their cotton plots or in an effort to arrange sharecropping agreements with the immigrants. One common way in which this is done is to give out loans or advances of money to the prospective workers. Once a worker accepts a loan from a particular Tenant, he thereby pledges his labour to the Tenant for the approaching season and thus enters into a morally binding contract. I shall argue later on in this chapter that while such loans might, on the surface, seem to indicate the generosity of the immigrant’s prospective employer, they are, in fact, the cause of many an immigrant’s feeling that he cannot move freely from place to place. Early in the development of the village, Tenants desiring the services of labourers on their plots first approached the village Sheikh, who agreed on the amount of pay the workers should receive and generally sanctioned the terms of the contract. But as the village grew in size and as many of the workers had themselves established relationships with Tenancy-holders, the Sheikh’s role as mediator between workers and Tenants became less and less necessary. The Sheikh would now only be involved in the initial contract situations. This applies in cases when a newcomer wishes to establish a sharecropping relationship but is not sufficiently well-established for a Tenant to accept him without someone to vouch for him. In such instances, the Tenant would go to the Sheikh who would then be involved in arranging the contract. In addition to the leadership of the Sheikh there are also the landlords. They are usually elders who have lived in Sudan for many years and who have contacts reaching far beyond the village boundaries, usually with other immigrant communities as well as with some important members of the encapsulating population. A number of landlords hold officially sanctioned positions as sub-chiefs or assistants to the Sheikh. The Sheikh always sends for them or confers with them when any important decision has to be taken. Their networks sometimes include wealthy Sudanese Tenants, immigrant landlords in other villages and officials of the SGB, as well as a number of local politicians and policemen. These landlords normally take single male pilgrims under their protection and help launch them into various enterprises of which they have some previous experience. Like the Sheikh, they some­ times act as middlemen with Arab Tenants on behalf of newcomers desiring work. However, the role they play in everyday life in the rural communities is neither as pronounced nor as important as their role in urban areas. I shall therefore devote more space to them in the following chapter. However, let us first take a closer look at one of these village landlords. A BRIEF LOOK AT A POLYGYNOUS PILGRIM FAMILY

Alhaji Hassan, who is in his mid-seventies, often boasts of his background in Nigeria where his family belonged to a long line of village chiefs in Sokoto

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Province. He is one of the village elders who is closest to the Sheikh in Wad Fellata. Like most comparatively well-to-do West African rural pilgrims he has a polygynous family with three wives and fifteen children. The whole family lives in a compound enclosed by a mud wall. Each wife has her own room which she shares with her children and each of these rooms constitutes, in effect, a separate sub-unit in which each wife caters and cares for her own children. The seven older male children sleep together in a room with a spare bed, in which occasionally a stranger may sleep. Alhaji Hassan arrived in Sudan during the Second World War accompanying his widowed mother who wanted to make the pilgrimage before she died. Her wish was fulfilled and she died in the village of Wad Fellata soon after completing the pilgrimage with her son. Soon after the death of his mother, Alhaji Hassan went to Mecca a second and a third time. He was then fortunate enough to receive the hand in marriage of the daughter of the Sheikh of the village. Thereafter he became established as a leading sharecropper and keeper of cattle. At the beginning of the 1960s he took a second wife, nearly twenty years his junior, whose father wanted a reliable and well-established husband for her. Hassan later acquired his third wife who, at the age of twenty (in 1983) was younger than some of his children. The wives take turns to cook their husband’s meals and sleep with him for a 48-hour period. During these days the wife on duty, so to speak, also takes care of all her husband’s other needs. For example, whenever he returns from the field she places a container of water in his hut for him to wash himself. (The floor of the rooms in the house are not cemented but covered instead with fine sand. The people bathe on the floor of their rooms. The wet floor has a cooling effect when the windows of the room are opened and the outside breeze sweeps through the room.) The wives do not go to Ajhaji Hassan’s room to spend the night: he goes to theirs, spending the allotted two nights with each wife in turn. It is his responsibility to see that each wife and her children are provided with grain and the necessary money for buying small groceries and provisions from the village shop. Most polygynous husbands take this part of their responsibility very seriously - but not Alhaji Hassan, who claims that he is ‘too poor to keep his wives happy’. He appears, however, to favour his youngest wife, to the resentment of his other wives and their children. Aware of the friction this causes, Hassan claims that he gives more to the youngest one because she has ‘young children’ while the others have grown-up children to help support them. As mentioned before, each wife’s unit has its own economy. One of the wives keeps hens that produce eggs and chickens; another prepares various small goods to trade with: she roasts groundnuts, produces eggs and bakes kisra (bread) to sell to the better-off Arab women. Alhaji Hassan insists on practising purdah, but appears to turn a blind eye to his eldest wife who

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goes out into the fields to help her sharecropping son to work on his plots. The other wives, however, depend mainly on their children, particularly on the young girls, to sell their products in nearby Wad Medani for them (unlike other young girls from the village who trade for themselves in anticipation of their wedding expenses). Each wife uses her earnings first and foremost to help her children, to enrich their meals and to buy clothes for them, but also to court the approval of their husband. For although he rarely provides them with money, he expects them to give him tea and coffee after meals and to see that his meals contain delicate vegetables. Because he insists on secluding his wives, he forfeits their help in the fields. Consequently his sons and even his younger daughters have to work very hard on the fields for him. A fifteen-year-old son of the eldest wife once expressed resentment at not having been able to receive any education apart from the Quranic instructions he received in the khalwas, the Quranic schools. He saw this as dashing all hopes of getting work away from the village. He also quite often lamented the poor prospects of finding a suitable partner for marriage since most eligible girls married successful older pilgrims, while local Sudanese girls were out of reach. We can discern in this young boy the making of a potential rejector of the pilgrim ideal. Later, I shall discuss the implications of this as a structural contradiction, which must eventually result in conflict between the polygynous and successful, older pilgrims on the one hand and the young stigmatised West African males on the other. Such conflict, however, is by and large contained while the male children are still young enough to be trained in the traditional school of Quranic instruction and instilled with the prevalent norms of West African pilgrim life. THE QURANIC SCHOOLS

The education of pupils in the village is carried out the by the khalwas. Children start in these schools at the age of six and sometimes even as early as four. There are about eight such schools in Wad Fellata, each of which is loosely attached to a mosque. The khalwas, like all schools in general, play a very important role in instilling and transmitting to children an identity as West African immigrant-pilgrims in Sudan. They are, therefore, vital in the processes of socialisation. In these schools children follow the traditional Islamic system of learning the Quran by heart while receiving commentaries on the texts later as they progress. The teachers of the khalwas, who are also referred to as ‘Sheikhs’, are as a rule very strict. Apart from the various kinds of advice on proper Islamic behaviour one constantly hears grown-ups imparting to the young, the Sheikhs of the khalwas are always judgemental and punitively inclined, particularly when pupils break the rules laid down for the schools. Pupils constantly get the cane, often for no obvious reason other than that they may not be reciting their lessons loudly or articulately

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enough. However, since all the pupils recite their different pieces simultan­ eously anyway, the impression one gets is that the teachers punish pupils haphazardly just to make them keep up a certain level of recitation, rather than seek to punish those who have not mastered their lessons. Besides Quranic learning, moral instructions to the children are usually imparted with almost unreflective rigidity, reiterating views that regard the pilgrimage as the ultimate virtue. One also generally hears imperatives such as: ‘True West African Muslims must not drink or smoke cigarettes. It is against God’s law for pilgrims.’ ‘It is forbidden to raise your voice to an older man.’ ‘Do not stretch out your left hand to receive something from another person. This is against the law of God.’ ‘Do not mix with or eat in the homes of the kafir (unbelievers) who live next door. They may feed you something that is forbidden for us pilgrims to eat.’10 To an outside observer, much of the caning may appear cruel and unneces­ sary, but parents rarely interfere in the running of these schools since they regard their stern discipline as a necessary aspect of successful socialisation. Indeed, some parents send their children off to the khalwas of other villages because they believe children are more effectively socialised if parents are not close by. Generally, however, children go to local khalwas because their help in the fields is necessary during harvest time and other peak seasons of agricultural work. West African pilgrims regard the khalwas as the preferred alternative to the formal Sudanese (Western) school system. Consequently, not a single child from the village of Wad Fellata has received a formal education, although Sudanese schools are open to all immigrants. When asked why they do not send their children to these schools, the people reply that formal schools in Sudan are not like those in West Africa - they do not elaborate beyond saying that Sudanese schools tend to erode and corrupt Hausa values - which is why they prefer a system that enhances the instillation of their own values. They regard formal education as European and secular and thus opposed to truly Hausa and Islamic values, both of which in this context are seen as commensurable with each other and mutually reinforcing. This is significant because in other contexts it is usually Arabic and Islamic values that are seen as one and the same. Thus pilgrims regard the Sudanese as fortunate in having as their mother tongue Arabic, the language of the Holy Quran. They find it difficult to accept that the Sudanese do not employ this gratis knowledge in the pursuit of Islamic scholarship. As concerns education, however, they take an opposing stand where they are completely uncompromising. They believe that Western schooling and Islamic values cannot go together and they hold this view despite the fact that they realise the prerequisite of a Western education is essential if they are to achieve any degree of advancement beyond the confines of their present position in Sudan.

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This negative attitude towards formal education has had a number of interesting consequences for the West Africans rural dwellers, two of which are particularly worth noting. First, it has served to reinforce stereotype notions held by the host population that West African pilgrims are ‘unedu­ cated and ignorant’,11 or that they are a people who never aspire to higher education. Second, a related consequence of the former is that a pilgrim family (the subscription to such views notwithstanding) who want to educate their children in the formal school system feels obliged to move from the pilgrim villages to Sudanese ones in order to be able to do so. Nine West African youths I encountered in the University of Gezira, who had been able to keep their immigrant backgrounds from their friends (see Yamba 1985), had invariably a history of having left their own communities to settle in Sudanese ones before attending school. Distance to the nearest schools might well seem like a good reason for their reluctance to attend school, but this is not so. The closest school to Wad Fellata is three miles away. But as many Sudanese pupils cover longer distances daily to go to school, it cannot be the proximity to the nearest school alone that makes the movement from the pilgrim-villages necessary. Group disapproval is the most important factor here. Sending one’s child to a Western-style school is viewed as a betrayal of the core values of the pilgrim community and, consequently, a negation of the very reasons for their presence in Sudan. West Africans who decide to send their children to Western schools regardless of what position they hold, quite often find themselves practically ostracised in the community. Yet a number of them, having weighed the price they have to pay for such a decision against the future rewards of secular education, have opted for a more challenging, if insular, existence within a Sudanese community. Hajiya (whom we met in Chapter 2) is one of those who chose to send her children to Western schools. Although an important member of the immigrant community in which she had lived for many years, when her grandchildren reached school age her whole extended family (consisting of Hajiya, her brother, her two sons and their families) decided to move to a Sudanese village near Wad Numan in the Hos Block of the Gezira Scheme. They had come to the conclusion that a Western secular education was a necessary investment for the future of their children in Sudan and that moving to a Sudanese village was an important first step towards achieving this goal. Hajiya does not feel that this action was in any way motivated by a desire to become integrated into Sudanese society; she still regards herself as an ardent believer in the virtues of rural pilgrim life. She admits that although one result of her decision is that her grandchildren have acquired a flawless indigenous-accented Arabic and are thus able to pass as native Sudanese, it is the ease with which they managed to attend schools without the collective disapproval of surrounding immigrants that was the main reason why they left the West African village.

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In Hajiya’s case, there was also the further disadvantage of losing the accumulated social capital she had stored for many years (with a corresponding loss in prestige), because, in the Sudanese village, Hajiya and her family were at first just one more group of ‘ignorant’ immigrants who would do menial work or who could be employed as workers on the Tenancies. It took several years before the sheer force of her personality, the revival of contacts with the authorities with whom she had remonstrated in the past on behalf of the immigrants, and the well-earned reputation of her two sons as reliable sharecroppers and wakils, gained them some degree of respectability in the new village. If the khalwas aim to teach the Quran and instil Hausa values in the young, the adult Quranic schools may be seen as both entrenching these values and expounding Islamic metaphysics. Their all-male students are usually older immigrants who believe in acquiring a more profound under­ standing of the Quran. The sizes of the classes vary, as does the procedure for instruction. One group I had occasion to observe met several nights a week outside a stranger’s hut in which I stayed. There were between five and twelve participants on each occasion and discussions often continued into the small hours. The role of the malam who led the group was more like that of the chairman of a debating club than a teacher’s. He debated the issues with his pupils and ultimately supported his contentions with quotations from the Quran. The meetings were rather informal and participants came and went as they pleased. After recording several of the proceedings, I found that the discussions seemed to cover three broad themes. These were: (a) topical issues, such as the war between Iran and Iraq and whether it was proper for West African pilgrims to take sides, or even heed local calls to join the Iraqi forces as volunteers against Iran, as some of young men who had left the village were reputed to have done; (b) themes affecting the immigrant community and their implications for the pilgrims generally; and (c) Islamic metaphysics, with West African ethnic slants here and there (cf. ideas of death in Chapter 6). Let me briefly recount two examples related to the second and third themes. Example 1: Lacking access to females, most of whom were betrothed to the older immigrants anyway, some of the men frequently visited prostitutes in the nearby town of Wad Medani. A number of them caught recurrent attacks of sexually transmitted diseases. At one stage, news spread in the village that I had arrived from Sweden with a consignment of antibiotics which I intended to give to the local clinic, and this brought some of the infected men to me to ask me to help them cure their affliction. I explained that antibiotics could not be administered without a physician’s supervision, and gave the drugs to a local clinic. This

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disappointed my friends. Apparently they did not find my explanation convincing since they sometimes bought the same kind of drugs in the chemists’ shops. Then one of the young men, after several infections, was told by a physician that he might not be able to have children. This was a terrible blow for him and seen as having wide implications for the immigrant group as a whole. The malam of the adult Quranic school was recruited to try to make the young men see the importance of being able to procure many children. If they failed in this fundamental task, he argued, they would cease to be an ethnic group from West Africa with distinct customs. The malam made long speeches and held discussions suffused with quotations from the Quran to get the young men to see the importance of his advice.

Example 2: A protracted discussion once centred on the issue of whether one could know what the future holds, as it is designed by God, and whether one could change it to suit one’s current lot, as some of the fakis (see Chapter 4) claim to do. The malam held that there was a definite pattern for every thing in the world, and through asceticism, piety, and prayers, and working close to nature, a Muslim can acquire a foreknow­ ledge of this pattern, and aid those who want to live in harmony with it. One could not change this divine pattern, but gaining some fore­ knowledge of it enabled one to submit oneself to it in accordance to God’s will. None of the discussants doubted that everything was pre­ ordained, ‘written’, as they expressed it. Some, however, saw the idea of knowing what was preordained and acting in accordance to it, as involving a contradiction and said so. The malam cited some passages from the Quran to support his contentions, and so the discussions went on. Two significant facts are worth noting. Apart from transmitting Islamic learning, the discussions and debates that take place in these adult schools enable the pilgrim-community to deal with some of its organisational prob­ lems, as well as to generate what are or become the norms of community. The outside observer is also struck with the ability of the discussants to expound on highly abstract concepts and issues, all of which are shrouded with Islamic legitimacy, as well as associated and inscribed with certain practices. One of these concepts is that of Insha’Allah that I shall treat at some length in Chapter 6. SHARECROPPING AND FARM WORK IN WAD FELLATA

Generally, economists have held sharecropping in disrepute. They have regarded it as thriving mainly in ‘semi-feudal’ agricultural settings (see

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Robertson 1980) and therefore inimical to agricultural development. Its detractors have argued that because of having to share (equally) with the owner of the land, the sharecropper does not feel the need to invest more labour than he requires to achieve a normal yield, since any extra input from him only brings back at most 50 per cent in returns. But the persistence of sharecropping in many parts of the world, despite the incursion of capitalist and mechanised agriculture, has recently led to a more realistic reappraisal of its role. No longer is it simply dismissed as standing in the way of technical innovation or impeding production; it is now accepted as being a necessary complement to certain agricultural forms. For instance, it appears to be a rather common arrangement in areas where the prevailing system favours the cultivation of one crop - usually a cash crop - such as cotton in Sudan or cocoa in Ghana. Although sharecropping was the principle on which the whole Gezira Scheme was designed, it seems later to have turned into a persistent headache for the leaders of the SGB. They now see it as draining manpower from the production of cotton, the main crop. In 1971, the SGB decided to apply some measures in an attempt to curb this practice among the Tenants.12 The cultivation of groundnuts was identified as the greatest ill and some attempts were made to forbid its cultivation altogether. When this proved unsuccessful, they resorted to milder measures such as encouraging the earlier planting of the groundnut so that its harvest did not interfere with that of cotton. In most of the Tenancies, some of the land is contracted out, mainly to West African immigrants, on a sharecropping basis. The most common form is one in which the sharecropper receives a piece of land from the Tenant, on which he either gets a free hand to cultivate or to produce a prearranged crop. The produce at harvest time is divided into two: the Tenant receives one half and the sharecropper the other. Sharecroppers in Wad Fellata were mainly involved in the cultivation of dhurra and groundnuts. West African immigrants were believed to be particularly good at cultivating these two crops and their partnership was much desired by Tenants. A few of the immigrants were wakils for absentee landlords, many of whom lived in the urban centres nearby. From my material I can distinguish three types of wakils. First, we have the Sharia Wakil, who is an agent recognised by both the SGB and the local Islamic community council within which the plot is situated. A Sharia Wakil is brought in when a Tenant is under-age, incapacitated by illness or is a woman who has just given birth. The family of the Tenant then chooses an agent to run the Tenancy. As a rule the choice is ratified by both the local council and the SGB. The second category is the Wakil Maktab, who is an agent appointed at the discretion of the authorities of the SGB. This kind of agent is common in cases where the Block Inspector feels a Ten­ ant has been neglecting his duties and decides that an agent is needed to

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manage things for the time being. The appointment of a Wakil Maktab might ultimately lead to the Tenant losing his or her Tenancy. The imposition of this type of wakil on a Tenant could also be a temporary, punitive measure. Tenants and wakils alike agree that Sharia Wakil involves a higher form of officialdom than Wakil Maktab, although the latter contains the word maktab which stands for office. Last, there is the plain Wakil, the lowest type of agent, whose position has neither the sanction nor the approval of the SGB or the local sharia law. Most West Africans are wakils of this third type. They often work for Tenants who live in the urban centres and who leave the running of their farms to them. Their position is not quite as legitimate as the other two, but most Block and Field Inspectors are not worried about this as long as the Tenancies are well-run and the instructions for the production of cotton are followed satisfactorily. A wakil (because his role entails managing a tenancy) has a higher status than a sharik, sharecropper. The only immigrants who stand a chance of becoming wakils are those who have proved themselves as reliable workers and sharecroppers with particular Tenants after many years. Wakils are thus common among the already-established immigrants. Their role involves the cultivation of cotton as well as subsidiary crops such as dhurra and ground­ nuts. As the rules for the holding of Tenancies make it virtually impossible for any Tenant to employ a wakil without the informal sanction of the SGB, one has to assume that the wakil system exists with its tacit understanding, if not approval. Many of the more established immigrants are either shariks, sharecroppers or wakils, whereas a majority of the immigrants subsist as farm labourers. A sharecropper who has received a piece of land to cultivate may himself also subcontract part of that land to someone for the cultivation of some other crop, which presumably would not interfere with the crop he himself is producing. Thus one sometimes finds that a sharecropper has given part of his land to members of his family to plant vegetables on and so forth. Each phase of sharecropping and subcontracting involves credit relations, in which the stronger partner in the transaction - that is, the one who is giving out the land - gives credit in some form or other to the one who is to cultivate the land on a sharing basis. This is to enable the sharecropper to meet the costs of purchasing tools, fertilisers and other necessities for the running of the farm. Sometimes credit is also granted for personal use. Later, at the end of the season, the amount owing is deducted from the borrower’s share of the produce. This appears to be the case whether it involves a Tenant giving an advance to a prospective sharecropper/worker, or a sharecropper giving a part of his rented land to a kinsman or friend to cultivate vegetables on. Indeed, the flow of credit seems to be (and has always been) an important aspect of the whole of the Gezira Scheme. Such was the case in most of the immigrant villages where I conducted my

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fieldwork. But other researchers, too, have dealt with the importance of debts in the area (see Culwick 1951; McLoughlin 1962). Indeed, Barnett (1977: 178) has discussed how important the flow of small credits, at village level, is for the Gezira Scheme as a whole. Considering the fact that it is the labour of these people that ultimately makes it possible for the government to sell cotton on the international market, and wheat and groundnuts in the local markets for large sums of money, much of which is used to underwrite the wealth of the nation as a whole, it is surprising to note how meagre is the cash that flows at the local level. In Wad Fellata the credit involved in the debt transactions was often very small indeed. Initial sums started from £S3 to £S10, and yet access to these was vital for the people. Self-sufficient though he might be, the share­ cropper, as he proceeds to cultivate the land, nevertheless finds that he requires various sums of money to purchase certain items he needs now and again: to buy soap, to pay for malaria injections or the doctor’s fees in the neighbouring town, etc. Usually the landowners are the source of all such credits and the immigrants, the receivers. Debts are, and have always been, very central in the lives of the pilgrims. Years ago when Culwick conducted her study of the Gezira (see Culwick 1951 and 1954), the immigrants declared that they were ‘being strangled by the Tenants’ noose of debts’, that they were like ‘slaves working for nothing’. Culwick, however, rejected such notions. She saw the debts rather as ‘bonuses’ (Culwick 1954: 170) and since she found that a great many of the IOUs which marked the debts seemed to run on for years without being collected, she concluded that there was no burden involved since no one expected the borrower to pay back his debts. In this she was mistaken, as I will presently make clear. West African immigrants, who live in pilgrim-villages, are usually indebted either to the landlords of their own communities or to Sudanese Tenants, for whom they work. Those who live in Arab villages or are regular wakils appear to be the most indebted ones. In the villages where I conducted fieldwork, many of the pilgrims almost invariably referred to debts, no matter what other factors they regarded as impeding their continued journey to Mecca. They claimed to be indebted to many patrons who had to be paid before they could continue their journey:

Many years ago when I arrived here, I was single . . . Now I am burdened with a wife and six children ... I am also indebted to many patrons who must be paid before I can move on. I am still saving towards the pilgrimage, and if it is the will of Allah that I should see Mecca some day, I will do so. Insha’Allah.

A full analysis of this statement is presented in Chapter 6. For the moment, let us devote some more space to the role of debts which I see as peculiar to

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this particular context and as being a much more constraining factor in the lives of the pilgrims than they themselves realise or are willing to admit. COLD AND WARM DEBTS IN WAD FELLATA

One valid anthropological maxim that can be deduced from the vast body of literature on debt-and-credit relationships, particularly in less complex or non-industrialised societies, is that they are social relationships par excellence. There are many statements in the literature on the anthropological perspective on debts as postulated forms of reciprocity upon which the very notion of society itself exists. But perhaps the dominant approach in modern social anthropology owes much to Firth’s statement that the economic system is to be regarded as part of ‘an overall system of social relationships’ in which the economic subsystems ‘can be fully understood only in a context of social, political, ritual, moral and even aesthetic activities and values’ (1964: 16). How credit relationships operate; their embeddedness in other aspects of the social system; whether the parties involved in a transaction have single or multistranded relationships with each other (in which, say, kinship, political and ritual roles are combined or play a significant part); how such relationships might inhibit or affect the seeking of credit by one category of people from another, as well as the use to which credit is put and the stipulated manner in which it is repaid, all these are themes that have offered anthropologists a wealth of interesting material to write about (besides Firth and Yamey (eds) 1964, see for instance Mayer 1955; Caplan 1964; Cohen 1969). There is little doubt that studying debt has been a most rewarding enter­ prise. Arensberg’s statement in his study of Ireland - a work which must have been one of the first in social anthropology to discuss credit - that to owe money to someone was to accept a social obligation which is mutually binding (1937: 172) still holds true in many ethnographical contexts. In the Irish case, as he described it, credit formed the basis of a reciprocal and permanent relationship between the countryman and the town storekeeper to whom he owed money and the relationship itself depended on the very existence of the credit. To have completely paid off one’s debts to a particular storekeeper was, therefore, an unequivocal statement that one was breaking off the relationship and taking one’s business elsewhere. Apart from the reciprocity involved, an important aspect of credit relation­ ships is that they show who in a given social context possesses or has access to liquidity and, ultimately, wealth and power. Power relationships affect, shape and determine social interaction and this too is a principle that anthropo­ logists have been schooled to take into account. Leach notes, for instance, that social relationships reveal much when we observe ‘who gives what to whom’ and that failure to see this underlying ‘general principle’ of such social relationships ‘has often led anthropologists to write a great deal of

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nonsense’ (Leach 1982: 151). It is perhaps in accordance with the spirit of this view that Wahlquist, in a paper on complex transactions involving the sale and the pledging (or reclaiming) of land for or with credit in north Nepal, states that the choice of a particular form of credit might be ‘preferred because it expresses symbolically an already existing social relationship’ (1981: 208). Such interests have led anthropologists to examine what social structures are likely to generate one kind of credit tie as opposed to another, and/or what are the consequences. So, although Firth (1964: 20) also called attention to the generally low level of peasant capital involved in transactions, most anthropological efforts in this area have been concerned with credit relationships with relatively large sums of money, usually concerned with cases where credit is raised as investment capital (for example Cohen 1969) or for reclaiming land (Caplan 1972 and 1964). The microscopic side of transactions, particularly those involving small debts and their postulated effects, have therefore received insufficient attention in anthropology. Yet one sometimes encounters debt relationships which involve very small sums of money borrowed for subsist­ ence purposes, too small perhaps to have any significance to the economist, but which have a ritual (and symbolically binding) force for those involved in the transactions. Such is the case with debts in Wad Fellata, where the villagers would often in one context cite debts and the will of God as contingent obstacles to their ultimate goal of reaching Mecca; while in another, they would say that they do not owe anyone any money but morally binding ‘obligations’. Despite this ambiguity, I will argue that it is analytically fruitful to regard these relationships as credit relations, whether they be emically defined only as ‘obligations’ rather than debts. Without needing to resort to the general anthropological claim that all social obligations are forms of debts anyway, I hold this to be correct for two reasons. First, a relationship always started with the borrowing of money and was, therefore, not the outcome of a reciprocal (symbolic) exchange of values and services. Second, the manner in which debts were repaid, although rarely entailing an exchange of money, none the less involved the transfer of agricultural produce, the scale of which had been determined beforehand, must somehow have been regarded as commensurate with the cash borrowed. Two kinds of debts were common in Wad Fellata. The first corresponded to the institutional bureaucratic kind in which a specified set of rules from the start defined questions such as when the repayment of the loan had to begin and what the penalty was for default or failure to meet the specified terms. This kind of debt transaction always involved bureaucracy and was never just on a personal level. Tenants borrowing money from banks or from a consortium of lenders, who had stakes in a certain Tenants’ holdings, fell under this category. Since the immigrants had no Tenancies, they were

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not involved in such transactions. The second kind of debts had a dual nature. On the one hand, they were a diffuse form of alms-giving, solicited and given because the donor was a good Muslim. (One therefore approached a prospective loan-giver on Fridays, the Muslim Sabbath.) Such debts are similar to qard (the Islamic name for money advanced as a loan without interest, to be paid off at the pleasure of the borrower), but they were not explicitly labelled as this. Nor were they regarded strictly as dain (which would correspond to ordinary debts with clearly defined terms of payment). Payment of these debts were usually promised in kind and did not appear to have any secular sanctions in case of default. The first kind of debts which involved Tenants and credit institutions in which clearly stated terms defined the transaction from the outset, I would like to call for want of clearer conventional terminology ‘cold debts’ and the second kind of debts, with seemingly no strings attached to them, ‘warm debts’. Warm debts were predominant in Wad Fellata and the other pilgrim-vil­ lages in which I did fieldwork. The loans, advances, etc., which prospective workers got from employers belong to this category. Although they are not secular and do not appear to have any penalties attached to them, they are still, I would argue, morally binding so that he who enters into a warm debt relation­ ship enters into a much more exploitative relationship than he who incurs cold debts, which have clearly defined terms for payment and penalty for default. Underlying the former is a moral/religious sanction which defines the debts in religious terms and thus makes them binding before God and in the eyes of the moral community of one’s peers. One could here borrow Bateson’s termino­ logy and call whatever pressure the borrower feels in the eyes of the rest of the community a ‘lateral sanction’ (1972: 49). The borrower feels obliged to carry out the unwritten and diffuse terms of the arrangement if he wishes to retain his place as a respected member of the community. (And behind all this still looms the potential threat of a possible resort to secular sanctions if the borrower should fail to repay, as one will never know with absolute certainty that the lender will not resort to sanctions from outside the moral system.) Payment of warm debts, as mentioned before, is almost always in kind, not in cash, and in a volume far exceeding the value of the loan. One transaction, for example, involved a young man in a pilgrim village about thirty kilometres from Wad Fellata. He needed to borrow £S3 (c. 13.20Skr.) since what he had was not enough to pay a doctor’s bill. He approached the village shopkeeper on a Friday, because, as he put it, the man was ‘a good Muslim who wouldn’t refuse to help a fellow on a Friday’. He got the money and was very grateful. The manner of payment agreed on was that the young man, who was then a share­ cropper with about live acres of groundnuts fields, would pay him back at harvest time with a sack of the crop. A sack of groundnuts at Wad Medani market sold for about £S18 that season. The cost for transporting the sack of groundnuts to the market would have been less than £S1.

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Firth cautions us against regarding disproportionate repayments as ‘inter­ est’ because he points out for example that ‘increments in grain were about cancelled out as far as value was concerned by a fall in the price of grain after the harvest’ (Firth 1964: 30). But even allowing for this, I would maintain that the transaction above (and several others I observed in Wad Fellata during the course of my fieldwork) has the function of masking the high degree of ‘interest’ that the actual payment of the debt involved. Sharia law forbids the extraction of interest on borrowed money. Indeed, usury is considered one of the worst crimes according to Islamic belief.13 Money-lenders in Wad Fellata circumvent this by demanding payment in kind. The dual nature of warm debts (alms as well as secular transactions) enables the loan-giver to get around the Islamic injunction, but, more import­ antly, it also places the loan-taker under the dual threat of divine censure and secular sanction (however potential) until the debt is paid. Such debts have also a cumulative effect and are not easily paid. A borrower incurs more debts to pay the last one and thus sinks deeper and deeper into indebtedness. A borrower is thus a double loser. In many cases I recorded in the course of fieldwork, ‘interest’ of about 300 per cent was not uncommon on loans share­ croppers had received from Tenants and shopkeepers. These kinds of economic and religiously defined relationships were very common during my fieldwork. For the sharecroppers such debts sometimes had disastrous effects. In many cases their share of the current crop went to the owner of the land to meet various debts incurred during the course of the agricultural season. As like as not, the sharecropper had to borrow more at harvest time and sometimes even to pledge a part of his next harvest in order to meet the expenses of any cash transactions he might enter into during the course of the coming season. This in effect meant that he was practically bonded to the man to whom he was indebted. And this kept him toiling recurrently in an attempt to pay off his mounting debts. One might ask why the debtor does not simply abscond: move on, leaving his debts behind. In Wad Fellata there are three reasons why this does or cannot happen. First, the index of what makes a reliable worker, sharecropper or wakil, is whether or not one has a family. A family man can be trusted, so they say. When a man has no family, as we have already seen, he needs a landlord to vouch for his integrity. The necessary recourse to the patronage of leaders, whenever necessary, induces a propensity to subject himself to the sanctioning force of the social organisation within which he lives. Second, unlikely though it may seem, if he were to move with his family to another place, the reputation he has left behind in his former village as someone who does not fulfil his obligations will sooner or later catch up with him, so effective are communication networks between the rural pilgrim communities. But probably more important is the fact that these debts are viewed in religious terms and have, ultimately, a divine sanction. To a believer a

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religious debt must be paid in full before the debtor is free. One might characterise this as very much a bondage of the mind, the effect of which is a bondage of the physical person. During her research Culwick (1954) discovered several cases in which White Nile Arabs absconded from their debts but she found no instances in which West Africans had done so. We could infer from this evidence that the West Africans accept the religious forces involved in these transactions more than the other groups because they see themselves as being at various stages in the undertaking of the pilgrimage, which in itself is a holy task. The Prophet Muhammad is reputed to have said that not even jihad (which erases every other sin) could expunge the state of being in debt (Hughes 1885: 81-2), the implication here is that to be in debt places a person in a state of impurity that is unique (if not worse than, then certainly different from, sin). Just as sins must be atoned for and sinners must be cleansed, so religiously sanctioned debts must be repaid in full before debtors can become free. INTER-VILLAGE RELATIONSHIPS

The pilgrim-villages are constantly in touch with one another chiefly through affinal relationships but also through linkages of ritual exchanges of a nonmaterial/economic kind. Villagers attend each other’s rituals and ceremonies, of which various Islamic feasts, name-giving and burials are the most common. The leaders of the villages know each other and often send delegations to weddings and funerals all around the Gezira. One consequence of such contacts is that these leaders can send messages to one another ahead of the occasional visitor, which can affect the sort of reception a visitor will receive. For example, it can facilitate or mar the acceptance of the prospective researcher in other villages; it can result in one being accepted as a person who is not to be regarded as government agent, or as someone to whom no villagers should speak. This reinforces the point I made earlier that West African villages form more or less one vast communication network. It is such contacts between the villages that make it difficult for anyone who has acquired a bad reputation to move from one village into another. Such people would invariably move into an urban area, preferably as far away as possible from the Gezira region. Young people travel long distances on bicycles or scooters to attend wedding celebrations or betrothal parties in other villages. In this manner relationships are established and maintained over time and prospective brides are found although, as I shall show in the next chapter, because the pilgrims commu­ nities are virtually endogamous, these young men have to engage in a tough competition both with other males from the urban centres who are also looking for brides and with the already-established older males who practise polygyny.

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One thing that appears to be markedly absent in these relationships is that of the direct exchange of goods and services between the pilgrim­ villages. Transactions of this kind appear to be chiefly mediated through the urban pilgrim-landlords. Lorries leaving the villages each morning at dawn transport farm produce and other items to be sold in the urban centres. Most of these goods would already have been bought up by the urban landlords, who would then resell them through their various middlemen either in the urban markets or even in other village markets. One example that will illustrate this kind of mediation may be taken from a village in which lived a skilled goldsmith who, together with his apprentices, produced a variety of fine ornaments, usually made from brass or different qualities of gold. They always sold their work in the town of Wad Medani, although their articles were very much in demand in a neighbouring village. This other village, in turn, produced some fine pottery that the goldsmith and his fellow villagers could (and in fact did) use. The two villages were virtually adjacent but their inhabitants did not sell any of their goods to each other directly. Indeed, I once travelled by lorry together with some pilgrims from one of these villages who had been to the Wad Medani to buy some trinkets made by this same goldsmith whom we both knew. One might summarise this by saying that the rural-to-rural pilgrim relation­ ships appear to be predicated on a lateral ritual/symbolic exchange: villagers visit each other’s weddings and burials, intermarry and partake in each other’s feasts, while their relationships with the urban pilgrims might be envisaged as predicated on a material/ritual exchange of a vertical kind. Villagers visit the urban immigrants to seek help with the authorities or sell their goods and, through these same urbanites, purchase some other goods which they require to live virtuous rural lives. While the urbanites - this will be made clear in the next chapter - seek out village malams and fakis for various ritual services because such religious village men are more powerful than their counterparts in towns. SUMMARY

I have tried to show the moral importance of rural life and the central role it plays in the lives of the West African pilgrims. I have also tried to show how they perceive themselves as existing outside the encapsulating social structures and yet are inextricably involved in and are, therefore, part of these same structures through the obligatory economic relationships they have with their hosts. Some of these relationships find their expression in credit-ties which place the inhabitants of the pilgrim-villages into constraining webs of dependency, amounting, in effect, to a kind of moral debt-bondage. I have further tried to present these constraining relationships as an important aspect of the daily lives of the pilgrims. However, we must also note that although the overall effect of these asymmetrical relationships (between the

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Tenants and workers - or sharecroppers, villagers and shopkeepers) is that the immigrants are unable to move about as freely as they would like, the pilgrims do not necessarily see these relationships as constraining. This is because they view these transactions in religious rather than economic terms. I suggest that this is a mystifying phenomenon, a term used here in the same sense as Parkin uses it in his analysis of the Giriama, where he sees it as denoting the ‘discrepancy, sometimes outright contradiction between the publicly manifest cultural justification for a role or activity (how people justify their belief in the purpose of the role or activity) and the long-term, hidden or latent consequences for the society of this role or activity’ (Parkin 1972: 98). The debt relationships that have been discussed in this chapter might also be viewed as mystifying phenomena because they are part of a contingent set of factors, the ultimate effects of which are to prevent the immigrants from successfully completing the pilgrimage; and yet this is a constraint the pilgrims do not appear to realise. This point will become increasingly clear as we proceed. For the moment, let us go on to pilgrim life in the urban areas. As has been earlier suggested, the pilgrims in the rural areas exist in an important symbiotic relationship with the urban centres of the Gezira region.

4 THE URBAN DWELLERS Landlords, clients, fakis and beggars

In the previous chapter I argued that the pilgrims had a veneration for rural life whereas life in the urban areas was regarded as corrupting. One important aspect of rural life, as they saw it, was that it helped maintain a collective ethic in which custom and control by family and older generations preserved what were believed to be the native virtues of the pilgrims. Such a collective ethic was absent in urban life and its absence led to perdition. Despite such sentiments, I shall show that the urban areas are still necessary for the pilgrims, partly because that is where any conversion into tangible rewards of their (accumulated) rural virtues can take place and partly because it is where the bigger landlords, malams and fakis live. Occupants of these three roles are the pillars of the immigrant establishment in Sudan; beneath them structurally, are a number of occupations which, particularly the newly arrived pilgrims - who act as clients - engage in and into which they help to launch these clients. Because of this, a number of these occupations have now become exclusive West African niches. In this chapter, I shall examine the roles they play in West African pilgrim life. WAD MEDANI: THE PRINCIPAL URBAN CENTRE OF THE GEZIRA REGION

From whichever direction one approaches Wad Medani1 for the first time, one’s initial impression is that it is a place that is considerably more pleasant than Khartoum. It is a town without the chaotic squalor of the Sudanese capital. Medani, as its inhabitants fondly refer to it, rises out of a vast expanse of grey arid plains on the western bank of the Blue Nile. Approaching it by road - as most pilgrims are likely to do the first time - one jolts and tosses in a Toyota ‘box’ (the Japanese car converted into a small truck to carry passengers) or in one of the considerably more comfortable Gezira Transport buses, along a road the occasionally unpaved stretches of which merge with the bleak desert landscape. Drivers overtake each other left and right. Sometimes, unable to pass the vehicles in front, they will quite simply drive off the road in a sixty-degree cross-terrain swing and place themselves

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ahead of the other vehicles, throwing whirls of dust on their own and others’ passengers, who would be drowsy and sleepy from the heat. Occasion­ ally, the distressing sight of a nasty smash-up will shake one back to the reality of one’s precarious situation, only to be reassured by a fellow passenger: ‘That won’t happen to us. We have a Fellata driver. They are very good.’ The immense heat distorts impressions of the surrounding landscape; images often turn into optical illusions as the vehicle draws close. After about 200 kilometres of such landscape, invariable in its monotony, one arrives quite suddenly at this large city with towers and minarets above the rooftops, surrounded by green fields and splendid gardens. Many of the buildings betray a past splendour - the Medani Club, the International Hotel, the Continental - a past that is closely connected with the coming of the Gezira Scheme which, as we saw in the previous chapter, gave rise to a new class of well-to-do tenant-farmers who moved into this town. A closer acquaintance with the city, however, reveals that the same ills that plague Khartoum are present here, albeit in a minor key: traffic congestion, numer­ ous beggars, filthy streets. Here and there are the odd chicken or goat scavenging for food at the street-side. And hundreds of half-starved dogs roam about in packs, snarling fiercely at timid passers-by - ownerless and homeless dogs, a constant menace.2 The great vehicular (and human) traffic on the unpaved streets of the city centre throws up a grey pall of dust that looms above it, reaching its peak at dusk. Yet Medani has its charm. The recurrent shortages of Khartoum are rare here: there are more hours of electricity; the shops always have more than an adequate stock of all kinds of goods and necessities, and shops and stalls bustle with constant activity. Perhaps Wad Medani’s greatest asset is its people who amid all the chaos always appear relaxed and dignified, moving about gracefully in their jellabiyahs while going on with their busi­ ness. Above the din and fray of shouting vendors and the loud cassette music of the yellow-painted taxis, one hears the occasional voices of Hausa speakers. Toyota ‘boxes’ shuttle incessantly between the town centre and the immigrant villages on the outskirts from dawn to dusk. There are no statistics on the numbers of West African immigrants in the city, but the impression of most people - both immigrants and locals - is that there are many more West African immigrants here than in any other city in Sudan. In the Gezira region, the town of Wad Medani sets the pace for West African pilgrims. The surrounding pilgrim-camps exist, as it were, within its sphere of gravity. It is where the newly-arrived first find shelter, informa­ tion as to which villages are the most conducive to live in, which ones are where kinsmen or local men from one’s home region are residing, what niche is available - best suited to one’s particular talents - and so on. Single pilgrims usually first stay for some time in the urban areas before deciding whether or not to move to the villages, while those travelling with their

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families (like Malam Abubakar in Chapter 2) are more likely to go directly to the rural areas, once they have arrived in the Gezira. OLD SETTLERS AND NEWCOMERS: TWO SETS OF OCCUPATIONAL CATEGORIES IN WAD MEDANI

Each morning, lorries loaded with goods and people move wearily towards Wad Medani from all directions. Their occupants need to buy or sell some commodity, to attempt to use the postal services, to contact the authorities for some necessary travel documents, to arrange a marriage - to name but a few. For the West African pilgrims, such activities usually require the brokerage, the intervention or involvement of a landlord, a malam, or a faki. These three categories represent distinct - but quite often overlapping - roles among the leading members of the West Africans pilgrims in Sudan. As these terms usually have a rather wide connotation in the anthropological literature, I will clarify my usage. I use the term landlord to cover the Hausa maigida, which stands literally for house-owner. Maigidas, however, are not merely owners of houses; they are also patrons who, apart from giving shelter to the newly arrived immigrant, would take him under their protection and help him become established in the new place. Sometimes they also act as brokers between the newly arrived immigrants and the formal authority structure of the host society. It is for such reasons that, with diaspora groups like the Hausa, maigidas tend to be important members of communities (cf. Cohen 1969; Works 1976). Some of the elders in the rural areas had roles that fulfilled similar functions to a limited degree. However, landlords in the urban areas are usually wealthier, have a larger number of clients and play a more prominent part in the daily lives of the pilgrims than their rural counterparts. We have already encountered malams in Chapter 2. The term is the Hausa for Islamic teacher (ulama in the Arabic). However, the term is also quite often used when addressing landlords as a sign of respect, even though they may not be formally engaged in teaching pupils. Thus a malam does not always imply a distinct occupation independent of another, as is often the case in West Africa. I shall, therefore, not treat it as a separate occupational category. In Sudan one finds malams who also occupy roles as landlords and/or fakis. A faki among the West African pilgrims is someone who has mastered the Quran through a lifelong devotion to its holy texts, which enables him to use secret passages - unavailable to the ordinary reader - to carry out extraordinary feats such as the recovery of lost property, winning the heart of an unwilling girl, doubling money and in general controlling contingency. By this I mean the claim that fakis can predict and steer the outcome of any future event in which their client will be involved. This aspect of the fakis' work might seem a contradiction in terms. Logically, such a view would be

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correct; but factually it would be misguided when related to my ethnography, as will become clear. The peculiarity of the role of the faki among the pilgrims in Sudan is primarily due to this very fact: that they claim to be able to control that which by definition is uncontrollable. This has farreaching consequences that will be discussed later in this book. Sometimes in the literature, the roles of the faki and malams are treated as merely forms of ‘maraboutism’, a phenomenon held to be common in most countries where Islam is the main religion, but differently named in different regions (Monteil 1969: 87-8). According to Monteil the different forms of maraboutism really entail the same roles, since essentially they provide a mediating link between creature and Creator. This may well be correct but that is not quite the whole story. For instance, in his analysis of this same phenomenon in Morocco, Eickelman (1977) also saw maraboutism as entailing roles intermediary between man and God (because it was the outcome of an ideology closely related to the prevailing social order) but he found that Moroccan marabouts were above all able to communicate baraka, divine grace, to their clients (ibid: 6). West African fakis in Sudan are not perceived as playing a mediatory role between man and God, nor do they communicate baraka. They sometimes have functions similar to those of malams in West Africa (who are also sometimes termed marabouts), in that both profess to be able to use the Quran for mystical services of various kinds. This, however, is where the similarity ends. The West African fakis in Sudan admonish people on the good and the bad in the everyday life of the Muslim, teach the Quran, but above all they use the same Quranic scholarship for extraordinary practices to a greater extent than do malams in West Africa. Moreover, unlike malams in West Africa, the fakis in Sudan have no formal authority within the Islamic hierarchy and their role does not become institutionalised in the formal structure of the communities where they reside. In this sense they may be described as private persons whose powers are believed to be acquired from Quranic scholarship (or perhaps, more accurately, from their ability to use that scholarship) rather than from some officially sanctioned positions within the Islamic community. The following point needs to be further emphasised: whereas one of the main functions of malams in West Africa is that of teaching the Quran, the fakis among the pilgrims rarely do so despite the fact that they may consider themselves qualified enough to carry out such a task. Again, malams in West Africa and fakis in Sudan profess to be able to use the Quran for mystical purposes. For such reasons, an attempt to apply a clearcut distinction between malams and fakis, based on their roles, particularly one which would define malams as teachers of the Quran and fakis as malicious manip­ ulators of Quranic scholarship, is bound to be wrong. For my purpose here, however, the more interesting aspect of the activities of the fakis is the claim that they can control future occurrences.

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Although the fakis conceive of their role in purely Islamic terms, they sometimes perform divination in a manner resembling that found in pagan practices of the kind. One faki I observed at work professed to be able to tell the future with the help of cowries. He would cast an assortment of cowrie shells on the ground and interpret the messages conveyed in their configurations. This is a common practice with soothsayers among the nonIslamic groups of Northern Ghana. It could thus quite well be a remnant of the pagan bori cult of the Hausa, but practitioners of the occupation of the faki would be surprised at the suggestion that their actions are remotely reminiscent of anything that is non-Islamic, believing their power to result from their control over jinns (spirits, recognised as potent forces by the Quran). The ability to control these spirits is also in turn derived from their mastery of Quranic formulae, a true Muslim endeavour. Nevertheless, the similarity with non-Islamic forms of divination is still quite striking and it is tempting to regard part of the activities of the fakis as a pre-Islamic residue. This view is strengthened by Cohen’s evidence from Sabo in Ibadan (1969: 164). When the Tijaniyya became the leading sect in Sabo the crusading malams initially tried to root out beliefs and practices that they considered as non-Islamic. Cohen (ibid) points out that certain elements of the bori divination cult, existing among the Hausa, were easily incorporated into Islamic practices. It was held that the Quran decrees the existence of jinns, spirits, some of which are conceived of as being benevolent, while others are malevolent and have Satan as their master. However, even the Satanic spirits are themselves created by God and are therefore also subject to His power. It thus became accepted that the malams could counteract the affliction of these malevolent spirits through secret prayers and rituals. Malams could thus legitimately take over an activity, originally from non-Islamic beliefs. Cohen tells us that these days ‘those who in the past would have taken their problems to bori practitioners before the Tijaniyya came, now go to consult malams’ (loc. cit.). In the Sudanese context, the essential relationships between these three roles, the malams, landlords and fakis, could be stated in this manner. First, the three are essentially urban occupations. Second, although it is common to find landlords who also function as fakis, not many fakis are able to obtain enough wealth so as to become landlords, or to become formally established as teachers of the Quran. Whereas in the rural areas the pilgrims derive their livelihood from one major source, namely farming, the urban pilgrims have many more occupa­ tions to choose from. In the larger Sudanese towns, of which Wad Medani is representative, West African pilgrims are predominantly engaged in occupa­ tions such as lorry-driving, tailoring, butchering, selling water and vegetables, begging, telling fortunes or selling charms. Together, with the work of landlords and fakis, these occupations could for analytical purposes be envis­

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aged as falling under two distinct sets of occupations, one of which is more prestigious than the other. The existence of the prestigious set of occupational roles fosters and maintains the other. Members of each set are able to change occupational roles within the set (whenever a given situation necessit­ ates it, sometimes even carrying out several occupations simultaneously) but seldom across the sets. I shall soon explain this in some detail. In the abovenamed occupations, lorry-driving, tailoring, butchering, and the selling of vegetables and water are predominantly male preserves, while women can be found begging, telling fortunes and selling charms; and they tend to dominate in street begging. The landlords and fakis (who may or may not be acting as malams) are incumbents of occupations that are considered to be the most prestigious of the livelihoods available to West Africans. Characteristic of occupations of this type is that they involve a higher degree of occupational constancy. By this I mean that occupants of these roles would be expected to play them with some permanence; and in the event that they do switch occupations, they would remain within the prestigious set. Thus, if a landlord, for example, changed occupations he would probably become either a faki or spend his evenings instructing students on the Quran. Another characteristic of this prestigious set of occupations is that their incumbents do not cease to play their former role even when they are currently involved in another occupation. Thus if a landlord, for example, at a particular juncture felt it expedient to become a faki, he would still not cease being a landlord. A landlord would not, however, become a beggar, a tailor, or a seller of charms in the market places, for these are occupations that form the second non-prestigious set. In contrast this second set does not, as mentioned before, involve any high degree of constancy in occupational roles even within the set. Thus street beggars sometimes turn into sellers of Quranic charms in the market places when their fortunes are down and vice versa. Tailors would leave their sewing machines to go to the Gezira villages to do a spot of agricultural work during the peak seasons and vegetable sellers become sellers of agashe in the evenings. Members of the less prestigious set acknowledge that land­ lords, fakis and malams are important members of their community and persons to whom one must turn for help with the authorities and so on. Occupants of the prestigious set of roles sponsor and launch those of the second set and, through these clients, keep in touch with the West African groups in the rural areas. Street-begging and the selling of charms are generally regarded as dubious and stigmatising by the host population, but are nonetheless accepted by them as legitimate activities for pilgrims. I would maintain that this is the case because of prevailing ideas in Sudan as to the essence of the pilgrim’s identity. The source of this identity is derived from the pilgrimage, viewed as an altruistic and holy undertaking, which enables its pursuers to become

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privy to a power. This power both exempts them from an evaluation in terms of the common standards generally applicable to ordinary members of society and enables them to indulge in what ordinary members of society must not or cannot do. This does not mean that they are awarded, as it were, a licence to do whatever they please. As I shall soon make clear, there are limits to what degrees they may push this pilgrim licence, but the limits are not clearly defined and this leads partly to an ambiguity in relationships between hosts and the immigrants. Begging will serve as an appropriate example here. Although begging is common in most Islamic countries, the Sudanese regard it as shameful. The authorities do not disallow it, possibly because giving alms to the poor is a meritorious act in Islamic belief; but they do discourage it. Indeed, the foreign visitor (who usually requires a licence for taking photographs) will find that he is forbidden to photograph beggars in the streets or any other ‘motifs that would disgrace Sudan’.3 Yet begging is accepted as a legitimate occupation for pilgrims because they are trying to fulfil a holy duty and so those who give them alms gain baraka. The badge of a pilgrim legitimates a great deal in this context. For example, one sometimes encounters people who have once lost funds to the money-doubling fakis - or others who describe the diviners in the market places as no more than sorcerers, yet it is rare to hear anyone question their activities as such or regard them as charlatans. Instead, one is usually told that these same people are very ‘powerful’ because they have mastered the secrets of the Quran and, as devout believers, they have attained a high degree of religious enlightenment, a quality that enables them to do what they profess to be able to do. Not even failure in any particular instance is a challenge to this claim. Beliefs in the divine uniqueness of the pilgrims can be further illustrated by situations involving the daily saying of prayers. With the pilgrims, both females and males will usually respond to the call for prayers. They spread their mats on the ground wherever they are, perform ablution (with water or sand, depending on whichever is available) and say their prayers; whereas with the Sudanese it is mainly the men who respond to the call for prayers while the women continue with their various chores. When informants are asked why it is that Sudanese women do not seem to pray as often as their men, while the West African females do, they explain that women are not ‘pure’ because they have no time to perform the washing ritual properly before prayers. They explain that women rise in the morning after having shared their husbands’ beds, and find that they have to cook, sweep their compounds and take care of the children. Because of this they cannot keep as ‘clean’ as men in order to say their prayers in the correct way. When one points out that the West African pilgrim women also sleep with their husbands and have children to take care of, the (same) informants explain further: ‘But they are pilgrims. They can do that.’ They point out, however, that

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this was not to be taken to mean that Sudanese women have less grace than men, since by his ritual activity the husband obtains grace for the whole family.4 THE ‘ELITE’: THE LANDLORDS

The landlords are the unofficial leaders of the urban West African commu­ nities. Although their role has no bureaucratic sanction, they do have the blessings of the authorities who approach the stranger communities through them. They cannot themselves exercise any formal control on immigrants residing in their districts, but have much influence over them, being bound as they are to many of them in a form of patron and client symbiosis. In this manner the position of the urban landlords is slightly different from that of the leaders in the rural areas, most of whom are either officially recognised Sheikhs, or leaders of various kinds appointed by these Sheikhs. However, this does not mean that the urban landlords have less authority. For instance, they are sometimes able to intervene with the authorities on behalf of immig­ rants in some scrape and, more importantly, as mentioned above, they are able to dispense other forms of patronage that entail the allegiance of those who receive it. A number of these urban landlords have vehicles that transport goods from the rural areas; they are retailers through whom the rural pilgrims sell their farm produce. In this manner, apart from being the main conduit of communication with the established formal structures of the rural pilgrim communities, the landlords are easily able to build up informal sets of followers and acquire wealth through the retailing of goods and services by these clients. From the brief description above, it might seem that West African landlords in Sudan are not very different from those recounted in the literature (Cohen 1969, for example) except for the fact that they appear to live under the ascetic and deprived conditions that are common to the immigrants generally. Sometimes their houses will be marginally larger than those of the other pilgrims. Occasionally, one finds some lorry- or taxi-owner living in a brick house of some comparative attractiveness. But this is rare for landlords, despite the fact that they are considerably wealthier than most of the immig­ rants. One of the landlords in Wad Medani will serve as an example. In his mid­ fifties and popularly known as Alhaji Ahmed the Kola Man, he is also one of the most influential leaders in the West African community in Wad Medani. Of West African descent, he has a good command of Arabic and possesses a Sudanese passport (something that is rare among the pilgrims). His parents were Hausa pilgrims who settled in Medani at the turn of the century. It is not clear whether his parents succeeded in completing the pilgrimage or not, but they left him a thriving business of buying and selling various odds and ends such as trinkets, perfume, creams and balms

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of many kinds and other items manufactured in Nigeria. Later on, he added the kola trade to his other affairs and has become one of the main importers of kola in the Gezira region. His house in Gari Baki (village of strangers), a West African quarter on the northern outskirts of Wad Medani, is no different from other houses in the vicinity, all of which, though made of mud, have more stable structures than those found in the rural immigrant villages. There is no display of conspicuous consumption in the quarter. All the houses are similar in size, have neither electricity nor piped water nor television antennae on their corrugated iron roofs. In sum, the inhabitants of the neighbourhood show no outward signs of any material well-being whatsoever. The impression a visitor gets of the area is that of a slum in which similarly deprived immigrants live. However, a man like Ahmed the Kola Man is believed by all to be a very wealthy man and most probably is. The main indication of his wealth which all informants emphasise - is that he makes about four visits to Northern Nigeria each year and imports kola and other goods manufactured in Nigeria. They point out that he makes these journeys by plane and pays fortunes for air freight charges for such heavy items as kola. Apart from having made the pilgrimage several times, he is no stranger to the larger cities of the Gulf States which he visits frequently on business. Alhaji Ahmed has retailers who sell his imports in the surrounding market places of the immigrant villages. He also has a stall of his own in the Wad Medani market. I first heard of him through a West African informant who told me that getting to know the Kola Man was a prerequisite to a successful study of the West Africans in Sudan. He would seek an appointment for me. In the meantime, because I was busy trying to obtain various permits and generally getting established, I was unable to see the Kola Man immediately. However, I soon found out during my contacts with the authorities that various function­ aries, whenever they heard about the theme of my research, asked if I knew the Kola Man. In a couple of instances, an interpreter answered in the affirmative on my behalf and this eased my dealings with those particular officials. It made visiting the man imperative. An informant took me one evening to meet Ahmed. Our timing was faulty because when we arrived we found that he had already performed ablution for the evening prayers and was leaving for the mosque with an entourage of about ten men. Nevertheless, he condescended to shake hands with us and said he would soon return to talk with us. We sat down on a traditional Sudanese angereeb (rope bed) and waited. Also waiting were about a dozen or so men, sitting in a semicircle in front of the bed on which the Kola Man usually sat. As soon as he returned from prayers, young children started emerging from within the house, bringing trays with several dishes of food in the traditional Sudanese manner. The people who were

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waiting began to eat. The aroma of the meals betrayed West African cooking: groundnut soup with rice balls, thick West African porridge, tuwo, with okra stew. There were some traditional Sudanese dishes as well. All those present were fed by a seemingly endless appearance of food trays from the house. Even passers-by were greeted with the Sudanese greeting fadel (‘you are welcome’, or ‘join in’) and a number of them sat down, said their Bismil­ lahis, and joined in the commensality without first washing their hands.5 The Kola Man lay semi-reclined on his angereeb and looked on as the people ate, now and then giving orders for a refill of soup, stew, kisra (pancake-like bread), etc. When the eating was over, they said their Al-hamdu lillah, grace, and began washing their hands meticulously even though they had not found it necessary to do so before the meal. A number of them even washed the inside of their mouths with soap and others their nostrils as well.6 When the callers had been fed, Ahmed the Kola Man started receiving persons who came to seek his help in a diversity of matters. I was able to follow up three of these cases from my first contact with the Kola Man. I will recount them here briefly. The first concerned a man who wanted to start a business of selling agashe and therefore wanted the Kola Man to tell his Sudanese meat suppliers that he was a reliable man who would pay his credit. He had just moved to Wad Medani from Khartoum where he had been unable to find any patron to help him with a similar enterprise. Next was a fellow from the Blue Nile Province who wanted the Kola Man to get the authorities to allow him to see his brother, currently in prison in Wad Medani. The third was a client who had come to receive a promised sum of £S2007 to ‘go and make citizenship’, by which was meant that he should go and secure a Sudanese passport.8 After promising to resolve these three - as well as several other requests - the Kola Man retired to his room to receive clients of a different nature: persons who had come to seek his services as a faki, about which I will be saying more later. This was the Kola Man at home. In the market place, while other stall-keepers would be busy buying or selling various commodities, the Kola Man appears only to be receiving an endless stream of callers who would have come to greet him. They start coming as soon as he arrives each morning to open his stall and the traffic continues until he closes in the evening. His stall is decorated with posters from Nigeria. He also has on the walls photographs and newspaper clippings showing him with some (recently) well-known public figures in Nigeria, pictures taken during some of his numerous visits. Each of his callers in the market place, who are exclusively West African, is given a kola nut to chew. Many of them leave as soon as they have gone through the customary Hausa greetings. Others, who would have come to consult him on some specific matter or to ask his help in some affair, sit a while before stating their

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business. Very rarely will any of them have come to buy something from him - and whatever they bought never included kola. This was a commodity he seemed to distribute free of charge. Since the kola nut is an expensive commodity in Sudan, it is reasonable to assume that the kola-trading side of his business must here be running at a considerable loss in monetary terms. This, however, is a loss that should be seen as counter-balanced by the symbolic wealth it brings him as an undisputed leader in the community of West African pilgrims. It is partly an activity such as the ceremonial distribut­ ing of kola nuts - a commodity of immense ritual value in Hausa cultural life - that legitimises his standing as an immigrant landlord. He might be said to receive considerable returns in the form of symbolic capital, transcend­ ing any monetary value of the goods used to signify these relationships. This perhaps is a small price - nevertheless a price - to pay for an occupant of a role such as his in order to retain it. Just like the situation at his home, too, there is always a group of people - one might call them followers - who just sit around him, listening to his comments on certain sections of the Quran or to his views on topics ranging from the current state of Islam to the plight of West African youth in Sudan. On Fridays the same group accompanies him to the main mosque in the centre of Wad Medani for the midday prayers. Before setting off for the mosque, they all perform their ablutions and decline to shake hands with non-believers or women, irrespective of what status or position they have.9 Most landlords have formal Sudanese citizenship: that is, they have Sudan­ ese passports and are usually holders of Nigerian passports as well. The former enables them to intercede on behalf of pilgrims who require proof of citizenship (I shall go into the question of travel documents later in the next chapter) and the latter enables them to move around with ease in West Africa. Alhaji Ahmed proudly exhibits both his Nigerian and Sudanese passports to visitors. This both consolidates and legitimates his position as a leader in the eyes of the pilgrims, since, as I will make clear later on, access to passports and proof of nationality are vital in the lives of the pilgrims. Ahmed the Kola Man is not the wealthiest of the landlords but he is a good example of the successful West African pilgrim-landlord. The prerequis­ ites of such a role here are asceticism, a network of dependents and a good relationship with Sudanese authorities - particularly the police, with whom they have dealings on behalf of the immigrants. In addition, an activity such as trading in kola, a Hausa identity-marker, enhances and reinforces that role. The Kola Man has all these attributes. Watching him feed his visitors, the thought that he must be a rich man does not fail to come to one’s mind. But one does not fail to notice, however, that he does not share in the commensality - he often claims to be fasting even though it would not be time for the Ramadan, when ritual fasting is practised. One does not also fail to notice that his clothes are no better than those of the ordinary run of

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pilgrims. Thus although there are other landlords who are more wealthy than the Kola Man, they are less important to the pilgrim community because they lack these features. One such landlord, who lives close to the Kola Man, is very rich but lacks the influence customary of West African landlords. He has five lorries that convey charcoal from the countryside into Wad Medani town and he employs both Sudanese and West African drivers on a strictly contractual basis. He lives in the West African quarter in a house that is both larger and finer than the others, but he keeps no clients and has little dealings with the other inhabitants of the quarter. For such reasons the West Africans sometimes express doubt as to whether he is truly of pilgrim descent, whereas Sudanese informants cite him as an example of a successful West African immigrant. As I have pointed out before, the urban landlords have wide-ranging contacts with the leaders of the surrounding West African communities. Their representatives attend local funerals of important immigrants in the rural areas and they themselves frequently appear in village funerals as well as weddings. Such contacts, apart from (in a sense) reinforcing their roles as key members of the pilgrim communities or enhancing trade, enable them to perform one other important function. They are able to keep an eye open for prospective brides for young male clients they have under their protection. This is a function through which they, more than any others, assert their authority over the urban young. It is practically impossible for a young man to find a suitable bride without the support or involvement of one of these landlords. Alhaji Ahmed would ask a man who has called to greet him: ‘How is young Amina these days? She must be nearly sixteen now. We must talk about her future.’ They not only find brides for their clients but they quite often help them with the wedding expenses, which are becoming increasingly inflated due to attempts by most West African urban youth to imitate Sudanese weddings. Pilgrim leaders are uneasy about this trend because they see it as contradicting the ethic of asceticism which they rate very highly. West African weddings are neither as elaborate nor as expensive as Sudanese ones. In 1983 the cost of a wedding was £S100 Sudanese pounds (£S1=50p in 1983) for a moderately well-to-do immigrant with the backing of friends and relatives, in contrast to Sudanese weddings which averaged £S2000 in Wad Medani.10 But even such a modest sum is bound to leave a considerable dent in the financial prospects of the young: thus the recourse to the patronage of landlords in the absence of kinsmen. While young immigrant males who enjoy the patronage of landlords receive assistance with their wedding expenses, the same is not the case for young females who have usually to furnish their own wedding contributions. The West African pilgrim-bride brings with her the kitchen utensils and crockery to her husband. She must also provide the furniture as well as the bedding

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for the room in which she is to sleep with her husband. For such reasons just as is the case in West Africa - most young girls have to work to save up for this kind of dowry. Besides taking part in various enterprises which their role in the family demands of them, young girls have diverse occupations to save towards their wedding. They prepare their own groundnut-paste or roast groundnuts to sell in the market place. Others with a reasonable knowledge of Arabic find daily work as maids in the homes of the middle­ class professional Sudanese. Another important role of the landlords is that they personify the essential values of West African pilgrim-culture. They lead prayers, are engaged in expounding Quranic scholarship and, above all, give moral instruction to the young on how to perpetuate their culture. This is often done by example and persuasion, not by the categorical pronouncements that are the case in the rural areas. Older pilgrims lounging in the shade during the siesta talk to young immigrants, saying: ‘Don’t raise your voice to your elders. Nigerian children don’t do that.’ Or ‘Don’t drink or smoke like the Sudanese do. You will run short of money and turn to stealing. That could lead to terrible consequences. That is not why your family left Nigeria (Faki Ahmed). ’ Young immigrants are often subjected to such mild rebukes, although many fail to see the connection between cigarettes and the negation of pilgrim status. Other forms of moral instruction might be illustrated by the Kola Man who, while holding an audience, will turn to a young student and say:

Young man, you are one of the few fortunate ones to have reached higher education amongst us. Bless your father’s foresight. But never smoke bongo, marijuana, or drink like Sudanese youth. Think of your background. Think of why your grandparents left Nigeria, a rich and powerful country to come here. Yes, Nigeria is a great country. Even the President of the America has to go to consult the Nigerian President before he does anything in Africa. He would never dream of coming to Sudan. Work hard, and remember that in Nigeria people like you drive about the streets on scooters, and are given bungalows and cars when they complete their university studies.11 Advice of this kind is intended for the benefit of all the young men in the audience who might be tempted to drink and smoke marijuana. In rural areas, by contrast, although the pupils of the khalwas do not receive as many whippings as their counterparts in West Africa, moral instruction is very categorical. Besides the teachers of khalwas any grown-up may rebuke, even punish, young children who behave in a manner considered impertinent. Instructions are always in the ‘Verily I say unto thee’ vein. ‘West African children must not do this. It leads to perdition!’ When on one occasion a visiting nursing matron suggested that in order to improve their hygiene they would need to send their children to school, the Sheikh of the village

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community said emphatically: ‘Your schools are not for us, they corrupt our values’ (cf. Robertson 1987: 112). The landlords of the urban areas might also condone such views but possibly, realising that relationships of interde­ pendence are not easily sustained in the urban milieu in an alien society (in particular since the values of that society initially have had a huge attraction for newly arrived immigrants), they tend to be gentle in their efforts at socialising and retaining the young members of their group. THE FAKIS

In a report to the Sudan government in 1926 on West African pilgrims, a colonial official wrote as follows: ‘Many of them practice a kind of religious witchcraft with which they cajole and often cheat the more simple Arabs of Western Sudan who are afraid of their reputed spiritual powers to disclose their presence to the authorities’ (Willis 1926: 3). What Willis describes here as ‘religious witchcraft’ is the chief occupational characteristic of the faki. Fakis range from those who sell charms in the market places and prepare different kinds of remedies for minor complaints, to those who are established members of the community and who, among other things, are reputed to be able to double the sums of money one gives them - and other such feats. The talisman-selling malams of the market places are fairly common all over West Africa, as indeed are the marabouts and powerful malams who, in addition to teaching the Quran, are sometimes engaged in what to an outside observer might seem to be the use of all kinds of ‘mumbo jumbo’12 to assist people achieve feats they cannot otherwise accomplish. Hausa malams with extraordinary functions similar to those of the fakis in Sudan are common enough in this type of business in West Africa. However, in West Africa one finds that this type of activity is not the sole preserve of Hausa malams; Mossi malams, Dagomba malams, Wolof malams, etc., are some of those also commonly involved in this kind of activity. The Asante chiefs, for example, had their kramos (malams) who prepared talismanic charms for them and whose rituals preceded any enterprise (Levtzion 1968: 182-3). The richer ones among the chiefs in Northern Ghana had similar, occasionally resident, malams. However, one striking characteristic of this second category of religious men is that they were usually transients or persons who moved from place to place. In West Africa such malams are rarely local members of society, nor are their activities universally accepted as legitimate by their peers or by members of the encapsulating groups.13 Some people may use their services wherever they reside at a given point in time, but scepticism of their professed feats is always commonplace. In present-day Ghana, for example, when one finds malams who are local residents, whatever their specialties may be, it would tend not to include controversial claims such as the doubling of money.

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Rather, such local residents would be found performing diffuse charms and remedies for local groups, which have built-in fail-safe aspects so that it is practically impossible to establish clearly the success or failure of a professed undertaking. I will expand on this presently. There are locally settled malams in West Africa too. Cohen (1969: 166), for instance, tells us that a man in Sabo would not undertake any enterprise without first consulting a malam about the propitiousness of the time for it. From the West Africa ethnographic context - and this is to some degree affirmed by the situation in Sudan - it can be inferred that powerful malams, particularly those engaged in the use of the Quran for supernatural remedies, are almost always those who are far away or those who happen to be passing through. It is not just the case of familiarity breeding contempt but rather that by the very nature of their activities, malams and marabouts must ultimately encounter a credibility crisis which is accentuated when they are one’s everyday neighbours. I am pursuing this line of thought for two reasons. First, to emphasise what appears to be the uniqueness of fakis as they are found in Sudan (which is why I have suggested that Monteil is wrong in regarding marabouts, malams, and fakis as the same thing). Second, as a preamble to my point of departure, I want to claim that fakis, who profess to be able to carry out extraordinary feats of the kind that are easily falsified, persist because they do not remain in one place long enough for a credibility crisis to arise. Such a preamble leaves me grappling with the unique role of the fakis in Sudan, which defies my scepticism. Many of the West African fakis in Sudan are constantly on the move. There are, nonetheless, also a number of reputedly powerful ones who are ordinary members of communities where they reside permanently and carry on their work locally, without succumbing to the crises of credibility I postulate as inevitable. How is this possible? As mentioned before, many of the landlords are also fakis. Not only have they managed to maintain their reputations as powerful controllers of the future but they also retain a steady flow of clients who do not belong to their own category: that is, who are not immigrants. Since the main source of the faki's power is his identity as a pilgrim, it follows that all West African pilgrims control that same power and, therefore, that every pilgrim is potentially a faki. The logic of this does not escape the pilgrims; that is why many of them are able to set themselves up legitimately as sellers of charms in the market places. Obviously not all of them are able to master the Quran well enough to become powerful fakis, but fakis they are by virtue of the fact that they are pilgrims. The landlord-fakis therefore draw their clients mainly from the surrounding local Sudanese population. Thus it is rare to find West Africans who use the services of fakis and, in the instances one does, one finds that they tend to seek help in matters pertaining to, say, the finding out of propitious dates for executing some particular

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action, rather than seeking to achieve something more concrete such as doubling money. Fakis who are also landlords perform the twin tasks of providing secular brokerage or telling the future for the pilgrims and spiritual brokerage to their Sudanese hosts. I have already mentioned some of the services the fakis offer. I must now pose the following question: What sort of people among the Sudanese are likely to seek help from a faki? It is not the case, as Willis (1926) supposed, that ‘simple’ Arabs from western Sudan are the ones who are duped by West African scoundrels. The Sudanese do not regard themselves in any way as simple in this sense. Indeed, if anything it is they who regard the West Africans as ‘simple’. Unfortunately I was unable to get much data on the activities of the fakis during my fieldwork. However, contact with two landlords who were also fakis and who did not mind talking about their activities indicates that their clients are from many different walks of life, even including some highly educated Sudanese professionals. One case I was able to follow concerned an official of one of the higher government establishments. An elderly gentleman, who had worked for nearly thirty years as a secretary-typist, suddenly found himself threatened by the new head of his office. The latter, an American-trained graduate, wanted the job of typing to go to the secretary’s young assistant, a lady with a proficiency in both English and Arabic shorthand and who could, moreover, type at a speed the old fellow could not even approach. The old man resented his new boss. He could not understand why this young man thought he could ‘return from America and change things overnight’. The relationship between the two became unbearable, as a result of which the old man approached a West African faki to ask him for ‘something powerful’ to remove his boss from office. The faki charged the old gentleman a fee of £S50 and two hens. He then gave him some powder derived from a mixture of the ashes of burnt paper, on which some ‘secret’ Quranic verses were written, and the roots of some shrub. The secretary was to blow a little of the powder on the chair of his boss each morning before office hours. Eventually the seat would become ‘too hot for the man to sit on’. The secretary believed the faki to be ‘powerful’ enough to succeed in this undertaking and carried out the instructions to the letter. Shortly afterwards, the young graduate got into trouble over another matter and was removed from the office by his superiors. It was at this juncture that I first met the secretary in the home of one of the West African landlord-fakis and heard the facts of the case. He was overjoyed with what he saw as the result of the faki's power. He sang the praises of this faki, even to the extent of telling me how lucky I was to have ‘such a powerful man’ as a friend, whenever I chanced to meet him. So wearisome did his reiteration of the case become that I could not resist asking him once whether he had considered the possibility that the removal of his chief was just a coincidence that had

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nothing at all to do with the ashes he spread on the chair. He insisted he had not the slightest doubt the man had lost his job as a result of the effect of the ashes. He saw the man’s other troubles (for which he was removed) as pure coincidence. Moreover, he happened to know that his former superior also believed that his misfortunes had been caused by a malevolent antagonist with the help of a West African faki and was himself, therefore, looking for a more powerful faki to help him get his job back. This news was so disconcerting that the secretary returned to his faki to seek advice on what counter-measures to take. The faki then advised him to seek help from one of the country-dwelling fakis because ‘they were the most powerful.’ I was unable to follow the case further, beyond noting that the young graduate was not reinstated during the period of my fieldwork. The above example suggests that fakis do not draw their clients from any particular category of people. This is an impression confirmed by Gaily (1982) who considered this same question in a project concerned with the proliferation of the reputation of fakis.14 As Gaily points out: ‘almost every­ body is prone to seek a faki's help’ (p. 5). For some people this is an act of desperation: when all else has failed, one tries the faki as a last resort. As he puts it: ‘When all other doors are closed the faki's door is always open’ (loc. cit.). For others, however, seeking the help of a faki is the first remedy to spring to mind when they are in some difficulty because of the great faith they have in the powers of fakis. As for fakis themselves, their occupation can be very lucrative. Successful ones among them are able to travel to and fro by plane and generally have a very thriving business. I did not have access to any precise data on what fakis usually charged for their services. From Gaily, however, we find that those with good reputations can make fortunes quite easily: ‘People pay and pay a lot to be cured or to remove a rival from the way . . . This could be a few ounces of gold, a cow, a cock or a bag of corn (loc. cit.).’ Fakis can help a person to eliminate difficult bosses and rivals but they also provide a range of other services. I recorded the following situations in which the services of fakis were sought: students wishing to pass difficult examinations; young men aspiring to positions in jobs where competition is stiff; youngsters requiring magical help to mellow the hearts of unwilling sweethearts; the not-so-young who want to become sexually potent again; and, finally, several cases of those who gave money to fakis to double it for them. The faki who helped the secretary above did not practise money-doubling. Such an accomplishment, however, was the professed specialty of some other very reputable fakis. I encountered one of them towards the end of my fieldwork. A Fulani male, about fifty years old, he lived in a straw hut in the atrium of a large brick house, the property of a Sudanese client who had once paid for the services of the faki with the house. (The grass hut was

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the reconstruction of the type Fulani nomads build on the plains of Northern Nigeria and thus had both an ethnic and a rural symbolic connotation.) This faki had several powerful clients whom he serviced. In addition to preparing charms for the success of the various future enterprises of clients, he also undertook to double cash deposits for them. Yet his clients could never get enough of his services because he travelled widely, as he put it, ‘in order to gain wisdom and to practise his craft.’ His operations spread from Riyadh in Saudi Arabia to Wad Medani in Sudan and as far as Addis Ababa. Whenever he returned after long absences, his clients came back with large sums of money for him to double. What was especially intriguing to me was how anyone could maintain an impeccable reputation as a doubler of money by religious means. This is an aspect of the activities of the faki that is most difficult to understand. It is not easy to falsify the claim that a lady’s change of heart was induced by magical power, or that the sacking of one’s enemy was caused by the power of a faki's contagious magical (although both client and master would emphasise: religious) practices. But the claim that a given sum of money can be doubled by such means is very tall indeed, since one’s point of departure must be that rationally this is imposs­ ible. The existence of West African fakis in Sudan is further interesting for the following reasons. First, that their activities are possible at all must be predicated not only on beliefs in their powers but, as mentioned before, in their ability to maintain (and keep on maintaining) impeccable reputations, something that - one supposes - ought to be impossible by the very nature of their activities. Next, they are important because they claim the ability not only to predict future occurrences but also to control them. Yet at the same time they belong to a people who impute their inability to achieve a professed aim to divine will (which they consider to be unalterable). The logic of the beliefs in the power of fakis is similar to the ontological logic of witchcraft beliefs among the Azande (Evans-Pritchard 1937). Fakis, I maintain, persist among the pilgrims and are able to go on functioning with their reputations intact for two very important reasons. First, the pilgrims have a cosmology in which all future occurrences are seen as predeter­ mined and inevitably fall into a rigid chain of divine design; each occurrence thus only confirms this design. Second, what is purported to occur is of such an amorphous nature as to be non-verifiable. Now the activity of telling fortunes, causing girls to fall in love with particular males or the recovering of lost property - whatever their outcome - can only be conceived as fulfilling the predetermined pattern. Such activities are thus not amenable to the logic of cause and effect. It follows therefore that some built-in mechanism prevents them from being false, although any single instance of success in an undertaking, irrespective of what methods were employed to accomplish that feat, only confirms the power of the faki. The role of the

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faki has a further ontological specificity for the West African pilgrims in Sudan, the understanding of which is necessary for the analysis of their whole existence. For such reasons, I shall return to the theme of fakis in Chapter 6 to expand on the question of why they persist and, more import­ antly, their role in promoting a successful completion of the pilgrimage. For the moment, I am content to treat the occupation of the faki as just one more occupation available to the West Africans, one which belongs to the more prestigious type. THE LOWER SET: TAILORS, WATER-VENDORS, BUTCHERS AND BEGGARS

The inconstancy of occupational roles, as I mentioned above, is more pro­ nounced in the less prestigious set of occupations. Here one can find people changing occupations or doing many of them at the same time: a water­ seller who the next day sells vegetables; a tailor who works seasonally as a picker of cotton for some Gezira tenants, etc. Abdul-Kerim is an example of a pilgrim playing this kind of multiple-occupational roles. He is a forty-fiveyear-old messenger employed in a higher-education establishment in Wad Medani. Abdul-Kerim’s father left the Northern Nigerian state of Sokoto for the pilgrimage at the start of the Second World War. He settled in Garidiyewa (Hausa for ‘village of many groups’) to work for more funds before going on. During this sojourn he married a Hausa woman and raised three sons, the eldest of whom was Abdul-Kerim. Years later, Abdul-Kerim’s father completed the pilgrimage but returned to settle in his Sudanese village; his family had now increased to two wives and six sons. In the early 1960s, then an old man, he decided to visit home (Nigeria) once more. He died there. As the eldest son, Abdul-Kerim assumed responsibility for the family. His job as a messenger ends each day at 2.30 p.m. After lunch he sits at his sewing machine and tries to meet orders from some of his superiors at work. They prefer to buy their jellabiyah from him, since he is regarded as a skilled tailor. Unfortunately, his lowly status as a messenger has its con­ sequence here. He meets his orders, but his principals are often not forthcom­ ing with payment and treat him with a sort of benign contempt whenever he attempts to remind them of his unpaid services. Abdul-Kerim, therefore, has to fall back on further occupations. He occasionally sells trinkets and various ornaments for some of the West African merchants or picks cotton during harvest time. Another common occupation for West Africans that is not regarded as stigmatised is that of selling water. Water-vendors can be found carrying water on their heads in different kinds of containers. The more successful ones turn empty petrol barrels into water tanks, which are pulled by horse and cart. They get their supply of water from overhead tanks that are filled twice daily by electrical pumps. The vendors pay a small fee to the authorities

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for the water which they transport to various households with no piped water. It is not only the immigrant quarter that lacks piped water in the houses: there are also other sections of Wad Medani with houses that are not equipped with water. The water-vendors are therefore in constant de­ mand. West African landlords are usually the source of credit for those immigrants who, after a period of work as water-sellers carrying water on their heads, wish to invest in a horse and cart. Although this is a more effective way of carrying water, to the West Africans the horse and cart in general is perceived as symbolising the successful Arab, as opposed to carrying goods on one’s head which symbolised humility, the characteristic virtue of the lowly West African pilgrim. Pilgrims sometimes say of a person, ‘He has become a bararibe (Arab), he has managed to get a horse and cart.’ However, they seem to make allowance for the necessity of a horse and cart for the water-vendors. Such assets are not then seen as implying a social mobility towards ‘Arabness’ although the West African farmer who buys a horse and cart, for example, will be referred to, even if jokingly, as trying to become or having become an Arab. It is common to find West Africans working as greengrocers and butchers. Vegetables such as carrots, green and red peppers, garden eggs, okra, etc., are delivered daily by Sudanese gardeners who own some of the most splendid plots one can see on the banks of the Nile in Wad Medani. This produce is abundant and rather cheap so that the selling of vegetables is not a very rewarding activity. However, a number of young West Africans become vegetable sellers because it is regarded as respectable and it pays for their board and lodging in the homes of the landlords with whom they reside. Butchers sometimes have either Sudanese or immigrant landlord sponsors or both. Butchering also belongs to the more rewarding occupations, particu­ larly for those who are good agashe sellers. At night, customers come from all over town to the West African quarter to buy a few pounds of this roasted meat. Quite a number of the regular customers are Sudanese because the meat is rather expensive and thus beyond the means of many pilgrims.15 Although selling agashe is an occupation without stigma, it is still thought of as a West African specialty with diffuse mystical powers attached to it. Locals say that the spices used for the meat (like the formulae of the fakis' Quranic remedies) are a well-guarded West African secret. Another curious side to agashe is that its hot spices are believed by some to make men sexually potent. This mystical implication and the attribution of aphrodisiacal qualities to agashe is, to my knowledge, not as pronounced in West Africa where it is mainly regarded as a delicious, hotly spiced meat.16 The ascription of mystical powers to activities in which West Africans are predominant extends even beyond consumables such as meat to occupations such as lorry-driving, something that West Africans are said to be particularly good at and a skill not merely derived from professional competence. Here

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again, there are hints of some magical forces controlled by pilgrims which enable them to handle vehicles, even those with faulty parts, without incur­ ring fatal accidents. Partly because of this belief, West Africans find it easy to get jobs as drivers and a number of them live up to this by hanging talismans and other charms in their lorries and Toyota buses to affirm and imply that they are safer than other drivers because, being pilgrims, they have access to these secret charms. Begging cannot strictly be regarded as an occupation. For the most part it is a tactical and temporary recourse used by many pilgrims: a practice, as we saw, allowed by Islam. In many cases it is the only available means of livelihood for disabled pilgrims or widows with small children and no relatives to turn to for help. There are, however, instances in which one encounters fairly healthy looking pilgrims who are street beggars. These are people who would, as it were, be using the pilgrim-licence to seek alms from the believers en route. The host population has an ambivalent attitude towards such beggars. One sometimes hears such healthy beggars referred to as lazy and disgraceful. Begging among the urban West Africans in Sudan - unlike the case in Nigeria - is not organised (see, for instance, Cohen 1969). Pilgrim-beggars would just pick a strategic street corner and proceed to shout their slogans of solicitation, while stretching out some receptacle for alms. However, a haphazard choice of spot can sometimes lead to conflict, since a particular corner might already have been staked out by another. I once recorded a quarrel between two female Hausa beggars concerning a street corner which one claimed belonged to her, because she had been using it for the past twelve years. The intruder had agreed to move to the other side of the street but this did not mollify the self-proclaimed ‘owner’ of the street corner. The two beggars traded insults across the street at one another. One mocked the other because her grasp of Arabic was limited to the phrases ‘Allah Kareem. Allah Kareem' (Allah will provide) which she chanted repeatedly when asking for alms. The other said her opponent was a typical ‘Kano prostitute’ who had undertaken the pilgrimage late in life to atone for the pernicious lusts of her wasted youth. Each tried to surpass the other with abuses designed to hurt as much as possible. It was significant to note, however, that nothing in the torrents of abuse they exchanged suggested that either of them doubted or questioned the pilgrim-status of the other. Displaying one’s semi-starved children or appearing under circumstances that emphasise one’s deprivation is believed to improve the beggars’ chances. Many female (and some male) beggars therefore have child assistants with them. This may not be only a pragmatic strategy: sometimes truly tragic circumstances make it imperative to adopt any means that enhances the receiving of alms. Some of the women, mentioned before, started the pilgrim­ age with husbands who had died during the journey and left them alone with children. Without kinsmen and very often unable to speak or understand

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Arabic properly, such beggars become drifters, moving from town to town. They are unable to fend for themselves and have to live off the alms they can get in the streets. For this type of pilgrim it is highly unlikely that the first generation of immigrants will be able to reach Mecca. All they can do is to instil the hopes and the purpose of their journey into those who are fortunate enough to survive them, hoping that the next generation will steadfastly continue. The receiving of alms is always acknowledged with formula-chantings, in which the giver is offered the blessings of Allah for himself and his family because he has shown mercy to the needy. When beggars are proficient in Arabic, the chanting will be in that language; otherwise they pronounce them in a mixture of Hausa and Arabic. Perhaps, because the whole interaction is imbued with religious sanction that defines the alms-taker as superior to the alms-giver, givers would sometimes stop for a while to receive the blessings of beggars. Beggar: ‘May Allah bring health to your children.’ Giver: ‘Amin!’ (Amen). Beggar: ‘May you succeed in any undertaking.’ Giver: ‘Amin.’ Etcetera. Alms are received in the name of Allah, whose blessings the beggar imparts to the giver as if he or she were empowered to dispense with it. While Sudanese beggars can often be heard thanking their benefactors for alms they have just received, it is rare to hear pilgrim­ beggars say a straightforward ‘thank you’ to givers, although one sometimes hears alms-givers thanking beggars for the blessing they have just received. The material gifts of the givers, although they nourish the starving beggar, are subordinate to the spiritual (and non-material) blessings with which the beggar can reciprocate. Alms-givers seem to acknowledge this by their sup­ plication to beggars for blessings. Despite its religious aspects, a certain ambiguity remains and street-begging is still regarded as socially stigmatising. The fact that the secular-bureaucratic forces regard it as disgraceful - since the eradication of poverty is one of their professed principal aims - has resulted in a local hostility towards it. Street beggars have to display (and even to exaggerate) the most appalling features of their deprivation in order to incur the pity of passers-by. This is regarded as disgraceful and since the beggars are predominantly West African, West Africans are, on another level, seen as a disgrace in the streets of Sudan. The religious ingredient is, however, more pronounced in begging of another kind, which is on the prestigious side of the begging scale: the ritualised solicitation of alms by malams and pupils (al majirai) of the khalwas on Fridays and during some of the Islamic feasts. This kind of activity is not normally regarded as begging and, consequently, not stigmatised. Yet it involves the chanting of Quranic verses and the solicitation of alms from door-to-door and sometimes in the streets. The line between this kind of non-stigmatised begging and street-begging, which is stigmatised, is therefore difficult to draw.

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These are some of the occupational roles that pilgrims in the urban areas are involved in. As I have tried to make clear, some of these occupational roles are not played with any degree of constancy. Whatever constancy there is relates only to whether or not an occupation belongs to the prestigious or the less-prestigious category. Constancy, therefore, applies only to the set under which the occupation might be subsumed and is not to be regarded as an independent attribute. Furthermore, although they do not move across the occupational types, it is circumstances that dictate whether a pilgrim will be doing one kind of job or another, or several jobs at once, at a particular point in time. The multiple-income opportunities available in the urban areas entail this inconstancy of occupational roles and - together with traditional Sudanese attitudes towards certain types of labour generally this has resulted in a stigmatised view of a number of these occupations. A consequence of this, as I have tried to show, is that some of these jobs have become West African occupational niches and are regarded as unfit for a Sudanese to do. This prejudice exists even though some of these occupations are self-employing and comparatively lucrative. The prejudice is further more pronounced in a small number of other occupations which involve working for another person. Such occupations are viewed as lower on the prestige scale, because working for somebody is strongly akin to (and reminis­ cent of) what in the past was the lot of slaves. Writers such as McLoughlin (1962) and Culwick (1951) have tried to show that historical values attached to menial work have resulted in certain kinds of labour being regarded as dishonourable or degrading. It is, for example, chiefly for such reasons that farmwork has never been popular or successful in northern Sudan. The most stigmatised category of jobs are those of sweeping roads, collecting the septic-tank latrine at dawn and pottering, which involves carrying some­ times up to a hundred kilogrammes of grain on one’s back. Apart from the intrinsically unpleasant nature of such jobs, they also entail working for an­ other person. Consequently, the Sudanese regard them as demeaning. West African pilgrims, however, particularly the single and middle-aged ones, take on such jobs whenever they are available, without hesitation. They see them­ selves as striving to achieve a higher purpose and do not find that the value­ scale attributed to those who are involved in such activities applies to them. Thus in Medani, except for a few Southerners (i.e. Sudanese from some of the southern ethnic groups) and some groups from Western Sudan, West Africans predominate in such jobs. As might well be expected, there is an indigenous ambivalence of attitude here. West African pilgrims are, on the one hand, despised for lowering themselves to perform such servile tasks. On the other hand, there is the notion of something akin to the licence of the pilgrim, which not only excuses them from contravening the normative value-scale as regards what jobs are demeaning to do, but enables them to be cleansed by the very fact that the goal they strive for is regarded as supreme by the same value-scale.

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Sometimes the attitude of the pilgrims and their host alike is one of the ends justifying the means. One thus finds that although the pilgrims are sometimes referred to as criminals and undesirables, they are also the subject of proverbial commendation for their diligence in such everyday expressions as ‘He is as hardworking as a Fellata’ or ‘I am suffering like a Fellata.’ Suffering is an attribute of prophets; the Prophet Muhammad himself is reputed to have said prophets suffer most. The slavishness which working for another entails is ultimately cancelled by its inevitable corollary: ‘suffer­ ing’, which is of highest merit for believers. This then, together with the desired end for which the pilgrim toils, explains the propensity of the pilgrim to take on servile or menial tasks. But the social stigma of servitude and the bureaucratic notions of social disgrace still persist in some domains, resulting in the fact that these self-same pilgrims are sometimes defined as a disgrace to their adopted country. THE COMPLEMENTARITY OF TOWN AND COUNTRY

As if to purify themselves for being contaminated by urban life, the town pilgrims descend on the Gezira villages during the high agricultural seasons, particularly during the cotton-picking season (January to March), to work and to partake in what at the same time resembles a spiritual rejuvenation. During the cotton-picking months the population of some of the pilgrim villages almost doubles. There are many occasions of revelry: drumming and dancing in the evenings, regular communal prayers in which scores of worshippers line up and say their prayers in the open. The urbanites take part in such activities, the intensity of which might be seen in effect as a series of ritual dramas, symbolising and affirming the central values of the West African community. Other non-pilgrim groups, who also pick cotton and take part in agricultural work during the high seasons, join in these ritual activities of the villages. To the West African pilgrims, however, this appears to have an ethnic specificity. Abdul-Kerim the tailor, for example, refers to these short spells of farmwork as making him ‘a rested and a new man’. Yet the harvest days entail hard physical work from dawn to dusk. The urbanites return to the towns at the end of the season renewed - and also economically better off. In this manner, the material deprivation of rural life and the moral and spiritual poverty of urban life are able to complement each other. When we compare the livelihood of the urban pilgrim to that of the rural pilgrim (as described in the previous chapter) it becomes clear that the predominant form of credit relationships (which, I argued, contributed to a reduced geographical mobility among the rural areas) are missing in the towns. The main reason for this is that the existence of a high degree of close-knittedness in primary relationships, which we find in the pilgrim­ villages, is absent in the urban areas.

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The urban pilgrims also have debts and obligations both to Sudanese principals and immigrant landlords and they owe their ratings of credit­ worthiness to the landlords. However, the urban-debt relationships are trans­ actional and are therefore viewed in contractual terms. They lack the religious undertones of the ‘warm debts’, typical of the rural areas. Default of urban debts is rectified mainly by means of judicial coercion. It is partly as a consequence of this that there is a great turnover among the urban population of young single males between the ages of eighteen and thirty. When they find themselves unable to pay their debts, many of them abscond from relationships with immigrant landlords to whom they owe money to try their luck in other towns. Such people usually find the patronage of Sudanese helpers in whose houses they live, often removed from the immigrant quarter. When their command of Arabic is good enough, they tend to pass as native Sudanese, denying their immigrant background. This category of West Africans is the most despised among the immigrants generally (see Chapter 5). Urban pilgrims regard such young men as those who betray their West African backgrounds and who give the immigrants a bad name in Sudan as criminals and undesirables. This is also a category that denounces the value of pilgrim-ness and the pilgrim subculture which I will discuss in the next chapter. SUMMARY

My aim in this chapter was to present some of the occupations that are available to pilgrims in the urban centres. Using Wad Medani, the capital of the Gezira region, as an example, I tried to show that the Gezira pilgrim­ villages have a specific symbiotic relationship with the towns. The occupations were divided into two sets: the one consisting of the landlords and fakis who foster and maintain the second set of occupations such as lorry driving, tailoring, begging and the selling of vegetables. While my data would seem to bear out what M. G. Smith (1959) observed in Hausaland as ‘the awkward Hausa practice of pursuing several occupations simultaneously’ (p. 248), the occupational plurality of the West Africans in Sudan is also rather constrained by factors such as the immigrants’ status and the heterogeneity of their backgrounds. Such factors influence their ability to pursue several jobs at the same time and, when they do, they only pursue a limited number of jobs within either occupational set. M. G. Smith (ibid: 250) also noted clearcut status differences between male and female occupations, the latter being less prestigious. No such marked cleavage was observed in Sudan. Wives of successful fakis and malams appeared to command the respects of their husbands’ male clients and had female followings of their own. Similarly, in the rural areas, pilgrims who did not practise purdah worked alongside their wives in the fields. I would like to go further and argue that by the very nature of their

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existence, roles such as those of the fakis and landlords are generative of such occupations as begging, the selling of charms and even lorry-driving. These latter occupations are then able to reproduce themselves, while being at the same time reinforced by the roles of the former. Granted this, the next point worth noting is that by their very roles, landlords and fakis contribute to a contradiction that makes the existence of the immigrant pilgrims under the present circumstances in Sudan possible. It is a manifesta­ tion of this contradiction that West African pilgrims are both economically indispensable and politically undesirable. They are usually involved in jobs which are viewed as entailing a rejection of the norms and values of the host population; jobs which are, however, necessary for the development and the economic well-being of the country as a whole. In so far as the decision­ makers are involved, another consequence of this contradiction is that it results in attitudes and policies which McLoughlin (1962: 382) has, in a very apt phrase, termed the ‘economics-versus-politics split personality’. This characterises the sometimes conflicting attitude of politicians who, despite the recognition that members of a particular immigrant group in a given sector are economically invaluable for their country (might still for reasons that may be politically sound), still advocate policies that are at once adverse and inconsistent to the welfare of the state (where that social group is concerned) (see McLoughlin loc. cit.). We have already seen how the authorities sought to reduce the involvement of West Africans in the Gezira Scheme (see Chapter 3) because it was then politically expedient, despite the fact that the labour-input of West Africans was vital for the production of cotton. Comparing the towns with the rural areas, I have tried to show that the towns need the countryside and the countryside needs the towns, not merely in terms of an asymmetrical inter-dependence but as complementing each other. In a similar manner the rural pilgrims need their tenant/sharecropping partners, from whom they borrow money, just as the urban pilgrims need their patrons who help them in their various enterprises. The fundamental basis of the former relationship is that of a moralistic and mystical-religious one, while that of the latter, though contractual, is also generated by beliefs couched in religious terms. This religious aspect notwithstanding, the rela­ tionships could be reduced to an asymmetrical cleavage of town and country, patrons and clients, tenants and sharecroppers, borrowers and lenders. Although each of these relationships entail some degree of reciprocity and consequently a symbiosis of sorts, there is always objectively one subor­ dinate party to each relationship. However, because of the religious ingredi­ ent, there is, like ‘warm debts’ in the previous chapter, a mystifying aspect that denies any asymmetry exists. Thus, for instance, the rural pilgrim­ villages of the Gezira may be regarded as slums in the worst sense of the word, yet their inhabitants regard themselves as leading a life that is spiritually

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superior to life in an urban setting. Yet the towns are where they go to make arrangements to continue the pilgrimage which defines their whole existence. It is to the towns they go to sell their farm produce, receive medical care or to present themselves to the authorities as honest pilgrims who desire to extricate some kinsman from gaol. The townsmen, on the other hand, enjoy comparative (material) well­ being but need the country pilgrims as the spiritual custodians, so to speak, of their collective identity - as pilgrims in Sudan. This interrelationship between the two categories of immigrants receives another interesting dimen­ sion when one takes the host population into account. One finds then that the rural pilgrims’ idea of themselves as morally superior to the urban dwellers is not a cosy delusion; it appears to be affirmed and legitimised particularly by Sudanese urban dwellers themselves. Such an affirmation takes place whenever townsmen seek out powerful fakis in the countryside because they believe them to be more powerful than urban ones. The affirmation also takes place whenever the urban pilgrims descend into the villages to do some agricultural work and submit themselves to the collective rigidity of rural pilgrim-life once in a while. And whenever this takes place, what happens amounts to the perpetuation of the ideology of pilgrim-ness. This in turn sustains a mode of living that transcends the worries of everyday life and contributes to the creating of a pilgrim subculture in Sudan. Let us now turn to the subculture of the West African pilgrims to see how it reproduces itself from generation to generation, thus making it possible for its members to maintain a self-identity as pilgrims on their way.

5 THE ISLAMIC PILGRIMAGE AND THE WEST AFRICAN SUBCULTURE IN SUDAN

The most likely greeting that a Hausa speaker would use in a fleeting encounter is ‘Sannu. Kana Kalo?' (Greetings. Are you seeing, are you perceiv­ ing, [or] are you alive?). In a more formal encounter: ‘Yaya aiki?; Ina kwana?' and ‘Ina gajiya?' (respectively: How is work? [where] how was your sleep; [where] how is tiredness?) would be correct. There are variations on these which one might use or elaborate upon in accordance with situational de­ mands. But on any given occasion the greetings employed would also appropri­ ately reflect the degree of familiarity and respect between the parties involved in the encounter. This convention is the same in both West Africa and Sudan. In the latter, however, one finds that although they also use the above forms, the finest greeting is ‘Allah i keka Makkah' (May Allah send you to Mecca). This greeting epitomises what might be regarded as a West African pilgrim-culture in Sudan. It also articulates their most ardent wish; but wishes are not horses and wishes essentially reflect desires we find almost unattainable, so not many of them reach Mecca. Yet, despite the failure of many of them to conclude the pilgrimage, West Africans still make up a relatively high proportion of the total number of pilgrims who visit Mecca every year1 and at any given point in time, vast numbers of them are at various stages of pilgrimage along the route to Mecca. Indeed, a Muslim from West Africa is more likely to attempt the Fifth Pillar of the Islamic faith than Muslims elsewhere. Now why is this so? I shall attempt to deal with two main issues here. First, why is the pursuit of pilgrimage the most common feature of the West African Islamic belief? Second, what are the main features of the West African subculture in Sudan this belief has served to generate in contradistinction to mainstream Sudanese Arab culture? This is to be considered an important aspect of the whole problem, because it is this subculture that perpetuates their most distinguishing characteristic as a group - the craving for the pilgrimage and enables its transmission to subsequent generations. These two issues are thus inextricably interrelated.

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Several scholars have dealt with the question of the prominence of the pilgrimage to Mecca in West African Islam. Their answers range from those that explain the pilgrimage in terms of the cultural propensity of certain groups to travel (Robinson 1896: Trimingham 1959: 86) to those which see it as a rational pursuit of prestige and economic power (Lewis 1966: 73-4; Azarya 1978: 89). I will examine these by turn. Cultural propensities and the power of economic forces form two explana­ tion-clusters which have been variously advanced for the pilgrimage. The first set is so-named because it comprises accounts that revolve around notions of how a particular group is likely or unlikely to behave under a given set of circumstances. But even this would be a generous way of characterising such theories, for proponents of this set of theories do not give way to any hints of doubt; they are merely ‘just so’ theories. The second set is what I will term the ‘too-many-chiefs model’, so-named because it postulates a desire for power and prestige as the motive-force behind pilgrimages. This latter set is the more common in the literature. I shall therefore devote some space to examining its validity. Before we take a closer look at these two types of theories, it is worth pointing out that they do not usually occur singly in any one work. They are often advanced in conjunction with other explanations with which they are interrelated. I have, nevertheless, subsumed them under two distinct sets only for the convenience of analysis, although I will make it clear as I proceed which ones advance which interrelated theories. THE CULTURAL PROPENSITIES MODEL

The cultural propensities type of reasons given for the pilgrimage is commonly found in the works of some of the late-nineteenth-century European travellers in West Africa. Such writers were not concerned with any systematic attempt to explain the pilgrimage but noticed its predominance in the region; and, being Christians whose aims were partly to counter what they perceived as the Islamic threat, they commented on it. It is thus worth pointing out that such writers wrote in a genre that was reflective of their times. Robinson (1896), and Kumm (1910), both of whom devoted a chapter in their books to the pilgrimage to Mecca, are representative of this type. Kumm saw ‘Mohammedanism’ in Africa as a threat to Christian civilising influences, while Robinson was inclined to regard its influence as slight. If Robinson was right, why then were thousands of the inhabitants of Hausaland leaving their homes annually for the pilgrimage? The reason he advanced was the following: The explanation is to be found partly in the fact that the Hausas are naturally an enterprising people, and that the journey to Mecca affords them a convenient means of gratifying their love for adventure; and partly

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for the fact that the journey, despite its risks and hardships, is from a money point of view by no means unremunerative. (Robinson 1896: 196-7, my emphasis) Robinson then goes on to illustrate what he means by ‘economic remunera­ tion’, by showing how pilgrims resort to trading or engage in different kinds of economic activities during the journey to Mecca. For Robinson, too, there is, further, a curious way in which this economic remuneration is achieved: namely by cheating in business. He holds that the more the number of times a man has been to Mecca, the more inclined he is to lie and cheat when engaged in a business transaction. Indeed, Robinson on the whole regards Islam as having had a rather detrimental effect on African civilisation. He goes to some lengths to reject some contemporary views which held that the religion had brought civilisation to Africans where none had previously existed, or that it had kept Africans from strong drink. Not only does he refute such claims (ibid: 189), but he tries to paint a picture of the West African Muslim as a conceited person who is plagued by an admixture of ‘pagan superstitions and drunkenness’, who thinks that non­ Muslims are only good enough to be enslaved (loc. cit.). He therefore concluded that there was still some hope for Christianity, providing its missionaries were patient enough and did not forget the lessons of evolution and history; for, he concludes: ‘It will certainly be several generations before the West African native, however carefully trained he may be, will have gained that force of character which the Englishman now inherits as a sort of birthright’ (1896: 194). Going on the pilgrimage, therefore, might express the Hausa pilgrim’s predisposition for adventure and the economic rewards he might attain (through sharp business practices) might also induce him to attempt it, but it certainly would not alter or improve him in any fundamental manner.2 Kumm (1910) similarly had no doubt of the superiority of Christian­ ity over Islam, but he was more inclined to see the latter as a serious adversary and was thus not inclined to dismiss the Islamic beliefs of the people so easily. A relatively modern writer whose views also fall under this model is Trimingham who notes in his Islam in West Africa (1959) that the fact that ordinary people could undertake the pilgrimage although they were faced with the dangers of enslavement or of being drafted into the Mahdist armies, ‘shows that the pilgrimage was an urge from which they could not be deflected by the dangers of the way’ (1959: 86, my emphasis). He saw no need to account for this ‘urge’ except to note that in the early days ‘the lure of Mecca [also] governed the direction of irreconcilables to the new regimes’ (ibid) and to repeat a version of Robinson’s on the pilgrimage as a manifesta­ tion of the proneness of some groups to the wanderlust: ‘Hausa and Negroid Fulbe of Northern Nigeria are keener than any other West Africans, a

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psychological factor distinguishing them from eastern Sudanese Muslims. Hausa, of course, are an enterprising people to whom it provides an outlet for their love of travel and trade’ (Trimingham 1959: loc. cit.). Observe that the pilgrimage here is reduced to such psychological terms as an ‘urge’ and an ‘outlet’. However, it must also be said that Trimingham deems it necessary to point out that the motives of the poor who undertake the pilgrimage are essentially religious. Views such as these on the peculiar predispositions of cultural groups to do one thing or another lead one to consider the question: Is the greatness of the numbers of Hausa among the pilgrims in Sudan just one result of their propensity to travel; might it just be an extension of a diaspora syndrome? Hausa are found in great numbers in the western Sudan belt and in other parts of Africa residing locally. They are often engaged in trade and, since the Fulani jihads in the mid-nineteenth century, are found as roaming malams, spreading the word of Islam. Commonly these two strands of activity are intertwined. This sort of migration has been discussed by some anthropolo­ gists as reflecting Hausa emic categories and conceptions of spatiality and mobility and, particularly, what cultural values Hausa attach to them (see Olofson 1981). In an analysis of the Hausa concept yawon Dandi, ‘roaming the world’, Olofson examines different attitudes to a type of migration that is common among the Hausa. Yawon Dandi, roaming-the-world type of migration, is characterised by the fact that the migrant soon loses touch with home. Commonly, the migrant would either be someone who had left home after some kind of trouble (as, for example, someone who has not been able to pay a debt) or a person who is just looking for adventure. Others, still, could well be bona fide traders looking for experience. Olofson shows quite clearly that, common though yawon Dandi is, the general Hausa attitude towards it is negative. They regard it as banza (which he translates as ‘selfish’, but which also means ‘worthless’, and in some contexts ‘bad’). There is a Hausa saying that makes their attitude towards this type of migration clear: ‘Zaman gida ya fi Dandi', staying at home (in one’s compound) is better than the walk of Dandi. Olofson concludes then that: ‘yawon Dandi, is a “liberational” migration in which the Hausa migrant exercises too much personal independence in a culture which sets high value on relations of interdependence among kin’ (ibid: 77). If this view is true, it would seem to call into question the conclusions to be inferred from anthropologists such as M. G. Smith (1960: 26) and Cohen (1969: 41-2) who partly attribute diaspora formation among the Hausa to their kinship structure which, they hold, is too weak to motivate pilgrims to return home or maintain contact over time with their homes of origin.3 The pilgrims do not consider their movement to Sudan as a ‘yawon Dandi'. They are very explicit about the fact that they see themselves as merely trying to fulfil a religious injunction. It would be quite unlikely for

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someone who seeks personal independence (from family and kinsmen) to choose the pilgrimage as a means for achieving this: a choice in the course of which he would precisely be subjecting himself to the collective rigour of the moral communities of his tribesmen at all stages along the route, where it is subordination to the collective goal that is important rather than so selfish a pursuit as a ‘liberational’ wanderlust. Olofson’s theory of yawon Dandi cannot, therefore, be applied to the migrants to Sudan. Related to the cultural propensities model of West African pilgrimages is the ‘run away’ model, a type of explanation first advanced by Willis (1926). He holds that people who are ‘under a cloud’ in their own homes are likely to leave for the pilgrimage, attempting thereby to show that such persons really have motive(s) other than religious ones and are therefore not serious in their quest. Willis, however, concedes that it is difficult ‘to draw the line between the refugee, the migrant and the pilgrim, except that the pilgrim hopes ultimately to return home while the others probably do not’ (Willis ibid). Now this is the view of someone who was not a social scientist: his interest in these issues derived from his role as a colonial official. Such views, however, are worth examining in this context because they have contributed to an attitude of suspicion with which subsequent authorities in Sudan have always regarded West African pilgrims, particularly those who chose to walk rather than to fly. Yet there is no single instance in which this allegation (that people who are in some trouble or other leave for the pilgrim­ age) has been proven. This is, of course, not surprising since it would be unlikely for a pilgrim to admit that he really had a record of unsavoury activities in his home village and it was for that reason he left home. I will argue, nonetheless, that what prompted a person to leave home for the pilgrimage is not very interesting. Holders of religious beliefs have always resorted to different strategies to atone for their own perceived misdeeds or sins. More significant must be the fact that the sinner could choose to do penance in a given manner (that is, the modality of the penance chosen) and the very existence of penance itself rather than the fact that a person has sinned, or that he or she might not have really confessed all his misdeeds. In the case of the pilgrims it is, further, less interesting what immediate cause sent them packing, unless one could show, for example, that someone who is a runaway criminal is unlikely to complete the pilgrimage or that such a person will probably revert to his criminal activities en route. We can therefore dismiss a charge such as Willis’s. THE ‘TOO-MANY-CHIEFS’ MODEL

Robinson’s views above on the remunerative aspects of the pilgrimage anticip­ ate the class of explanations that is now quite common in the literature, which has given rise to what one might term the ‘power and prestige’ hypothesis. I shall subsume the first model above under this hypothesis, for

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it seems to me to be the only one worth considering in some detail, the other being easily dispensed with. There is, to the best of my knowledge, no concise formulation of this hypothesis anywhere in the literature to date,4 but there are abundant allusions - if only fragmentary - to the importance of economic gain and/or power and prestige as key catalysts for the pursuit of the pilgrimage. Variations on this theme are numerous and all hinged on the assumption that the pilgrimage is popular among West African Muslims because the title of Alhaji that the pilgrim acquires after completion of the pilgrimage can be converted into various resource systems that enhance success in sociocultural life, particularly in business and politics.5 As a consequence of this, the primarily religious motive for the pilgrimage which the actors themselves give whenever asked - has become underem­ phasised in the literature. I am not suggesting that we accept the actors’ own submission of what their motives are without further ado, but I think it nonetheless unfortunate that the emphasis has shifted so much from what earlier writers (James 1884 and Kumm 1910, for example) found striking. For them, it was the uniqueness of the beliefs that could spur people to undertake so hazardous a journey. No friend of Islam, Kumm (ibid.) grudg­ ingly attributes the zeal he encountered among Muslim pilgrims to a ‘fanat­ icism’ induced by their religion, while he almost laments that Christianity has not been able to instil a similar ardour in the natives of the region (1910: 265). So entrenched is the power-and-prestige hypothesis that it now reappears in various forms in a number of works by social scientists concerned with Islam (or dealing with aspects of it) in West Africa, such as Cohen (1969: 171), Works (1976: 20) and Azarya (1978: 88). However, because most of these comparatively recent works are the result of first-hand field studies, they tend to be more systematic than the older ones; and even if they too are partial to the power and prestige explanation, they often attempt to show that pilgrim-motives may be more complex than have been assumed in the past. M. G. Smith (1960) notes, for example, that while wealthy merchants often seek to increase their status by undertaking the pilgrimage: ‘the poor mallam who has made his pilgrimage on foot or by lorry has greater religious prestige than the merchant who went by aeroplane, since the mallam’s effort is the more meritorious, and is itself an act of faith’ (Smith 1960: 252). Now let us take a closer look at the explanation in terms of power and prestige. First, the main problem with this hypothesis is that it is one that is quite easy to verify. There is thus abundant evidence for it in this context. Ever since the incursion of Islam into the region, several prominent West Africans have performed the pilgrimage and borne their ‘Al Haji’ titles with pride. Many of these early pilgrims, as we have seen (in Chapter 2), were chiefs and rulers: persons who could be regarded as trendsetters in their

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own societies, who also set the pattern for succeeding members of their own class (which is why the literature is full of records of pilgrimages by chiefs and rulers from the western Sudan).6 As Islam became increasingly wide­ spread, as it began to permeate popular consciousness, the example of such leaders did not pass unnoticed. And although these leaders might have occupied lofty social positions before their pilgrimage, whatever height of fame and fortune they later on attained was probably perceived by the lower classes as rewards deriving therefrom. Furthermore, it is also quite possible that any (subsequent) enterprises of theirs achieved success - their positions becoming entrenched or strengthened - because they were pilgrims and, therefore, considered pious, more deserving of prestige or more trustworthy than others. One recent example is that of the Hausa quarter of Sabo, Ibadan, where the pilgrimages of the chief, the landlords and their malams served as rites of passage (Cohen 1969: 170—1) which launched them into new roles, but also marked a transformation in their relations with the rest of the community. The character of the chief was perceived in a different light after his pilgrimage. Before that, Cohen informs us, the chief was considered ‘cruel and brutal ... [a person who] used to ‘murder’ his rivals ruthlessly by pagan black magic’ (Cohen loc. cit.). Yet after the pilgrimage, although he still turned to the malams for help with various mystical undertak­ ings, he was no longer thought of as doing evil to any one. The landlords too assumed new roles, being now the undisputed big men of the community: ‘Today when the chief needs to deliberate on an issue he simply tells his messenger: “Call the Hajjis”, i.e. the leading landlords and malams’ (Cohen loc. cit). Such persons, then, were distinguished to some degree or other in their communities before their pilgrimages; but the pilgrimage crystallised and enhanced that distinction. At the national level, too, there were men like Alhaji, the Hon. Sir Tafawa Balewa, First Prime Minister of the Federation of Nigeria; Alhaji, the Hon. Sir Ahmadu Bello, Sardauna of Sokoto and Premier of Northern Nigeria, to name two well-known figures in Nigeria’s post colonial history, who emphasised the importance of their pilgrimage to Mecca. For instance, in his autobiography (see Bello 1962) Sir Ahmadu was unequivocal about what he felt was the importance of the pilgrimage for him as a Muslim. He begins by noting a recurrent theme in pilgrimages (see Chapter 6): the destructuring of social relationships that are believed to occur as pil­ grims draw near the ultimate holy spot, the object of their veneration and quest: King and Commoner, poor and rich, all are equal at the actual rites; no display is permitted; no special privileges [are] allowed; all must wear the pilgrim’s simple white cotton cloth . . . To go once is to achieve merit in the future life: to go more then [sic]

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once secures for the pilgrims still more merit. There is no limit to the number of times anyone can go and I hope to go whenever it is possible for me to do so - in fact; I have already performed this sacred duty seven times. (Bello 1962: 192) Apart from these, there are several other cases of successful men from all walks of life who also proudly paraded the fact that they have been to Mecca. This would appear to lend credence to a view of the pilgrimage as a prerequisite to success. Doubtless, as said before, the pilgrimages of such outstanding men must have been seen as setting a desirable example for others to emulate; and there may well have been some who were induced to do so because of the perceived rewards.7 No one disputes that those who pursue pilgrimages expect that the effort will change their lives in some fundamental manner or other, a change that they would perceive as an improvement over their previous state; it is the essence of the whole thing. But I think it is important here to distinguish Christian pilgrimages (see, for example, Turner and Turner 1978 and Sallnow 1981) and the visiting of regional shrines (even by Muslims, see Marx 1977), where the whole enterprise is often impelled by a single motive-cause which might lead to the visiting of various shrines, from the Islamic pilgrimage which is predicated on a religious injunction, even if the fulfilment of that injunction is to some degree voluntary. (I shall discuss this fully in the next chapter.) This difference is fundamental to a proper understanding of what impels people to pilgrimage. But even if we allow that pilgrims expect their lives to change after the pilgrimage, should this provide sufficient grounds for us to view the whole enterprise as a quest for power and prestige? I think not. As a motive-force behind the Islamic pilgrimage from West Africa, the power-and-prestige hypothesis further breaks down when we consider the greatness of the numbers of those who attempt it each year. Power and prestige would be very common commodities indeed, with so many would-be legitimate claimants. What if someone were to make the counterpoint that what these people primarily seek is divine grace; and that divine grace is an unlimited commodity and, therefore, that its covetousness and even acquisition by all the members of a given group would not devalue it or undermine its attraction within the group? In answer to this I would point out that proponents of the powerand-prestige hypothesis do not merely say that these people are striving for divine grace; rather, they postulate the potential conversion of divine grace into secular rewards as the aim of the pilgrims. Valuables (tangibles as well as any desired qualities) are usually coveted where they are rare, not where they are abundant. Power and prestige are values that belong to the secular sphere; their attraction lies, therefore, in their rareness. Moreover, the notion of conversion itself must mean that not all holders of the one value

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can successfully convert it into the other. Some would be bound to succeed in doing so, but many would not. Thus, inevitably, an insufficiency and scarcity of the desired value is maintained - and so its attraction. This alone renders the quest for power and prestige inadequate, even more so when we consider that there are also those numerous aspirants to the attributes of pilgrimage: the faceless ones who do not appear in governmental statistics because they do not apply for passports or foreign-exchange licences; the ones who embark on the pilgrimage - to borrow Polly Hill’s phrase - ‘the hard way’ (Hill 1972: 101): namely, by walking. They make up a category who do not aspire to return home to Nigeria to try to convert their pilgrim­ titles into successful enterprises. After the pilgrimage they would usually continue to live in a strange land, among a people who regard them as inferior and whom they can hardly hope to match in prestige, much less to lord over. So why do such people undertake the pilgrimage? Perhaps it is only fair to point out again that some of these scholars have been at pains to distinguish the purported pilgrim-motive of the poor, which they regard as primarily religious, from that of the well-to-do, which they see as a striving for power and prestige (Cohen 1969: 11 and 170-1; Smith 1960: 252; Azarya 1978: 89). The rich might well find it easy, as it were, to convert their pilgrim licences into lucrative enterprises or legitimate their positions of power through a pilgrimage. But even here one must not forget that there is more to it than simple conversion. The fact that some of them, like Bello, had to go again and again on the pilgrimage must indicate that they constantly need to legitimate their occupancy of lofty roles in secular life by virtue of the reacquisition of divine grace. What is therefore more interesting is not so much the motives themselves as the fact that a given set of beliefs should have arisen and generated those motives and made them necessary. Questions such as: ‘How does going to Mecca legitim­ ate the holding of a given social position, or why is it Mecca and not, say, Paris that is prerequisite to that legitimisation? ’ are pertinent and, I think, more interesting in this connection. Such questions, however, are not easily answered. But in posing them one sees quite clearly that it will simply not do to say that West Africans who aspire to power and prestige go to Mecca. THE TURUQ AND THE POWER OF DOGMA

If one must regard the power and prestige hypothesis as insufficient, where then must one turn to seek a further explanation? What seems to me a rewarding attempt is that of the historian Al-Naqar (1972) who, rather than conjecture on motives spurred by impending secular rewards, looks at the level of dogma to see what sort of preconceptions of Islam it has created among Muslims in West Africa. Al-Naqar’s approach, added to the influence of the Tijaniyya, the main religious order tariqa (plural, turuq) in West

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Africa, could, I think, go far in accounting for the preponderance of the pilgrimage among West African Muslims. Al-Naqar begins by noting that the major schools, madhahib,8 of Islamic interpretation are agreed that the following four conditions should be met before a person can undertake the pilgrimage: first is the requirement that a person be of the Muslim faith;9 second, the demand that one be of age; third, be free (that is, not a slave); and last, possess the ability, istita a, to make the pilgrimage (1972: xvii). AlNaqar points out that it is in the question of the last of these prerequisites, istita a, that the schools differ in their interpretation. The Schools of AlShafii, Ibn Hanbali and Abu Hanafi define istita a in straightforward pragmat­ ical terms: they see it as implying the ability to find a means of transport, rahila, and possessing the funds, zad, for the journey. Furthermore, these schools qualify this requirement in the following manner:

The monies spent on both zad and rahila . . . must be superfluous to a person’s needs and also those of his dependents who stay behind. Means of transport, or rahila, is seen as necessary for persons who live at a distance of three days or more from Mecca. If a person’s home is two days or less from Mecca and he can walk, he is to do so. Al-Shafii, absolves women from walking altogether from any distance, and also goes further and allows the sending of a deputy if the person is unable, for legal reasons, to go himself. (Al-Naqar 1972: xvii) In contrast, the school of Maliki, which is predominant in West Africa (see Greenberg 1941; Cohen 1969: 136), holds that although the pilgrimage must not be made under conditions that are precarious to the pilgrim’s life, the requirement of money could be met by a person’s ability to work, that is, to use his craftsmanship en route to Mecca, and he could solve his transportation problems quite simply by walking (Al-Naqar 1972: xvii). Founded within a walking distance from Mecca, it is not surprising that the Malikis do not regard the pilgrimage as the increasing duty only for those who reside at distances that are nearer to Mecca. They see it as incumbent upon all true Muslims, irrespective of where they live. They expect the blind pilgrim to find someone to lend him a guiding hand; and a woman, some relative to accompany her. Furthermore, while the other schools rule that the money pilgrims have to spend for the journey must be superfluous to their needs, the Maliki hold that the financial ability of a person should be the sum of his entire belongings when sold, which need only suffice for one journey to Mecca. Should there be insufficient funds for the return journey, then the pilgrim should take up residence in Mecca or return in stages as his resources can sustain him (Al-Naqar loc. cit.). Islamic worship, Al-Naqar points out, divides into three categories: (1) prayer (salat) and fasting (sawm), activities that require the physical involve­ ment of the Muslim himself and cannot be performed by another on his

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behalf; (2) the dispensing of legal tax and alms (zakat), which belong to the class of activities that can be delegated, that is, performed on a per­ son’s behalf; and (3) the pilgrimage, the performance of which involves both bodily effort and the procurement of finances for the journey. There is some disagreement among the schools on the relative merit of the notion of physical involvement and the procurement of finances for the pilgrimage. This issue is particularly pertinent to the question of whether or not it is valid to perform the pilgrimage by deputisation. Al-Naqar points out that the schools of Al-Shafii, Ibn Hanbal and Abu Hanifa rate the financial effort of a person undertaking the pilgrimage as more important than the bodily effort, thus making it valid to send another to perform the pilgrimage on one’s behalf - although they qualify this by ruling that it must be done under certain conditions.10 The most common of these conditions are, for instance, old age, illness and legal hinder (Al-Naqar 1972: xviii). The Malikis, again, have a different view here. They regard the physical effort involved in the performance of the pilgrimage as more important than the procuring of funds. Thus, to quote Al-Naqar again:

The school flatly rejects deputization; if for legal reasons the person cannot make the pilgrimage himself, he is then not obliged to do so and it would be unnecessary for him to send a deputy. No reward would be bestowed on the person, except that of having assisted a Muslim in doing a good deed and the deputy will not get the reward of pilgrimage; he and the person who sent him will still stand obliged to make the pilgrimage, (ibid) Such, broadly, then, were the fundamental injunctions of dogma as handed down to the Muslims in West Africa. But what interpretations and modifica­ tions are placed on these rules? Obviously they were not meant to be taken literally and even if they were, situations were bound to arise in which the rules - in their rigid forms - had not been anticipated or perhaps instances where they could not be given a satisfactory or clearcut application. Take, for example, the Maliki school’s ruling that the pilgrimage need not be undertaken under conditions that could imperil the pilgrim’s life. This notwithstanding, the same Malikis also teach that any pilgrim who dies during the pilgrimage goes straight to heaven and moreover, as we have seen, they place a high premium on the physical effort and suffering involved in its pursuit. Physical effort in the pilgrimage is a particularly important tenet of belief for the Maliki, because the Prophet is believed to have once said that ‘the pilgrimage is a sort of punishment’.11 Thus, perhaps, the conviction of the intrinsic merit of suffering in the pilgrimage. The pilgrimage must not be undertaken if it imperils one’s life; but if it does, heaven is the reward; and pilgrimage must be undertaken with physical suffering. These are examples of the type of ambiguities which believers

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have somehow to resolve. It is in anticipation of such ambiguities that a voluminous amount of literature exists today on the interpretation and clari­ fication of religious injunctions. One must wonder, therefore, in what ways these have contributed to a modification of attitudes and behaviour that could be regarded as correct for the West African Muslim. In the case of West Africa, Al-Naqar does not believe such commentaries have been particu­ larly significant. He notes that most works of explanatory commentaries with which West African Muslims are familiar are usually shortened versions in poetry of long treatises. Coupled with the fact that there is (and has always been) a low level of literacy in the region, this has meant that the finer points of Islamic interpretation have generally eluded the West African Muslim. Caliph Muhammad Bello, one of the leaders of the Fulani Jihad (whom we met in Chapter 2) was also a great scholar in his own right who wrote extensively on the fiqh, theoretical Islamic law. He too found it necessary to discourse on some of these popular assumptions of West African Islam. The more learned ones among the pilgrims in Sudan today are acquainted with his works. Many ordinary pilgrims can quote and recite his writings. However, their grasp of his works appears to be fragmentary and this supports AlNaqar’s contentions above. In one of Bello’s better-known pieces (the Tanbih cited in Al-Naqar 1972: 55ff.), perhaps anticipating that some might be attracted to the pilgrimage for the wrong reasons, he condemns those who would be inclined to conceive of the pilgrimage as a starting-point for prestige. He even finds it necessary to try to demote the relative merit of the pilgrimage as a Pillar of Islam and to question the necessity of going to Mecca at all. He writes further: ‘he who performs the morning prayer . . . and remains seated telling the name of God until sunrise’ could expect the merits of a full hajj (ibid: 59). Again he writes that ‘to stay at home with the constant desire of being in the neighbourhood of the Prophet is better than to live next to him while your heart is constantly longing for your homeland’ (loc. cit.). The cynic might point out that Bello needed to justify his own inability to make the pilgrimage by arguing that jihad was a more meritorious act than the pilgrimage; the same reason might be cited to refute his contention that it was a sin to undertake a journey as hazard­ ous as travelling to Mecca in those days, despite the Prophet’s own view on suffering. The pilgrims, however, cite Bello to legitimate their own view of the pilgrimage. In Sudan one sometimes hears pilgrims quote the preceding lines from Bello on the merit of having a constant desire in one’s heart for the neighbourhood of the Prophet. However, they appear to be unaware that the lines that follow this piece actually regard the desire itself as that which is meritorious and not the actual movement to the Prophet’s birthplace. Nor do they know that Bello regards longing for one’s home while in or

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near Mecca as cancelling any merits accruing from living in close proximity to Mecca. A corollary of what Al-Naqar regards as a ‘misrepresentation ’ of the commentaries, or their inadequate comprehension (if it could be allowed that there ever is an adequate comprehension of any text) is that it has led to what amounts to a misapplication of a number of religious principles. This has resulted in much syncretism, enabling the incorporation, for instance, of several tenets of traditional African religious beliefs and practices in West African Islam. One appropriate example here is the tenet of the Maliki doctrine which stresses the importance of the ego’s physical involvement in the pilgrimage. Among West African Muslims this later turned into the belief that the difficulties and hardships encountered during the pilgrimage are particularly rewarding; and, ultimately, that death on the road to Mecca procures the status of martyrdom. Pilgrims are convinced of the truth of this belief. Hence the many accounts in the literature of frail, sickly West Africans walking through the desert on their way to Mecca, knowing full well that their chances of completing the journey were very small indeed. Al-Naqar holds that this view, on the attainment of martyrdom by those who die during the pilgrimage, is derived from an incorrect interpretation. The correct view, he claims, is that only those who die in jihad, succumb in selfdefence, drown or die in a fire can achieve the status of martyrdom in Islam (ibid: 134). So much for the schools. Now what have the turuq, religious orders, which hold sway in the day-to-day activities of the Muslim, added to the above preconceptions and underlying assumptions around which the people organise their lives? The Qadiriyya and the Tijaniyya make up the largest and the most significant turuq in West Africa. Although the older tariqa, the Qadiriyya has had to yield ground to the Tijaniyya, an order with clearcut injunctions that demand the adherence to a stricter moral code, the practice of which tends to make the initiated member feel that ‘he belongs to a religious elite’ (Trimingham 1959: 92). A majority of the pilgrims in Sudan profess to belong to this Tijani order. A Tijani must neither lie nor engage in corrupt practices and must seriously adhere to the prohibitions of drinking and smoking. He must also, over and above the ritual activities performed by all Muslims, perform two ritual duties daily: the wird and the wazifa. The former, which may be performed individually, comprises an act of forgiveness (100 times), the Salat el-Fatih, a special prayer in praise of the Prophet Muhammad and the prayer ‘There is no God but Allah’ 100 times. The wazifa, on the other hand, is a duty that must be performed collectively in the company of other members of the order and led by the ritual master of that collectivity. It consists of the act of forgiveness (to be recited thirty times), the Salat el-Fatih (fifty times); ‘There is no God but Allah’ 100 times; and a special prayer Jawharat-el-Kamal (to be recited twelve times).

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So strict is the collective aspect of Tijaniyya worship that if a member cannot take part in the collective ritual, particularly the Friday ritual, he must recite some of these prayers up to more than a 1000 times with the help of his rosary (Trimingham 1959: 100; Cohen 1969: 153). These collectiv­ ising characteristics and the strictness of ritualisation appear to be effective for group mobilisation and it is perhaps this, more than anything else, that has served to make the Tijaniyya tariqa a suitable one for radical reform movements. That its influence in recent West African history has been dynamic is well-known (see, for instance, Cohen 1969). Its impact was already felt immediately after the post-Sokoto jihad period through the work of Alhaji Umar, a Torodbe from Futa Toro (Senegal) who had been initiated into the order as a young man. Besides his importance as the champion of the Tijani order, Alhaji Umar is also regarded as an outstanding figure in the history of West African pilgrimage mainly because much popular attention was focused on his pilgrimage (Al-Naqar 1972: 65). Alhaji Umar was in many ways a remarkable figure in West African Islam in general. He is chiefly remembered for his jihads against the French, but his role in the spread of a puritanical form of Islam in the Western Sudan by far superseded his martial exploits. He appears to have been open to the influences of the Tijaniyya order before he performed his pilgrimage in 1828 (see Abun-Nasr 1965: 107). It was common in those days for the learned pilgrim to stay on in Mecca for some time to study under a religious master. Umar was no exception to the rule. He was fortunate to meet Muhammad al-Ghali, the Tijani representative in the Hijaz, and to study under him (Martin 1976: 70). Three years of this tutelage placed an absolute seal of authority upon an already considerable list of religious merits, particu­ larly since Muhammad al-Ghali is said to have appointed him muqaddam, initiator of the order and, probably, as Khalifa, religious and political head, for Western Sudan (Martin 1976: 73). Returning home from Mecca, he stayed in the courts of the rulers of Borno and Sokoto to propagate his creed and marry their daughters. This was during the reign of Muhammad Bello, who was about this time preoccupied with consolidating the vast empire his father Dan Fodio had founded. Alhaji Umar is believed to have initiated Bello into the Tijaniyya order. Umar’s Sokoto sojourn lasted from c. 1833 to 1837 when Bello died. So good was his relationship with the ailing Sultan Bello that the latter even gave him a document designating him his heir (Abun-Nasr 1965: 109). However, after Bello’s death the council of Sokoto nominated Bello’s brother to succeed him, despite the authenticity of the document of succession in Umar possession. Controversy and discussion ensued, focused on the question whether the kingdom was Bello’s to give away. The appointment of the new Caliph was affirmed. Rather than contest the decision, Alhaji Umar left Sokoto to pursue his political and religious destiny elsewhere (Abun-Nasr loc. cit.). During the six years of his stay in

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Sokoto, not only was he inevitably drawn into contemporary events, he was also able to influence their outcome, being a royal affine as well as a religious leader.12 His contribution in making Tijaniyya one of the most powerful tariqa in Northern Nigeria cannot therefore be overemphasised Another important aspect of the religious orders is that they attribute a special place to the Prophet as the ultimate link to God. Al-Naqar sees this influence as reflected in the ‘vast body of poetry [in West Africa] expressing love of the Prophet, and the desirability of making the pilgrimage and of visiting Medina’ (Al-Naqar 1972: 132). Again, although the turuq (particularly with one such as the Tijaniyya, which in effect shows that an individual can mainly achieve salvation through human mediators), might easily have led to a cult of saint worship, this has not become the case with West African Islam. Except for the Mourides in and around Senegambia (which originated in Senegal), a sect whose members visit the grave of Ahmadu Bemba, the founder, there is little saint worship in the region. Trimingham sees this as an extension into Islam of indigenous ‘Negro’ attitudes towards the dead. He holds that ‘Negro’ peoples in general do not revere the graves of persons, however prominent they might have been during life. He further speculates that this may be due to the fact that indigenous beliefs see the dead person as divorced from his corpse and joining the ancestors, whereas Islamic belief (in its pure form, at least) links the soul to the corpse which is expected to be resurrected some day. The unity of soul and corpse makes it natural for Muslims to visit the resting places of their dead to honour them (Trimingham 1959: 88-9). Whether this is really a particular characteristic of ‘Negro’ peoples generally - and I have not found a single instance in the ethnography of West Africa to dispute this claim although I am instinctively wary about such a generalisation - or whatever its causes, the Tijaniyya order does appear to discourage the cult of saints. And, to some extent, the Qadriyya order does the same. Hence the graves of Qadriyya leaders such as Dan Fodio have not attracted visitors to any large extent (Al-Naqar ibid: 133).13 Al-Naqar points out that even Alhaji Umar himself has no known grave: his followers believe that he did not die but retired to live in Mecca. When all these factors are taken together, they contribute to our under­ standing of why the pilgrimage is very prominent in West African Islam. We may conclude this section by saying that whatever motives it is possible to attribute to those who undertake these pilgrimages, it must be allowed that the religious motive is the most important, not only because it is the one that the actors themselves cite, even where we can objectively identify some displacement factors and other secular forces as catalysts. Even if some pilgrimages are a camouflage for something else, it is still significant that the impulse to move found its expression in a choice not only of turning towards Mecca in prayer, but to moving towards it. Further, even if we accept the evidence given by various writers in support of explanations,

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some of which we have dealt with: that irreconcilables to their (colonial) governments embarked on the pilgrimage, that seekers of enhanced prestige went on the pilgrimage, or that persons in trouble in their own communities went on the pilgrimage, we are still left with the question of why the pilgrimage should have been their choice for remedying their plight. For such reasons I believe we must ultimately - whatever the ulterior motives of the individual involved in this particular situation might have been - accept that the choice of remedy was determined by religious belief. Islam, unlike Christianity, does not require more of a believer than that he or she outwardly display behavioural characteristics as a member of the faith. The Prophet Muhammad himself is reputed to have said: ‘Islam is external, faith is of the heart’ (Ahmad B. Habal, Masnad, iii, quoted in Trimingham 1959: 50). What Islam primarily requires of a Muslim is that he say his prayers five times a day. What is really in his heart, whether he has faith or not, is secondary: that is something between himself and God. Similarly, it might be argued that the only index of a Muslim fulfilling the fifth pillar of his faith is that of going to Mecca. Whatever impelled him to start the journey (that is, whatever proximate reason he had for leaving at a particular point in time) is not important beyond the fact that he conceived of a visit to Mecca as necessary to solve his problem - if he had one in the first place. West African Muslims have made the pilgrimage a paradigm for their existence and this is particularly true for those who have moved to Sudan on their way to Mecca. The peculiarity of the pilgrims’ existence in Sudan has resulted in the emergence of a brand of West African culture, which I have termed a pilgrim-subculture, suspended between home (that is, Northern Nigeria) and Mecca. Features of this subculture are similar to that of the Hausa diaspora culture found in many parts of Sub-Saharan Africa (see Cohen 1969; Works 1978), but with a difference. Let us go on to examine the prime features of this subculture and how it is generated and maintained. ‘them’ and ‘us’: primordial sentiments and OBJECTIVE DIFFERENCE

Allah i keka Makkah (May Allah send you to Mecca) might be a wishful expression of the West African pilgrims, but more importantly it expresses axiomatically the core symbol of their ideology, an ideology which (ideally) every member of the pilgrim groups must adhere to, expressing his adherence in terms of a longing for Mecca. Initially a religious injunction, the longing for Mecca has become a moral one, the ideological raison d’être for their very existence in Sudan. The greeting also expresses what is the essence of the subculture which the pilgrims have generated in their adopted home. This subculture consists compositely of original West African traits and those borrowed from their Sudanese hosts, both of which are merged, arranged

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around (and reinforced by) ideas of the Islamic pilgrimage. It is thus neither wholly ‘West African’ nor wholly Sudanese. Why then should I designate it as West African? First, because it is the way in which the pilgrims themselves interpret their difference. They view themselves as Takari Muslims with customs that demarcate them from their hosts. Second, their hosts see them as different, being collectively just Fellata. Put in the above manner, the mutual acceptance of difference might seem tautological, since it merely asserts that one category regards itself as different from another category, while the other accepts that such a distinction is valid. And a tautology it would be, had it not been for the fact that this mutual conception of difference receives an objective expression in various ways, ranging from types of linguistic application in daily interaction to distinct patterns of behaviour among the West Africans. Milder forms of their efforts to maintain such a distinctiveness sometimes lead to disapproval by their hosts, while severer forms have been known to result in serious conflict between the immigrants and their hosts. In other words, although the observer might discern an interarticulation of cultural symbols and traits between these two groups, making it difficult to demarcate what is pure Sudanese from what is pure West African immigrant culture, there is another level where a mutual conceptualisation of difference leads to consequences external to the groups. The notion of a subculture is itself rather problematical. In one sense - and therefore by its very name - it presupposes the existence of some (other) culture, possibly the mainstream one from which the subculture can be distinguished and around which it forms part of a constellation of meanings or distinct perspectives within the larger social context. In a second sense, the emphasis might be on its relationships with other cultures within this wider context in which it exists. Subcultures thus do coexist, to borrow Hannerz’s (1986) phrase, as ‘a network of perspectives’. In the Sudanese context it may be difficult to justify the notion of a West African subculture as an existing entity distinct from a mainstream culture which is the contrasting pole and by which the other perspectives (subcultures) are defined. There are many perspectives at play here, reflected in the numerous ethnic groups which are found, for example, in the Gezira. Apart from local Sudanese Arabs, there are numerous communities: Equatorial Africans, Chadians, Nubians, a number of groups from Southern Sudan such as Nuer, Dinka, Shilluk. But distinct though all these groups might be, they nevertheless maintain that distinctiveness by conceiving it as opposed to a mainstream Sudanese Arab culture. Sudanese mainstream culture, on the other hand, is rather diffuse and not easy to delineate, but I think that is beside the point. In referring to a West African subculture, I am merely accepting an emic distinction without necessarily going into what its members share or do not share - for I take it as given that each subculture has internal divisions even within its own perspective. At the

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same time I am postulating that ‘a subculture’ is only meaningful and fruitful when it is seen through its opposition to the mainstream perspective that reinforces it. What I regard as a West African subculture differs in one major way from the other subcultures in Sudan. The West Africans regard the mainstream culture of the hosts as superior to their own and, as I will be arguing in the course of this chapter, the assertion of a West African distinctiveness is the result of an inability to merge into what is perceived to be the mainstream Sudanese culture. Let me reiterate the point that although Hausaness is the hub around which the West African subculture evolves, it is as I have said above - neither wholly ‘West African’ nor wholly Sudanese. But the pilgrims certainly see their difference as a West African - Sudanese opposition. Among diaspora Hausa groups living in the zongos in Ghana (of which I have first-hand experience, having been partly raised in one) a concept that is quite often employed to demarcate ‘them’, i.e., the encapsulating society from ‘us’, the immigrants, is dan (or yan) kassa, literally children of [this] land, as opposed to us who are baki, strangers or immigrants. No matter how long baki have lived among a local group, they will always remain strangers as opposed to the locals. The mechanism by which such ethnic difference is maintained and articulated is through custom. Ethnicity, I am inclined to agree with Barth (1969) must be held - to a certain degree - to be concerned with the phenomena of boundary maintenance, in which a set of groups living in close proximity with each other maintain what they perceive as primordial differences between them. A successful analysis of such phenomena must encompass both the mechanisms by which the bound­ aries of difference are maintained and the uses to which difference is put. Much discussion on ethnicity in the past has either centred on the problems of boundary maintenance between groups, or the symbolic forms expressions of that difference takes (see Cohen 1974b for an illustration of this point). There is a complex body of anthropological literature on these issues, a familiarity with some of which must make one wary about exaggerating boundary maintenance between groups, on the one hand, and the symbolism of perceived difference between groups on the other. The two issues are interrelated, as they are dimensions of the same phenomenon. Group bound­ aries may be symbolic but they are predicated on perceived difference; similarly, such boundaries, in order to prevail, must be conceived in symbolic terms and must consequently give rise to mechanisms whereby they are kept. Whether or not such difference is real or misconceived is itself as much an anthropological problem as are the symbolism of ethnic difference and the mechanics of ethnic boundaries. My own opinion here is that any views that would deny, for example, the tribal differences between groups in the zongos (of which much has been written) are mistaken. Tribal differences are initially perceived as physical,

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one might say, objective differences and these affect an individual’s identity and hence structure his interaction with other groups. A resident in a Ghanaian zongo could sometimes be identified by his marks of ethnic differ­ ence carved on his features. The patterns of his facial scars would quite easily enable the members of another group to classify him as Frafra, Hausa, or the member of some other ethnic group. His clothes too would be different and enhance such classification. He would be seen in the long loose robes of the Muslim as opposed to the Roman-toga-like cloth worn by the Akans among whom he lives. Furthermore, his language would also betray a difference. The aim of a zongo resident would not be to strive to pass as a member of another group, but to reinforce his tribal identity in competition for the available resources within the social context in which he lives. The notion of a ‘melting pot’ is completely irrelevant and unknown and would not be an appropriate image here.14 In Sudan there is also a difference between the West African pilgrims and their hosts which might be regarded, on one level, as an objective difference. The older immigrants commonly have facial markings and these can be easily categorised. The clothes they wear are also different from those of the Sudanese, but this can soon be remedied since most pilgrims aspire to wear ‘Islamic’ clothing. Then there is the Arabic language: the most important criteria for the authorities, at any rate, for drawing a line between Sudanese and immigrants. All these factors serve to strengthen the boundary between the pilgrims and their hosts.15 The pilgrims in Sudan also refer to their hosts as yan kassa and see themselves as strangers. Except, as said earlier, for one major difference, the same situation as outlined above (as being the case in Ghanaian zongos) prevails in Sudan. In West African stranger-enclaves, the immigrants have not the slightest doubt as to the superiority of their own lifestyles over those of their hosts. They would retain their language and adopt a (to the encapsulat­ ing population, ludicrous) pidgin as a lingua franca in their dealings with them. In Sudan, however, the pilgrim accepts from the beginning the superi­ ority of the encapsulating social structures and - initially at any rate strives to become a part of it. It is only when he fails in this endeavour that he turns inward to what innate mechanism he possesses for maintaining his distinctiveness. He then begins to reject the hegemony of Arabness as consti­ tuted by mainstream Sudanese culture, which he initially accepted. This new attitude is pursued through the use of what he perceives as Hausa symbols and customs, but which to the discerning stranger or the pilgrim newly arrived from Hausaland (whose feelings for Hausaness are still fresh, would appear to be quite strange and not quite Hausa. Consequently, the overall result of the encounter between the pilgrims and their hosts is that of an ambiguousness that is at once admiring and hostile. West African pilgrims in Sudan who use Hausaness as a source of cultural identity, unlike

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those in Ibadan, for example, would not have said: ‘We are Hausa, our customs are different’ (Cohen 1969: xiv). They would have said (and they certainly do feel the sentiment) that: ‘We are Muslims and thus Arabs but the Arabs won’t accept us so we must remain Hausa.’ SOME SYMBOLS OF DISTINCTIVENESS: CUSTOM AND LANGUAGE

I have said that West African pilgrims aspire to wear Islamic clothes but it would be more correct to say the pilgrims dress in a manner they think is Arabic which, in a sense, is for them the same as Islamic. They have a lot of tailors among them who cater for them locally and who are so skilled as to have the patronage of many Sudanese customers. But though they wear Islamic dress, particularly the young, the attire of the older generation of pilgrims serves as a clear badge of ethnic identity, even if this is not so obvious to the uninitiated. A faki informant who once called on me found himself surrounded by a jeering bunch of students. Although I could not then identify what was so distinguishing about him, it was his embroidered cap and his socks which were of a garish purple colour. (I was later told that his attire was patently that of ‘the Fellata'.) This combination for the Sudanese Arab students was absurd and they said: ‘typically West African’. The cap he wore was of the beautifully hand-embroidered type commonly worn by Muslim males in West Africa. In Sudan it has become a badge of West African identity. Most elderly male pilgrims wear it. Perhaps if the students who laughed at this faki had known that the price of the cap alone was in the region of £S38 (1983), certainly more than the total cost of their own attire at most times, they might have restrained their ridicule. The wearing of Hausa embroidered gowns is becoming increasingly com­ mon among the rural pilgrims. A growing number of urban residents too are beginning to clothe themselves in an ethnically distinct manner. Whereas in Northern Nigeria the wearing of the gown, riga (whether it was embroidered or not) and the trousers, wando16 would have been regarded as the correct dress, in Sudan it is the embroidered cap that, curiously enough, has become the centre of Hausa ethnic dress for men. Whatever a pilgrim gentleman wears on a given occasion, he crowns it with his embroidered cap. Embroidery in Hausaland is a craft that has persisted as a very developed art-form for centuries (see Heathcote 1972). It was one of the important articles of commerce for which the region was famous in the last century (as we saw in Chapter 2). In Northern Nigeria this art-form was constantly revitalised through the infusion of new (Arabic and Turkish) designs being brought home by pilgrims returning from the East. These were then adapted and incorporated into the traditional craft by Hausa embroiderers and tailors (Heathcote ibid). But while in Hausaland it is those patterns and styles that are from the East that are regarded as the most attractive ones, because they are believed to be more imbued with (or diffuse ideas of) Islamic art than local

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ones, in Sudan, Hausa pilgrims prize the caps and embroideries from Hausaland above all else, thus the comparatively high price.17 Some of the landlords of the pilgrim-immigrant establishments count the importation of embroid­ ered cloths from Hausaland among their economic activities. Just as the kola that the Kola Man distributes freely to his callers is an ethnically symbolic activity, so the wearing of these small caps may be seen as suggesting a symbolic expression of West African ethnic identity. If custom prescribes that the true West African pilgrim wear his embroid­ ered cap as the proper form of dress, in the question of language-norm pre­ scriptions are rather ambiguous. Yet language is the reason for the pilgrims’ initial acceptance of the hegemony of Sudanese culture. As said before, the West African pilgrim regards the Arabic language as superior to his own because it is the language of the Prophet and of the Quran, which he spends his whole life trying to master. As he moves eastward towards Mecca, the aura of the glory of the spot that is his goal increases with each stop. Sudan is the first country the pilgrims enter where the language of the people is the language of the Quran and most pilgrims are euphoric when they first experience hearing Arabic speakers all around them. (Hajiya, see Chapter 2, p. 56, sought to convey some of this unique feeling.) Unlike their own country, the Sudan that they encounter is seen more as a Dar al Islam (territory or land of Islam). It was (is) the home of the Mahdi and it lies next door to Mecca. West African pilgrims see Arabic and Arabness as coterminous with Islam and what is Islamic. They do not, for example, believe that a concept such as ‘Christian Arab’ is valid or that such people truly exist.18 They expect the Sudanese to be the custodians of Arabic/Islamic mores and culture. That is why the immig­ rant-pilgrims initially try to behave like Arabs. They even change their names into what they perceive to be their Arabic forms. ‘Yissifu’ becomes ‘Yusuf; ‘Mahamudu’ becomes ‘Muhammad’, and so forth. This fascination soon wears off when they find that Muslims they may be but Arabs they cannot become. They then, as it were, have to revert inward to their own identity concerned solely with who they are and why they are in Sudan: an identity maintained through the reproduction and socialisation of their members into a singleminded pursuance of the purpose for which they have come this far. Language, the most important vehicle for socialisation (above all, because it is its acquisition and competent use that makes a person an accepted member of a given society), plays an important role in the lives of the pilgrims. It is paramount in their efforts to maintain an ethnic identity. It will be necessary to examine a few areas in which their language reflects these efforts. However, I shall not do this through any intricate delving into the ‘meaning’ of linguistic utterances, but hope to give examples of how such utterances act as agents in the transmission of West African culture; and how at the same time, the incompetent use of language - that is, its inadequate grasp or impure use - serves to deny one the same identity.

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An informant who had lived in Sudan for twenty years lamented that all through those years, although his knowledge of the Quran had greatly improved, he could still not speak everyday Arabic properly: ‘After my first three years in Sudan all I could say was ateni moya (give me water [to drink]).’ Because of the manner in which the West African communities are placed, their inhabitants only have a superficial contact with their hosts. They have little opportunity to learn Arabic properly. This in turn affects their ability to achieve any degree of integration or to become Sudanese by naturalisation. The former they would regard as inimical to their identity as pilgrims on their way because it contradicts the purpose for which they are in Sudan; while the latter is coveted because it facilitates their purpose by enabling them to get travel documents. They would always point to those who have become integrated as negations of cardinal West African virtues. The ideal strategy is to obtain Sudanese identity papers and yet remain West African. So they would claim that integration is not good for them. It is my contention that this attitude has arisen out of an unsuccessful attempt to be accepted, if not integrated, into Sudanese society. Sometimes, even after twenty years of residence, they still find they are regarded as non­ Sudanese. The Sudan Nationality Act of 1957 is sometimes claimed by the authorities to have practically turned most of the West African immigrants into Sudanese citizens, but in practice nothing has changed for many of them.19 Only some of those who immediately applied for documents of citizenship after the Act became legal residents. Many of them found no reason to transform the promise of citizenship into something concrete, so to speak, so they still remain immigrants (who are in fact stateless). A further consequence of the Nationality Act is that it practically rules out the chances of any immigrant engaging in legal business. As Duffield points out: ‘Basically, any occupation other than small-scale cash-crop production or unskilled manual-labouring requires a licence which, in turn, requires proof of Sudanese citizenship. It can be appreciated that the post-war eco­ nomic differentiation amongst the urban Takari has necessitated many of their numbers obtaining Sudanese citizenship’ (1983: 59). This, however, is easier said than done. Take the case of a pilgrim called Idrissu. After having lived in Sudan for twenty-nine years, he was at last able to save sufficient money to continue on his pilgrimage. He found, however, that times had changed since he first set out from Nigeria. National boundaries were now increasingly controlled and he needed documents in order to cross the Red Sea. Having lived for such a long time in Sudan, he first tried to get a Sudanese passport, but the authorities declared him a non-Sudanese on the basis of the fact that he could not speak Arabic properly. He then went to the Nigerian Embassy in Khartoum and, although he spoke Hausa, he was surprised to find that the Nigerians too did not regard him as a ‘Nigerian’. He had been subjected to

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a test in which he was expected to give the name of his village chief in Nigeria, the chiefs of the neighbouring villages as well as the head of government in his state. Having then been absent for thirty years he could not remember past names nor was he able to give current ones. Idrissu was bewildered, but there was nothing he could do about it. This strategy, invented by the Nigerian consular representatives, seems designed to make it impossible for any of the pilgrims to pass the test. Whether or not it was really prompted by a true desire to sort out true Nigerians from non­ Nigerians is beside the point. It is doubtful that anyone but a Nigerian would have tried to get a travel document from the Nigerian embassy in this manner. The effect of this policy on the pilgrims is certainly detrimental. Despite the fact that this pilgrim had sufficient funds to make the pilgrimage, he could not find the necessary papers to enable him to do so. He then tried to approach one of the immigrant landlords to intercede with the Nigerian Embassy on his behalf, but he had been known to be a difficult person in the past, so no one would have anything to do with him. Discomfited, he gave up trying, citing again the will of God as the contingent obstacle: if Allah so willed, he would be able to go on the pilgrimage in the end. A number of the urban young, who retailed Idrissu’s farm produce in the market, suggested that Idrissu go back home to Nigeria and apply for a passport from there, or to try to purchase a Chadian passport. They knew how to obtain such passports. Idrissu, however, found the first suggestion horrifying and the second unacceptable. He doubted whether he had any living kinsmen left in Nigeria and felt, moreover, that he could not withstand the tedium of such a journey back home. But, above all, he felt that the moment he set out on his journey for Nigeria he would cease being a pilgrim and all his life’s efforts for religious grace would be lost until the moment he said his ‘Bismillah’ and started for the east again from Nigeria. He was in his mid-seventies and suffered from poor health, so he chose to continue to live and work in his adopted village in Sudan. What was exception­ ally painful for him was the fact that he had been rejected by the Nigerian Embassy. All his days in Sudan, he had fallen back on his Hausa (therefore Nigerian) identity whenever he felt rejected by his Sudanese hosts. Now he was defined by the official representative of his own government as ‘not Nigerian’. Even the Hausa language he had spoken all his life was declared ‘not a Nigerian Hausa’, the official intimating that it was something he could easily have picked up from some Hausa immigrant! Many of the pilgrims find themselves grappling daily with these same problems.20 Having failed to master Arabic (which they regard as the superior code), the pilgrims quite reasonably adopt many Arabic words in their everyday discourse. The Hausa language itself is full of Arabic phrases and expressions but these are subject to a more or less standardised usage and one might generally see it as the case of one language infusing itself with vocabulary

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from the more developed domains of another, with which, as in the case of Arabic and Hausa, it has an historical relationship. However, the Hausa spoken in Sudan has a kind of little-brother relationship with Arabic.21 Those who speak Hausa with a increasing number of Arabic expressions are sometimes described as those whose ‘eyes are open’ (idonsa ya bude, literally ‘his eye is open’). A person ‘whose eyes are open’ is smart, knows his ways around the intricate maze of the bureaucracy, for example, as opposed to the pure Hausa speaker who speaks without using Arabic expressions, which is supposed to be a sign of lacking sophistication. The category of Hausa speaker who infuses non-standardised Arabic words in his speech is usually found in the cities and generally tends to be a younger male, while the speakers of pure Hausa are usually the older pilgrims. Indeed, these two speech forms may be viewed as two distinct codes, one of which reflects the core values of Hausaness, while the other is seen as negating Hausaness. One frequent visitor to the stall of the Kola Man said of a young Hausa acquaintance of mine:

His speech is not Hausa. He keeps using Arabic words for which there are many Hausa ones. He does not even greet properly. He says ‘kwaiyis?' instead of even ‘Kana kalo?' But having been born here, he has not learnt Hausa properly. He thinks Arabic is better than the language of his fathers. He says ‘Salam a leekum' instead of ‘gafara'. He talks in this manner. When I was a young man, I used to speak like that. Now I use Arabic only when I am explaining the Quran or when I am talking about Islam. I will never allow my daughter to marry anyone who talks and behaves as these young men do. (Faki Abdulai Ahmed) The type of youngster that the above speaker disapproves of comprises those whose ‘eyes are open’ (or more accurately who define themselves as such). They would say: Zamu hau tiarah, instead of zamu hau jirgin sama (we will go by plane) (tiarah is Arabic for plane, while the corresponding Hausa word is jirgin sama (literally, boat of the sky). Similarly, sentences are interlarded with Maalu? (Arabic for ‘why’) instead of Sabuda mi? (the Hausa equivalent). Or, when I suggested to a young man who lived all his life in Sudan to say that since he was born there he had a right to citizenship, he said Basu gabala (Basu: Hausa for ‘they won’t’; gabala: Arabic for ‘accept’. ‘They won’t accept [agree]’ instead of the Hausayarda). Older pilgrims usually take those who talk in this manner as examples of those who would eventually betray the key values of the pilgrims. Practically all instances I encountered during my fieldwork in which young men had left the West African quarters to reside on the Arab side of town involved those who employed this style of speech. Older informants always commend young men who were able to speak Hausa properly, but generally the young immigrants and sons of immigrants,

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even those who have had some Western schooling, do not realise the import­ ance of their own language as an identity-creating instrument. They would joke about Hausa speakers who, for example, say ‘lemu' (Hausa) instead of ‘lemon' (Arabic). The young man whose speech elicited the above reproach told me that the older immigrants pretended to disapprove of the speech of the youngsters because they could not themselves learn to speak Arabic properly. He then went on to list some Arabic words that he claimed were nearly impossible for West African immigrants to pronounce, particularly those who were not born in Sudan. Newly arrived pilgrims, when they live in the urban areas, are usually prone to pick up this style of talking. But they too eventually revert to a purer form of Hausa. When they do, they tend to exaggerate the domains of usage for the expressions seen as typical for either language. Women generally remain custodians of a purer form of Hausa. Whenever I had difficulty understanding a word that was patently Arabic my youthful informants would turn to their mothers for the Hausa equivalent rather than ask some of the older informants. In the villages, the more well-to-do pilgrims sometimes practise purdah, which entails little interaction with member of those categories which might have a corrupting influence on indigenous Hausa values. Generally, however, the practice of wife-seclusion is the exception rather than the rule. Most pilgrims point out that because the collective effort of the whole family is necessary if they are to be able to save towards their continued journey to Mecca, they have to allow their women to go out and work. This is subject to the scorn of Sudanese women in particular who consider it ‘shameful’ for the ‘Fellata' to allow their women to work outside the home.22 Young girls who work for Arab families as domestic help are often linguistically competent in both Hausa and Arabic. As much early socialisation is carried out by women, one would expect the language skills of the young immigrants to prevail, but this is not the case. An ever-increasing Arabicising of pilgrim-Hausa is taking place. Arabic loan words and expressions are being adopted into the language every day. As I pointed out earlier, young children too are involved in the overall economic efforts of the whole pilgrim-family. This means that they spend much time outside the home, outside the sphere of female influence. They are there­ by always being subjected to external influence, and this further enhances the ascendancy of Arabic. There is no regular infusion of current Hausa from Nigeria.23 Newly arrived immigrants who ought to be the source of cur­ rently spoken Hausa from home are the ones most attracted to Arabicised Hausa. These are some of the domains in which Hausa pilgrim identity forms an underlying foundation for West African pilgrim culture. All these domains are viewed in terms of a strict adherence to the practice of Islam and the view of oneself as a pilgrim and therefore different. Although the form that

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this distinctiveness takes is indeterminate - in other words, since it feeds on its own logic - it is the landlords and the fakis who help maintain this distinctiveness by occasionally defining what a true Hausa pilgrim does or might not do and what the true attributes of Hausaness are. Strange clothes and comical speech might elicit scorn from their Sudanese hosts, but the leaders of the pilgrim-communities encourage their people to strive to behave, speak and dress as West Africans. The only ones affected by the scorn that can be occasionally experienced are the young unmarried males who see themselves as potential competitors of the older male pilgrims. POTENTIAL CONFLICT AND THE DISSENTERS

Occasionally one comes across a West African youth who has left his village, conceals his origins and rejects the whole ideology of pilgrimage. The one singular cause of this rejection appears to be the conflict arising from the inability of these young men to find suitable wives. The practice of polygyny is thus one of the causes of this structural conflict. Polygyny is more common among the pilgrims than among the Sudanese. Sura 4, 3 of the Quran, which is the only reference to this matter, does not explicitly say that a Muslim is allowed to marry four wives. Yet Muslim scholars have generally agreed that a believer may marry up to four wives and this has remained the officially sanctioned practice in most Islamic states. Among the Sudanese, however, the practice of polygyny is very rare indeed. With the pilgrims this is different. Almost all the immigrant landlords, and even ordinary house-owners, have more than one wife. In Wad Fellata, for example, two wives are the norm, while in the towns the landlords quite often have up to three wives each. The more wives a man has, the better off he is. Wife-seclusion among the pilgrims appears to go hand in hand with polygyny and usually it is those with more than one wife who can afford to practise it. However, the most important consequence of polygyny among the pilgrims in Sudan is that it has led to a shortage of their own brides. This means that young immigrant males who are being socialised into main­ taining their ethnic distinctiveness - and thereby being cut off from Sudanese Arabs - are constantly in sharp competition with each other for marriageable females, as well as with the older immigrants who are often more established and therefore better off. Most informants refused to see this as the potential cause of any discord, but interviews with six youths in Wad Medani who had left their pilgrim villages and moved to live among Sudanese Arabs confirmed this. For most youths the rigid maintenance of their own minority group boundaries means that they have to get out of the group in order to find wives. It is reasonable to assume that an encapsulating population might quite easily develop prejudicial attitudes towards a minority immigrant group when the members of such a group are too successful in maintaining their ethnic exclusiveness. In successfully maintaining their ethnic distinctive-

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ness, the West Africans unwittingly strengthen the stereotype views their hosts have about them, thus making any prospects of being accepted by these hosts unlikely. This means that West African youths who reject the West African ethnic identity have to attempt to pose as Sudanese in order to escape the stigma they perceive as attributed to their ethnic group. Such youths always leave the immigrant quarter of town and pose as ‘Arabs’; and some eventually succeed in marrying a local girl. I had occasion to interview some of these dissenters. Every evening, just before sundown, half a dozen or so of these dissenters, mainly young men in their early twenties, meet on the Blue Nile bridge in West Medani. From where they stand they usually have a commanding view of the squalid, ill-lit immigrant quarter on one side of the bridge and the stable, beautiful buildings of the University of Gezira on the other. The view, on the one hand, of West Africans pilgrims performing their ablutions and hurrying towards the mosques to say their evening prayers and, on the other hand, of scores of well-dressed young students walking leisurely towards the cinema or sipping iced soft drinks and listening to music, offers two stark contrasts that usually provide the topic of conversation for these young men, as they smoke their joints of bongo (marijuana) and reflect on life in general. These young men actively reject the pilgrimage as the dominant principle of West African life. One of them was Unis, then twenty-five years of age, who arrived in Sudan with his father when he was nine years old. His mother died during the first leg of the journey from Nigeria. His father left him together with his six-year-old brother in the care of a kinsman in the town of El Hosh, western Gezira, to go to Mecca. Unis’ younger brother died that same year. He never heard from his father again. He believes his father died in Saudi Arabia, but whether or not he completed the pilgrimage before he died, Unis does not know. The guardian with whom he lived was a strict malam who taught the boy the Quran and made him work hard in the fields. Unis was envious of the young Arab boys of his age who passed him each day on their way to school and he wished he had been given the same opportunity. He smokes bongo every evening with his friends, tells unflattering stories about West African pilgrims and then goes into the night to court his girlfriends, none of whom knows about his immigrant background. Why are we so sick and ignorant? I will tell you why. It is because we believe in religion and think that we are all going to Mecca. The Arabs do not believe in religion. They believe in the power of money. They have fine houses, they send their children to schools and their sick children to doctors, not to fakis. Fakis only say that it is God’s will whether one recovers or dies. That is how my younger brother died. My uncle had four wives. When his eldest wife died, he was planning

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to marry one more, although I was then sixteen and needed a wife. In the end I just ran away. I can speak Arabic like an Arab. I used to play with the children of the owner of the Tenancy on which we worked. If only these Fellata would stop fooling themselves. These days I never let anyone know that I am a Fellata. All I do I try not to do it like a Fellata. I am an Arab. My father [the Arab landlord he lives with] has promised to find a girl for me. So very soon I will have a wife. But if I had the money I would go back to Nigeria, go to school and get some training, and a job. Grown-ups can go to night school in Nigeria. (Unis Baba Ahmed) Another dissenter case I recorded involved a Hausa youth who had become a policeman in one of the towns in the Gezira. Unlike Unis, he had had some years of schooling and therefore managed to find this job. One day his uncle had some business in the town and called at the police station to greet him. He was met by a policeman who said that there could not possibly be a Hausa policeman in that police station. The uncle insisted that he was not mistaken and even gave them his nephew’s name but was told that there was no one of that name among the policemen. All the while his nephew, who was sitting in one of the inner rooms with other policemen, was aware of what was going on and was laughing with the rest. The man left without seeing his nephew. This story became the topic of conversation in his village. Everybody cited the case as the worst behaviour a West African pilgrim can show. The policeman told me that he had also found it necessary to leave because of difficulties with the elders of his village community. He was also initially scornful of the idea of the pilgrimage among the West Africans. But gradually this changed when his marriage to an Arabic girl ended in a divorce.24 These two examples also illustrate a serious structural conflict within the pilgrim communities. Duffield (1983) deals with other forms of ‘internal contradictions within the Takari settlements’, as he phrases it, which he regards as contradictions arising from the West African settlement during ‘the colonial and the neo-colonial phases of production’. His argument is that these internal contradictions have led to a cleavage between the poor (who still retain a positive view of their identity) and the rich - that is, the rising bourgeoisie who negate that identity, choose to become Sudanese and who adopt an ‘exclusive ideology’ (ibid). This may be true of the Takari groups whom Duffield studied (see Duffield 1981). Those groups belong to the first wave of immigrants who came with the fall of the Sokoto Caliphate (see Chapter 2 of this book) and comprise a group that are not considered Fellata by the Sudanese. The pilgrims in the Gezira regard such early settlers as pilgrim immigrants, although they sometimes conveniently refer to them as an ex­ ample of ‘West Africans’ who have made it. Many of these groups, however, do

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not generally even speak Hausa or Fulani and they do not have an ambiguous nationality status. They also seem to have virtually given up any pretensions of the pursuit of the pilgrimage. Besides this, an application of Duffield’s analysis (in terms of colonial and neo-colonial modes of production and how the latter has led to a capitalist mode of production which has achieved a dominance over a ‘household mode of production’, and thereby led to a cleavage between the classes which adhere to either modes) will not work with the pilgrims of the Gezira. There is here a collective ethic of an inclusive ideology which defines all West African immigrants as pilgrims and therefore legitimate migrants, as opposed to other strangers such as the non-Arab Sudanese groups who live nearby. Thus, for instance, the inhabit­ ants of the rural pilgrim communities in the Gezira, which are referred to as ‘camps’, in turn condescendingly regard the villages of the non-West African immigrants as ‘camps’ and their own as ‘villages’.25 The common ideological basis for their existence in Sudan is all-pervasive. To reject this ideology of necessity also entails an abandonment of any pilgrim-intent as well as a lifelong effort to hide one’s background as a West African. By collectively deriving their identity from the symbols of Islam and the pilgrimage, they find they have to reinforce this identity by conceiving it in a perpetual opposition to their hosts whom they initially accepted as superior. Such conceptions of opposition are provided for in accounts of on-going conflicts with their hosts. News of conflicts are usually passed on by word of mouth and become more and more lurid in detail as time passes. Stories of such conflicts almost always originate from a passing stranger, who would profess to have passed by where it had happened or been an eye-witness to it. And conflicts as a rule are usually between West Africans and local Sudanese. One story I recorded was alleged to have occurred in Kordofan, north­ west of the Gezira. A Sudanese had borrowed money from a Hausa pilgrim in the 1920s and given him a piece of land to cultivate in lieu of repayment. The Sudanese kept livestock and was constantly moving about to graze his animals. The pilgrim and his family cultivated the land from year to year without any difficulties, assuming all the while that it belonged to them. Twenty years passed and the original owner of the land died. His heir, a Western-educated young man, ordered the pilgrim to produce a legal docu­ ment to verify the transaction with his father or vacate the land. Things came to a head when he called on the pilgrim in order to evict him because the pilgrim had been unable to produce such a document. In the scuffle that ensued, one of the Hausa was fatally stabbed by a Sudanese. A gang of Hausa youths then attacked and killed one of the protagonists. Both groups carried their slain supporters to the police station. The Hausa immigrants were all sent to prison and forced to leave the land, while the Sudanese were freed. This story was widespread. Quite soon, however, the facts had altered to claim that the Hausa had killed three Arabs instead of one.

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Stories of another kind I also recorded concerned purported conflict be­ tween landless Sudanese and some West Africans in Galgani, Blue Nile Province, in a pilgrim settlement which dates from the turn of the century. Once in a while, landless Sudanese nomads allegedly drive their herds of cattle into West African gardens in order ‘to stir up trouble and involve the authorities’,26 who would invariably rule in favour of the Sudanese. All such stories ended in the deaths of some of the protagonists. A Hausa informant expressed the fundamental cause of these conflicts in the following manner: ‘It is because they are movers [nomads] and we are stayers [sedentary] and we are West Africans and they are Arabs.’ Stories of this kind were quite common among the immigrants. However, during twelve months of field­ work, although I always heard detailed accounts of fights between local Arabs and West African immigrants, I never witnessed one instance of such conflict myself. Try as I might, I always discovered that a serious fight, particularly one that ended fatally, was always something that had happened in the next village. Yet details of these conflicts, their course and resolution, how many were killed and how many injured, were always quite specific, even if, as I have pointed out, they achieved some colour with time. I was, however, able to observe many instances of amity between immig­ rants and their hosts. At many of the pilgrim burials I attended in the villages local Arabs were always present and some of them had come from far-off villages to extend their condolences. Apart from certain verifiable conflicts, such as those recorded by Birks (1978: 135) (one, for example, in which pilgrims attacked local Sudanese who were found drinking beer within sight of a Tijani mosque) it must be concluded that actual conflicts are rare. There is some ethnic hostility between immigrants and local groups in the urban areas but these rarely lead to open violence of the degree intimated above. Inevitably, too, one must conclude that the many tales of conflict that circulate, particularly about fights and deaths, are in reality verbal accounts invented - consciously or unconsciously - to reinforce the West African ethnic identity and minimise whatever internal conflict there is within the communities themselves. The fact that everybody generally be­ lieved in them, even though no one had actually witnessed a fight, is certainly significant. I have argued that the West African subculture in Sudan contains borrowed traits which the immigrants have blended with their own. I must point out, however, that this borrowing is not one-sided. The host population, through years of sustained contact with the West Africans, has itself borrowed much that is West African in its own lifestyles today. An appropriate example is the short-handle West African hoe, referred to as kadanka Hausawiyya, now common in Sudan. To use this hoe one has to stoop, a posture local Sudanese farmers regard as unbecoming and joke about, saying that their own hoe, the kadanka Halalbiyya, which has a long handle and can be operated

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virtually from a standing position, is easier to use. But both immigrants and hosts agree that the kadanka Hausawiyya is the more effective implement to weed with. In the field of language the situation is slightly reversed. What is borrowed from the immigrants, is regarded by their hosts in turn as subcul­ tural, that is, not the mainstream way of saying things. For example, in Wad Medani it is usual to hear a Sudanese Arab say: ‘Baabu arabia. I had to walk like a Fellata'. Now baabu is Hausa for ‘there is no’, and arabia is Arabic for ‘car, vehicle’. The speaker in this context wishes to say he was unable to find transportation: ‘there was no car’. But to indicate that the usage is subcultural, the speaker adds the humorous simile ‘walk like a Fellata' to show that he is a non-Fellata, while at the same time implying that only the Fellata would walk long distances because they cannot or will not pay the fare for cars. Such jokes are often mild markers of the attempt to show the exclusiveness of ethnic identity. Nonetheless, one finds that the Arabic spoken in and around the Gezira also employs many Hausa words in daily intercourse. Generally, however, the borrowing tends to favour the Sudanese because their language is believed to be a superior one, the mastery of which partly legitimates the immigrants’ self-identity as pilgrims. The source of this self-identity is the pilgrimage to Mecca. SUMMARY

I have examined the explanations of some writers for the popularity of the pilgrimage in West Africa. I found that the notion of power and prestige as the underlying motives for pilgrimages does not explain its preponderance in any region, nor does it explain the great numbers from West Africa, all of whom could not hope to achieve such secular attributes, even through the conversion of divine grace. I then examined the work of Al-Naqar (1972) which considers the level of dogma and, in conjunction with the teaching of the various religious orders, goes far in accounting for the differences in the actual practice of the Islamic religion within various sects and from region to region. One variant of its practice, I have tried to show, has produced a West African subculture in Sudan, which is both coterminous with (and reinforced by ideas of) the Islamic pilgrimage to Mecca. I shall now go on to examine the Islamic pilgrimage with which we have hitherto - as is the case with most of the pilgrims - had only a vicarious relationship.

6 DIVINE DESIGN AND ITS CONSEQUENCES FOR THE ACHIEVEMENT OF PILGRIMAGE IN THIS LIFE

In the previous chapter I maintained that the Islamic pilgrimage was the keynote of the West African subculture in Sudan. I argued that it led to great hardships and misery among the immigrants but was not perceived as such, since they saw these as manifestations of suffering which the Prophet himself regarded as the essence of pilgrimage. Suffering in this context had intrinsic merit. The more suffering they had to endure, the greater the future rewards they would receive; their effort lead to salvation and, ulti­ mately, give meaning to life. Thus, they pursued the pilgrimage with a singleness of purpose, their whole life geared towards the fulfilment of this one aim (in accordance with what they believe are the dictates of their religion). My contention, however, is that despite the great energy they direct towards this singular purpose, the sum of their effort seems to be that of vicarious fulfilment. Paradoxically, it might be said that the beliefs that underlie this purpose (and the spell of those beliefs) are so strong and so persistent as to be self-defeating; its holders are unable to act sufficiently to achieve their ultimate objective. Take the case of Wad Fellata, for example. Only five out of the (approxim­ ately) 4,000 inhabitants of the village had physically completed the pilgrimage to Mecca. These five had performed the pilgrimage not only once but over and over again. The distribution of persons who had completed the journey was about the same in three of the pilgrim-villages where I conducted fieldwork. Yet, as I have pointed out, the adult inhabitants of the village describe themselves as pilgrims on their way to Mecca. It is clear, therefore, that the actual occurrence of pilgrimage is rather rare among these self­ professed pilgrims and that they seem to thrive mainly on the pilgrimages of a few of their members whose accounts serve, as it were, to keep the dream alive. This, then, provides a starting-point for the central paradox around which this whole book evolves: the attempt to explain the social action of a people whose lifestyle is shaped and geared towards the achievement of one major goal; all is done as if to fulfil this goal, but which is never to be.

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Deriving from this paradox are questions such as: why is it that these West Africans have come all the way to stop in Sudan, almost at the threshold of their most coveted goal? why have they not finished the journey; and why do they not finish it? The latter set of questions are, on one level, quite unproblematical; ordinary anthropological queries could yield plausible answers. Questions pertaining to our present paradox, however, are meta­ physical problems. These are issues that arise when the anthropologist strives beyond the recording of novelties in social organisation which make up much of our ethnography, to the presuppositions that underlie that organisa­ tion; they constitute the central queries of life itself and are, consequently, not easily answered.1 One manner in which we might tackle such questions is to look at the cognitive logic that determines and gives meaning to the daily lives of a given people. Such an approach would enable us to go beyond the realm of whatever rational choices we impute to them (and the material factors that constrain them), into the realm of their orientation to life itself and what they see as life’s purpose. In the course of this chapter I shall attempt to deal with both levels, in order to show how it would, for example, be insufficient to regard the non-arrival of the pilgrim at Mecca as a non-achievement of pilgrimage. Indeed, the meaning of pilgrimage for these West African Muslims, I shall try to show, lies in the perpetuity of endeavour rather than the finiteness of achievement. I shall argue that among the West African immigrants certain concepts are causally related to the scope and possibilities of their lives in Sudan. By this I mean that a limited number of recurrent emic concepts seem to shape and define their ideas of life and provides them with categories for that life. In so far as these concepts embody the norms of society, they are de facto prescriptions on what sort of behaviour is to be regarded as proper and appropriate for the members of a given society. They constitute what Colling­ wood (1940) would regard as the ‘absolute presuppositions’ of a society. It follows that the efforts and responses of a people in pursuit of their ‘absolute presuppositions’, in any particular situation, are meaningful only in terms of the world view created by the categories they employ (as is the fact that any optative choices they make would themselves be subject to the constraints of those concepts) (cf. Parkin 1978). Such categories reflect a whole orientation to existence and have, sometimes, in specific instances, consequences that are at variance with the overt goals desired by those who use them. Let us begin by examining some of these concepts (which are to be regarded as ultimately able to impel action, using the word ‘impel’ in a somewhat weak sense) to reveal why objectively the pilgrim’s efforts fall short of their professed aim.

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DEBTS, GIFTS AND INSHA'ALLAH: SOME KEY CONCEPTS AND PRECEPTS IN THE ONTOLOGY OF WEST AFRICAN PILGRIMS IN SUDAN

Given, then, that it is valid to examine the ontological consistencies or inconsistencies prevailing in a given society and their effects and con­ sequences, how is this applicable to the case of the pilgrims in Sudan? Let us begin with the necessary assumption that these pilgrims are unable to act sufficiently to achieve their professed objective and that is why they still find themselves in Sudan. There are a number of ways in which we can approach this problem. We could examine factors such as how their professed motive(s) and action(s) are enhanced or constrained in the social context of daily existence. As was the case with the action-roles of the pilgrims in the course of history, as dealt with in Chapter 2, even everyday personal motives are themselves subject to the influence of external and macro-structural factors. Therefore in order to speak validly of actions falling short of the professed objective(s) of agents, it would be necessary to examine the socio­ cultural context in which such actions take place. A related and necessary approach is to try to examine in what manner we can conceive of macrostructural factors as causally constraining (or as catalytic to) action. We can do this by examining some of the key concepts the pilgrims employ in daily intercourse, particularly concepts that belong to the domain of aspirations and the perceived possibilities of attaining these aspirations in daily life. I shall deal selectively with some of the concepts that reflect what the pilgrims perceive as being within the range of life’s possibilities. Recall the fact that these concepts are precepts that represent the presuppositions they have about the world and how they perceive their place in it. Some of these concepts invariably came back in conversations and interviews over a period of fourteen months in the pilgrim-villages where I conducted fieldwork. Obvi­ ously, therefore, the inference that these concepts and categories are culturally significant for the West Africans as an immigrant group in Sudan cannot be wholly mistaken. How do the West Africans themselves explain the fact that their efforts have evidently fallen short of their aims? Why have they not managed, despite lifelong efforts, to reach Mecca? Their own reasons range from fairly comprehensible accounts of the pragmatic kind to others more diffuse, the understanding of which requires some grasp of what we might appropri­ ately term the logic of their cosmological world. Let us look at the answer given by the pilgrim who had managed to walk all the way from Northern Nigeria to Sudan but does not appear to have managed the last few miles to Mecca in more than a decade. His answer was:

Ten years ago I was single. I was not burdened with a wife and six

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children. Today I have a family. I am also indebted to many patrons who must be paid before I leave. But what do all these reasons matter, Insha’Allah? I am still saving for the Haj. If Allah wants me to go to Mecca, I will do so some day. (Malam Mumini) Another began by listing other kinds of impediments but similarly ending with a reference to divine intervention: From Nigeria you just walk across into any country you pass. Nobody asks for papers. You are just one of them and you look just like anyone else. But when you reach Sudan you are different. When you reach Port Sudan you need papers to board any of the boats for Saudi Arabia. You are now a stranger. They call you Fellata - not even ‘Nigerian’ even though you are a Muslim like any one else. That is when passports become important. But passports are not easy to get. When you are a ‘proper man’ - a country man who farms and has a family - you have a lot of obligations (bashi, debts). You must think of your family. You must leave them money when you go away or on to Mecca. And perhaps when you are away, some one will go to your sharecropping partner and say to him: ‘Such and such a fellow is gone to Mecca. You don’t know when he will return. He may choose to stay long in Saudi Arabia to study, or perhaps to work for some time. So you need a new sharecropping partner.’ The Arab [Sudanese Tenancy owner, for example] may agree, and your wives and children have no farm to share, and no food to eat. So you have debts, and you have obliga­ tions. But, above all, if you are an honest man, you have the support of God. You will get to Mecca in the end, if it is what He wills. (Hassan Ibrahim)

We can isolate the following themes from the above reasons given: the demands of the family and the debts to brother Muslims, the difficulty of crossing the Red Sea without documents in contrast to the ease with which they have managed to reach Sudan and, always again, the inevitable ‘God’s will’. These were recurrent themes in answers respondents gave to questions on why they had not physically completed the pilgrimage. These answers are significant for several reasons. First, they seem to follow a pattern in which any occurrence the pilgrims are involved in is explained by different accounts, starting with what one might call mechanical explanations and ending with those citing the ‘will of God’, which belong to a class I will call metaphysical explanations. These two types of explanations were often used by the pilgrims in the same context to explain a particular fortune or misfor­ tune. They often cited them in the same breath, but appeared to rate them differently. These types of explanation were always conceived hierarchically.

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This became abundantly clear to me whenever, after having received answers similar to the ones above, I asked my informants to pick out what they considered the most important factors in an explanation and to arrange them in order of precedence. They invariably picked out Insha'Allah, God’s will, as the ultimate factor hindering them from continuing their journey to Mecca. Irrespective of whatever proximate causes they chose, they always perceived them as ultimately subject to (and ‘caused’ by) divine will. This may be the natural propensity of the truly religious people, but if we stop there we will be missing a range of much more interesting phenomena, as I will show. The mechanical tenets of the explanations they give for not having been able to complete the pilgrimage seem to me to be quite unproblematical. We have already discussed a number of these. It is not very difficult to understand how the web of indebtedness and responsibilities to family might hinder pilgrims from freely moving from place to place, once they have settled for some time in Sudan and become established as respectable members of the local pilgrim community. We can envisage several other factors that fall under the mechanical tenets in this context. Let us examine three of these that are of relevance. The first is an inevitable consequence of the pilgrim’s acquisition of respectability. The longer a pilgrim’s sojourn in Sudan, i.e., the more he becomes a ‘real man’ in the eyes of the local pilgrim community, the less are his chances of acquiring travel documents, necessary for a visit to Mecca. A prolonged residence, as we have seen, results in the loss of vital information required, for example, for passing the eligibility tests designed by the Nigerian Embassy for proof of citizenship. Furthermore, the stable resident also becomes increasingly subject to an overall entrenchment of Hausa values, developed - as is the case with most of the immigrants - in order to preserve a distinctiveness in face of what he perceives as a rejection by his Sudanese hosts. But Hausa values are attributes that are alien in this context and serve, therefore, to lessen his chances of acquiring Sudanese citizenship. Again, the ‘real man’ further acquires many other responsibilities once he becomes identified as standing for Hausa values. His Sudanese patrons will have tied him down through gifts, chauta. These gifts (as we saw in Chapter 3) belong to the grey, diffuse zone between what is given freely without an expected counter-gift and debts. They demand to be repaid in a manner more cumbersome than that conveyed in the overt intentions of the givers and receivers. Chauta, however, is usually not a transaction that is common only between Sudanese patrons and immigrant pilgrims, but between pilgrims and the leaders of their own communities as well. Malam Abubakar, for example, was offered a house for one shilling which he described as similar to ‘receiving a gift’. Gifts of this kind are indications of trust between the leaders of a community and the newly arrived immigrant and, like all gifts

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demand a counter-gift. But whereas the appropriate manner of reciprocating to Sudanese patrons is through payments in kind, the customary manner of counter-gift to the leaders of one’s community requires, first and foremost, that one strives to become ‘a real man’. This means acquiring a family and raising one’s offspring in accordance with Hausa ethnic ideals; ideals charac­ terised by a yearning for the pilgrimage. Paradoxically, however, it would seem that the primary relationships that precede the acquisition of these Hausa ethnic ideals, because they reduce the pilgrims’ mobility, do not augur well for the successful achievement of the pilgrimage. The second point is that most of the pilgrims leave home without much in the way of initial travelling funds. The reasons for this are partly ideological and partly circumstantial. The traditional manner of ‘going on the pilgrimage’ for this category of pilgrim, who perceive themselves as proper Muslims, precludes long preparation because it would mean attempting to avoid the hardships that should be met with dignity along the route. An informant, when told that Malam Abubakar left home with as much as £150 in his pocket, expressed great surprise. That is unusual for a real faki like him. I thought he was one of those who would have left home with nothing, and worked his way towards Mecca. All that a man needs to do is to put his affairs in order before leaving home. It is those who remain behind who have to be cared for. The pilgrim on his way to Mecca places himself in the hands of God. He is already cared for. I myself left with £15 (British) and one American dollar, and was even ashamed that I had taken too much with me. I reached Sudan three years later without having touched the original money. (Malam Mumuni) It therefore suits a poor person, who might not be able to afford any great amount of money anyway, to deny his poverty by holding that he is per­ forming the pilgrimage in the only befitting manner. This partly accounts for the fact that most of those who choose to perform the pilgrimage by walking across the savannas and desert are generally less well-to-do than those who fly. Yet for them it is not a question of a difference between those who have and those who have not, but between those who are true believers and those who are less so. It is important to note that such beliefs account for the predisposition of pilgrims to leave home with less funds than what would just have seen them through the first leg of the journey. Adequate funds, however, are vital for any steady progress on a journey and its completion within a reasonable timespan. However, the pilgrims’ ideas of what is to be considered the proper manner of leaving home only serve to make such progress unlikely. Third, there is the question of what other reasons - apart from the

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religious ones they give - precipitated the journey at a given point in time. From Malam Abubakar (see Chapter 2), we gather that he left home after having been told by a diviner, albeit in rather vague terms, that Allah desired him to make the pilgrimage. This was common among the pilgrims. Often a particular year was chosen only after they had consulted a malam on the most propitious time to start for Mecca. But although pilgrims generally refer to the advice of malams, it is quite conceivable that some other proximate cause or causes combined to prompt their departure at a particular time. They are unlikely to admit that they were prompted by external pressures apart from the dictates of faith. Yet such possibilities cannot be ruled out even if, as I have argued in Chapter 5, they do not lessen a person’s commitment to the pilgrimage. The pilgrimage urge of such a person need not be less genuine, nor should he be considered less religious. However, if external pressures, such as, for example, conflict with relatives arising from unfulfilled obligations, etc. were partly the reason for a person’s departure at a given time, they would certainly have a bearing on his chances for a speedy completion of the pilgrimage. Someone who is compelled to leave home would, conceivably, be unlikely to have been able to make the necessary preparations before the undertaking of a journey. Even if the tradition derived from the Maliki doctrine does not require that they first procure sufficient funds, there are other important preparations such as, for example, finding out where one’s relatives reside en route, whether such relations are able to give the traveller emotional and/or financial support, etc. Such factors would have some bearing on the progress of the journey. Now what these reasons have in common is that they belong to a graspable set that could explain why a person might not be able to complete the journey successfully. In order to analyse the metaphysical tenets of their explanations, let me briefly outline the pilgrims’ notions of ‘two worlds’ which affect their lives. First, there is the idea of ‘this world’ (duniyammun ga, literally this world of ours), and second, the idea of ‘that [other] world’ (wannan duniya, literally that [other] world). For want of a more appropriate term, I will call the latter the ‘cosmological’ world. They conceive the cosmological world as superordinate to the social world of lived everyday experience. Ideas derived from that world generate a moral system that defines the social world and encompasses all the good West African pilgrims in Sudan. The ontological status of this cosmological world is not very clear, even from the accounts of the malams. It has no clear location in space. One gathers, however, that it is not to be regarded as having an existence of its own independent of the everyday world of lived experience. The cosmological world is to be conceived as a dimension of this world with which it has a hierarchical relation (thereby legitimating and rendering meaningful the incomprehensible arrangements of the subordinate world). For instance, it is through the cosmological

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world that the contradictions of social structure, the seeming futility of daily toil and the anguish of everyday suffering derive their innermost meaning. Among the pilgrims the reality of the cosmological world is brought home daily in a blend of myths, concepts, precepts and what we would generally call key symbols. These are imbued with a potent force that steers and determines the lives of the pilgrims. Inevitably, this life is steered along a path that only fits into the predetermined pattern laid down by God. The only significant role pilgrims play in this pattern is that of instruments for the fulfilment of God’s will. Thus the precepts of the cosmological world are always right; they must never be questioned. According to the malams, West African pilgrims who reject the precepts of that world fall outside its sway and are, therefore, not subject to its logic. But it also means that such persons are worse than those who belong to a dar el harb, land of unbelievers, because they are those who were fortunate enough to have once belonged to the right path and yet have chosen to reject it. (Choice here is seen as resulting from the work of Shaitan, the devil; the true Muslim submits to God’s will and does not choose. Those who reject pilgrimage are to be considered as damned.) This is the fate in store for those of the West Africans immigrants who eventually discard their pilgrim-intent - or reject the pilgrimage altogether - as the defining symbol for life in Sudan. From my knowledge of Muslims back home in West Africa, nothing similar to these ideas exists there on the force of a cosmological system that affect the lives of Muslim-believers even among malams. A question worth posing at this juncture, therefore, is: what about the West Africans back home in Nigeria? Are they not subject to this same cosmological logic? Informants are unable to give a coherent answer to this; they appear unable to fit people back home into their cosmological scheme. A malam who was also a village Sheikh of some renown explained that this cosmological system begins to operate once a person leaves home to begin the pilgrimage in the ‘correct’ way - as is the case with all the West Africans in Sudan - thus becoming a member of the pilgrim community. Another said that such ideas were present in all Muslim societies but come more and more to the fore, the more devout the members of the community become. Hence such a cosmological system obtains in its purest form in the settled - though transitory - pilgrim communities in Sudan. Since as a state Nigeria comprises many non-Muslim peoples, the same logic cannot apply there. One’s impres­ sion, therefore, is that these are ideas they have not worked out in general and universal terms. However, they are not so hesitant when it comes to the question of the relative religiousness of Nigeria and Sudan. Sudan is infinitely more religious as it is closer to the consecrated ground, the dar el Islam, than Nigeria. Their reservation pertains only to the inhabitants of this holier country who, sometimes, behave in a manner not in accordance with the teachings of Islam.2

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We have already noted how the West Africans, through their common adherence to the Islamic faith, share the same cosmology with their Sudanese hosts, just as they share the same social world. As is the case with the borrowing and interarticulation of concepts we examined in the previous chapter, the component concepts and myths of this cosmology acquire among the immigrants new meanings which are often inversions or transformations of their original import. We noted, for instance, that in the social world the pilgrims are accorded, and accept, a subordinate status - even if this is somewhat ambivalent - in relation to their hosts, chiefly because, as mentioned previously, the latter are speakers of a holy tongue and therefore custodians of the heritage of the Prophet. It is perhaps for such reasons that they are content to work for their hosts and even to accept local stereotype ideas which regard West African pilgrims as overwhelmingly susceptible to crime. The pilgrims then seek to modify this unflattering picture by invoking rural existence and hard work on farms as characteristic of their pilgrim ethic and as necessary for the maintenance of that ethic. Pilgrim ethic reflects one of the central precepts of Islam; the West Africans in the Sudan therefore see their ethic as ultimately mitigating any contemptible views their hosts ascribe to them. The negative notions about themselves, in so far as they are true, are seen as resulting from the activities of a few of their members, particularly the single males who reject the pilgrim ideal and live in towns and thus do not adhere to the logic of the cosmological system of the pilgrims. Yet if the pilgrims have a subservient position in the social world, their position in the cosmological world is as lofty as that of their hosts; and, possibly, even superior by virtue of the fact that they spend a lifetime attempting to fulfil one of the most important injunctions of Islam, a religion they share with their hosts. To this might be added the rewards of Islamic social virtues epitomised by their asceticism, diligence and, above all, devotion to the holy scriptures. These constitute attributes that allow them access to a modal power that is sought after even by those who are their social superiors. There is thus an intricate ambivalence here between the pilgrims and their hosts regarding their role in any social situation at any particular point in time. But the inversions and refractions of some of the concepts in the social and cosmological worlds are basic to their conceptions of life and its purpose. It is in the light of such ideas that we must consider the pilgrims’ attribution of failure (in the world) to reach Mecca to the will of God, as conveyed in the recurrent use of Insha’Allah, a concept they inevitably invoke to punctuate any explanation. Let us again use the pilgrims’ own explanation above as our point of departure. They refer to the will of God as that which has hindered them from completing the pilgrimage. We must then face the question: can the anthropologist accept this as a sufficient explanation without further ado? In what manner could God be said to have prevented them from reaching

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Mecca? Given that they consider themselves true believers, why should they keep on acting in contravention to His will (since persisting, as they do, as pilgrims-on-their-way is in itself apparently adverse to His will)? In short, how significant is the notion of Insha’Allah? At first sight, Insha'Allah looks very much like the class of common verbal conventions Dr Johnson called ‘cant’.3 It is perhaps merely the way people talk in this society. However, the evidence suggests that this is not the case. It fits very distinctly with the dominant logic of their cosmological world; a world in which, as we have seen, the actions of any members only serve to fulfil a preconceived pattern attributable to divine design. The past wars against the British and the outcome of those wars, the millenarian beliefs about the End of Time, the eventual movement of the pilgrims to Sudan and even the mundane day-to-day quests for nourishment, are all subject to this overall design. (In the question of the last of these, it is perhaps not quite certain that this is the contention of all the pilgrims. It is, however, certainly the view of most of the malams and some of the leading Sheikhs.) Therefore, while at the one extreme, Insha’Allah might look like cant, at the other extreme, which I am exploring, it can be regarded as a concept that functions as a theory of causation as well as a theory of predestina­ tion. It is symptomatic of the world view that permeates the whole existence of the pilgrims. This contention was reinforced now and again by several occurrences during my fieldwork. The following is one of the more significant of these. At the beginning of my fieldwork, the shack of a pilgrim in her late seventies caught fire. She had been selling cigarettes and matches in Wad Fellata ever since 1951 when she first settled in the village. Despite attempts by many of the inhabitants to put out the fire, she apparently lost all her worldly goods. Clearly visible in the glowing ashes were some personal photographs from the past, a few odds and ends and the remains of half-charred British pound notes of various denominations, totalling £500. She had saved this money over the years in the hope of using it to finance the journey to Mecca. Apart from my surprise at discovering that any person in the village could possess that much money (I have shown in Chapter 3 how cash debts of as little as £3 Sudanese pounds were regarded as substantial sums which paved the way for near-bondage relationships) and the sadness at watching someone lose the savings of a lifetime, the woman’s own reaction was very instructive. She appeared to take her misfortune very calmly. Her only words were: ‘Insha'Allah. It is the will of God. Sometimes one set of things happen for the better. God’s will be done.’ She hoped to borrow some money to set up shop again and to continue saving for the pilgrimage. An examination of this concept, therefore, is necessary in any attempt to understand what I have so far tried to present as the West African subculture in Sudan. It is, however, also to be regarded as a difficult and tricky notion,

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mainly, I take it, because it belongs to a class of concepts - found crossculturally - which might, on the one hand, seem to serve merely as verbal ex­ pressions in daily speech while, on the other hand, have a clear significance that extends beyond speech alone. The difficulty, then, is that of trying neither to overemphasise nor underemphasise their dual characteristics. However, as will be clear in the course of this chapter, I shall argue that Insha'Allah has significantly this latter characteristic: namely, that its significance extends beyond speech alone. Before pursuing this point, however, let us look at two examples of concepts of the type. One sometimes hears an English speaker say: ‘Most people have caught this ghastly flu, but I have managed to stay healthy. Touch wood,' and the speaker might even go through the motion of touching something wooden. Another might say: God willing and weather permitting [I will do such and such a thing]. The first example, Touch wood, is often heard when the speaker has said something that seems too brazen, as if challenging providence. We might, if we felt so inclined, dismiss this sequence of word and (an odd) deed as irrational behaviour, possibly a superstitious leftover from some dim and distant past. The latter example, however, is somewhat different. If this were considered my promise to visit you, contin­ gent upon a future set of conditions: God’s willingness and fair weather and I was unable to keep my promise, it is unlikely that I would cite God’s will as the cause of my inability to keep the promise (although it is conceivable that I might cite bad weather). Similarly, if the speaker in our former example were to catch the flu after he had or had not touched wood, it is unlikely that he would refer to the act of not touching wood as being responsible for his current state. ‘Touch wood’ and ‘God willing’ in these contexts are thus ‘cant’ in the Johnsonian sense of the word. Expressions such as these occur in daily speech in a wide range of languages in several forms of usage, but commonly they serve, as it were, to blunt the edges of categorical locutions which might be seen as tempting providence. To repeat this point: on the one hand, such expressions are decorative instances in speech as well as conventions that reflect the religious identity of the speaker. On the other hand, these same expressions are able to function as accepted causal theories about why a particular occurrence chanced to take place. Sometimes these two characteristics might be found to operate simultaneously. It is likely that originally expressions of the former kind also once functioned as causal theories, in that they attributed the agency of contingent occurrences to God or some entity beyond human control. As must be obvious from the above example, a common characteristic of causative concepts of this kind is that they almost always have an inherent failsafe aspect that immunises them against falsification. They are furthermore sufficiently vague and general to be easily verifiable. For instance, the will of God, as epitomised by this same Insha'Allah, was operative in Malam

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Abubakar’s decision to leave on the pilgrimage. The message he received from his diviner was so broad as to be vacuous. It left him the choice of when to depart for Mecca and where to settle, yet imbuing each subsequent choice with God’s approbation. This is the same kind of fail-safe ingredient we find in Evans-Pritchard’s analysis of the Zande imputation of malevolent occurrences to the agency of witchcraft (1937). The Azande regularly consulted poison oracles before any social undertaking: those of social importance and those concerning mundane day-to-day affairs. One of the chief functions of the oracles was to protect the Azande against witchcraft by finding out the identity of the witch who had afflicted a person in a particular instance. Although the oracles were usually able to meet this requirement, they were often not without contradictions in their findings nor unequivocal in their messages. Yet this did not lead the Azande to question the reliability or the efficaciousness of oracles. Indeed, each negative or contradictory instance, Evans-Pritchard tells us, serves rather to reinforce their faith in oracles. For it was sufficient proof that the oracle would have functioned if it had not been interfered with. Thus, were an oracle unable to give clear proof of the identity of a witch, or if it contradicted itself, they would hold that the oracle itself was bewitched or that the oracle ritual itself had not been correctly performed. This is similar to the pilgrim’s imputation of all that happens to God’s will. The inevitable logic of this view is that all occurrences (including those in which their own volition played a part) only affirm God’s will. Hence, it follows, too, that all non­ occurrences, including those that were contingent on their non-volition or non-acting, were also in accordance with the will of God. Insha’Allah is efficacious because it cuts both ways. It cannot be questioned; it cannot lose. And it is the mainstay of the cosmology of the pilgrims, which is why they invoke it ultimately to explain causation. I suggest that it is the anthropolo­ gist’s duty not to take such concepts at face value only. They are important because they address questions on the role of the self in effecting what are perceived as the goals of life. Another important aspect also worth mentioning is that Insha’Allah, too, allows the smuggling into the system of some degree of free will, although that too is itself subject to the divine pattern. For such reasons, I believe it incumbent on the anthropologist to attempt to fully analyse concepts of this type in relation to their contexts, in order to elicit any meaning or sense from them (before they can be rejected as meaningless). Let us now look at the traditional Sudanese usage of this concept of Insha’Allah. The indigenous usage largely falls under cant, as a manner of speaking. A Sudanese would say: 'I will visit you tomorrow Insha’Allah.’ If he does not visit you tomorrow and you asked him what caused him to fail to come, he would give you a reason that had nothing to do with the will of God. (However, the use of Insha’Allah itself probably entails a social conven­ tion that precludes any question or query, should the promise not be ful­ filled.)4 With the Sudanese hosts of the pilgrims, past events always appear

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to be explained through a retrospective analysis of a mechanical kind. No recourse is made to the inevitability of divine design as the ultimate cause, even though this may sometimes be implicit at the level of rhetoric. Sudanese, therefore, use the concept only prospectively.5 With the pilgrims it is different. A West African pilgrim would recount an occurrence that took place in the past as having occurred just as it was foretold that it would, or outline a future undertaking predicating its outcome on Insha'Allah. This may be an occurrence, the outcome of which would largely depend on his own action or be one of which the outcome is independent of any part he may play in effecting its direction and outcome. The pilgrims, therefore, use Insha'Allah both prospectively and retrospect­ ively. By their view, what will happen tomorrow will happen irrespective of their own volition. Nothing that will happen to them will in any way happen through their own action because according to their cosmology, all that will occur is written (by God) and their own action cannot alter that which is divinely predetermined. Furthermore, their system precludes the possibility of God changing his mind. For Him to do so would seem to indicate doubt or uncertainty about the pattern He had already outlined and that would be unlikely and inconsistent with the conception of an omnipotent and omniscient God. Hence it follows, too, that that which occurred in the past and the extent and quality of that occurrence was merely in accordance with that predetermined pattern. The following story was told to me by a malam who meant it to illustrate the inevitability of human fate as epitomised by the concept of Insha'Allah:

Once in the past, during the jihads in Northern Nigeria, before the rise of the Shehu’s empire, a young chief fell in a battle and his followers fled in all directions, leaving their dead behind them. Darkness fell and the chief, who was left for dead, woke up thinking he must be in heaven. However, a pain in his side made him realise he was only wounded and still in this world. This was made more real by the fact that he recognised the battlefield, with the bodies of the slain lying around him. Then he saw an amazing sight. Two angels walked from body to body identifying each person and sending him off to rest in peace with God. They would touch a body and say: ‘Your soul said you would die in a jihad and this, truly, is how you died. Rest in peace.’ When they reached the young chief he lay still, petrified. They touched him and said: ‘But this is odd. You said you would die by a fish, but you have died in a battle instead. Well, who knows the myster­ ious ways of God? You fell in a jihad so you will enter heaven. Rest in peace.’ As soon as the angels departed, he rose and ran towards his home as fast as he could ... He then instructed all his people to remind him - if

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he should ever forget - never to go near a river and never to eat fish. He lived a very long life. Then one day, he told one of his wives to prepare him a meal with fish. He made them remove all the fish bones before he ate. He even checked to see there were no bones in the meal before he started to eat. And yet a piece of fish bone stuck in his throat and he died. This shows that you can never change or avoid the will of God. (Sheikh Rahman Ahmed, my emphasis) Before going on, let us compare this story with orthodox Sunni views relating to death as derived from the Traditions, on what happens to a person immediately after death. There are interesting deviations as well as similarities here. According to the Traditions there are two kinds of receptions for a person after death, depending on whether he is a believer or an infidel. As soon as a believer dies angels ‘whose faces are white’ (Hughes 1885: 79) descend from the heavens to the deceased. These are followed by the Angel of Death (Malaku al-maut) who sits at the head of the corpse and says ‘O pure soul, come forth to God’s pardon and pleasure’ (Hughes loc. cit.). The soul comes forth ‘as easily as water from a water-skin’ and it is wrapped in fragrant perfumes and carried upwards towards the heavens. During the journey any angels they meet inquire after the name of this virtuous soul and they answer, ‘calling him the best names by which he was known in the world’ (ibid). After a brief visit to heaven, during which the believer’s name is written in Iliyun, the soul is returned to the corpse. Then the time has come for the two Angels of Death, Munkar and Nakir, to question the deceased on the basic teachings of Islam. The believer, as could well be expected, passes the test and goes to paradise. The infidel, by contrast, is met at his death by ‘black faced’ angels who proclaim: ‘O impure soul! Come forth to the wrath of God.’ Anticipating its fate the soul of the infidel usually refuses to come forward and has to be drawn out ‘as a hot spit is drawn out of wet wool’ (ibid: 80). The Angels of Death then take the infidel towards the heavens, passing other angels who question them on whose ‘filthy soul’ they are carrying and ‘they mention him by the worst names that he bore in the world’. The doors of heaven, needless to say, are barred to the infidel. His name is written in Sijjin. They then return to earth where the infidel fails the tests which the Angels of Death give, whereupon his soul is condemned to eternal hellfire. I have gone over this in some detail to highlight the differences between the above story told by the Hausa pilgrim and notions of death as derived from the Traditions in Islam. I am aware that often-practised religion significantly differs from its original source but such differences are in themselves significant. If we compare the above story with its written scriptural source as repres­ ented through the Sunni Traditions, for example, we find that one idea common to both is that of the two Angels of Death who come to the deceased.

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There the similarity ends. Indeed, the Hausa pilgrim’s story is reminiscent of the spoken prenatal destiny of the Tallensi (see Fortes 1959: 38ff.) who believe that a person can choose his own destiny before birth. As Fortes has attempted to show - and others have affirmed (see Horton 1961) - the notion of a prenatally self-chosen destiny is widespread in West Africa. Most probably the above Hausa story contains an original traditional element that has been introduced into Islam. But whereas in the Tallensi case it was usually possible to exorcise an unfortunate choice of bad destiny later on in life through the diagnoses and help of a diviner, this is not the case in the Islamised Hausa version of chosen destiny. (I shall soon re-emphasise the point that, although among the pilgrims in the Sudan the predictive role of the diviner is fulfilled by the fakis, their activity precludes any attempt to alter the choice of destiny since they see such ‘choice’ as reflective of divine design.) In the pilgrim view as reflected in the above story, the ‘choice’ of destiny, if one can call it that, is itself rigidly subject to divine design and indeed fits with it. It was, perhaps, not the intention of the malam who recounted the story to convey orthodox Sunni views on death (although he certainly had little doubt that it was an Islamic story and that it showed what happened when a person has just died). The most important point for him in the whole story was that it illustrated the inevitability of destiny. The Quran is full of references to the inevitability of human fate (see Suras 2, 17, 30, 50, 49, 139). It seems probable, therefore, that this story of what occurred to the Hausa chief is an example of the interarticulation of Islamic teachings and ethnic Hausa pre-Islamic notions of predestination. The two examples I have presented above on the inevitability of human fate deal with the role of predetermined fate in the life-course of the individual. The same principle, however, holds at the level of social facts (i.e. sociostruc­ tural phenomena) as illustrated in the following case. A young and vivacious American lady had volunteered to teach in one of the centres of higher education in the Gezira. The institute had been unable to find her accommoda­ tion before her arrival, so Cecilia, as I shall call her, was placed in a pleasant hotel with rooms overlooking the Blue Nile. Originally an exclusive social club for British colonial officials, the hotel now catered mainly for expatriates and well-to-do Medanians and therefore sought to retain some of the exclusive­ ness and dignity of the past. The service was good and the rooms clean. Cecilia for the time being was quite happy with her accommodation while her employers tried to find a more permanent residence for her. One day, however, she returned from work to find that her jewellery and some cash had been stolen from her room; she immediately reported the theft to the management. The police were brought in and the culprit turned out to be a young steward employed by the hotel. What was exceptionally distressing for Cecilia was the loss of a ring to which she attached great sentimental value. She expressed a willingness to refrain from pressing charges if the

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boy would return that particular ring, but he had sold it to a stranger and could not retrieve it. In any case, Cecilia soon found out that she was neither required to press nor refrain from pressing charges. The autonomous wheel of the law had already begun to grind. The boy was charged with theft, remanded and a lawyer was found for him. It was then that Cecilia found out to her horror that sharia law, which had been imposed on the whole country some months earlier, was now in effect and that the prescribed penalty for the crime, if the boy should be found guilty, was the amputation of his right hand. She dreaded being the reason for anybody to lose a limb. Particularly painful in this case was the fact that she had volunteered to work in Africa ‘to help her fellow blacks’, as she had proudly stated when we initially became acquainted. Since this was at the start of the implementation of sharia law, there was a great deal of fervour at trying to set as many examples as possible. Rumour had it that soon we would all be able to witness whippings and amputations in the market square at Wad Medani. The pilgrims whole-heartedly approved of the new code. Cecilia’s greatest concern was to try to prevent the accused from losing his hand. So instead of giving evidence against the accused, she found herself pleading before the presiding judge not to impose the penalty of Islamic law on the young man. She also had several meetings with the defending lawyer to find a means of saving the accused. One day the lawyer called on Cecilia to tell her that he had come across an article in one of the local newspapers that could help their case. The piece was supposedly written by a senior judge who had stated that if a person whose things have been stolen declares a posteriori that he considers the goods as given to the thief and therefore did not any longer consider them as stolen, then sharia law would regard what had transpired as the exchange of ‘gifts’ and the prescribed penalty for theft need no more apply. The lawyer felt that since Cecilia appeared willing to help the young man, she should sign a document stating that she was giving away the articles stolen from her as ‘gifts’ to the thief. He saw this as the only way to prevent the judges from passing the sentence of amputation. Cecilia was confused. She had gone out of her way to try to help the fellow who had stolen her things, but she thought it against her principles as a Christian to sign such a document. Energetic as ever, she went to the court house to discuss this proposal. She was received by two attentive judges in their chambers. One judge said that he too had read the article in question but considered it irrelevant to the present case because they had not received any official instructions to that effect. The other judge thought that if Cecilia were to sign such a document and have it witnessed by three reputable citizens, it might be considered as having an extenuating effect on his judgement of the case. His colleague disagreed. Cecilia sat by while the two judges disputed the law with each other. She left the court house without any clear idea of

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what was expected of her. But still she could not bring herself to sign the document. Meanwhile the highly publicised case of two automobile thieves whose hands had been amputated took place in the capital, Khartoum. Confused, appalled and depressed, as she professed to be, Cecilia signed the document, giving away the articles stolen from her. It helped. The boy, who was twenty years old, was sentenced to five years’ imprisonment or a fine of £S600. Let us now look at what transpired simultaneously with the above drama. The young culprit, it turned out, was a West African pilgrim who had renounced his background and posed as an Arab. This was something I discovered while doing fieldwork in one of the villages where his relatives lived. Though in the eyes of his people he was an outcast, his fate was still the subject of considerable talk in the village. Theft, they felt, was abhorrent in any form. The culprit, therefore, deserved to suffer the full force of Islamic law, even if in this case what was stolen was the property of a strange American woman, the only female who walked around in the streets of Wad Medani in shorts. She had probably tempted the misguided boy and led him to steal the items! I thus had every day the doubtful pleasure (but anthropologically useful privilege) of hearing Cecilia recount her experience of the successive stages in the process of the law, while at the same time observing the boy’s relatives’ own attempts to live with the great shame he had cast on them and their attempts to ‘help’ him. The boy’s relatives did so by consulting a local faki. Eventually all talk about the young man’s case stopped; the faki had already foretold what was going to happen to him; Insha'Allah, God’s will would have to run its course. When news reached the village that the boy had escaped with a punishment that was relatively mild, they seemed unimpressed, saying only that they had known all along that this would be the outcome. Had not the young man renounced his background, he too might have had access to this fore-knowledge and all the great anxiety he went through might have been averted. I have recounted this story at some length to highlight the following points: (a) that one important aspect of the concept of Insha'Allah, as conceived by the pilgrims, is that it necessitates the quest for the anxiety­ averting insight of the fakis: and (b) more importantly, Insha'Allah does not only apply to individual destiny but also to events such as the process of law, involving many people, myriads of wills and motives and other contingent factors. Such phenomena were perceived as just falling into a rigid pattern of divine design which is also sometimes accessible to some to whom God has given the powers to perceive, or to those who possess what might well be the gift of prophecy. Insha'Allah, then, is the concept that the pilgrims invoke to explain the uncertainties of life, but it is also premised on a basic and certain presupposi­

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tion: namely, that God’s hand steers everything. Not only is it symptomatic of attitudes that embody a world-view in which everything is seen in the terms of a predetermined pattern, but informants sometimes talk as if even motives and the daily choices of individuals are themselves subject to this pattern. The concept of Insha’Allah, therefore, provides an important clue to the underlying presuppositions that give meaning to the cosmology of the pilgrims. As is clear from the foregoing discussion, Insha’Allah is not to be regarded as implying the adherence to a simple theory of causation or a monocausal one at that. Rather it must properly be viewed as embodying a whole complex of presuppositions which together result in a propensity to see the world in a certain manner and to act according to that picture. Insha’Allah provides the organisational frame, as it were, for an ontology that defines the being of the individual pilgrim in this life. The idea, for example, that a person who is on the pilgrimage surrenders himself into the hands of God and is therefore in an extended state of grace as long as the journey lasts may well be seen as a direct consequence of this ontology.6 West African pilgrims believe that any sins committed before their journey began are cleansed, as are any others during this holy interval. They therefore believe that all pilgrims who die during the journey to Mecca go straight to heaven. This state of sinlessness prevails as long as they face Mecca, or consider themselves as progressing towards it. In the light of this we can better understand why Malam Abubakar (in Chapter 5) declined to return to Nigeria to apply for a passport in order to re-start his pilgrimage. Setting out on a journey towards Nigeria, as he explained it, would amount to terminating the pilgrimage he was currently on, thus loosing the state of grace in which he was living. A man of considerable age at the time, he dreaded the possibility of dying during a return journey to Nigeria. During such a journey he would not only have lost all his pilgrim grace, but he would also be subjecting himself to the forces of a non-Islamic cosmology: a state of affairs that would prevail until he began another journey towards Mecca. This seemed an unattractive option indeed. Consequently, he declined the advice of the youngsters who saw a return to Nigeria to secure a passport as a pragmatic option. Abubakar thus decided rather to live on in Sudan, in the hope that God’s will would eventually result in his own geographical movement to Mecca. These, broadly, are some of the wider implications of Insha’Allah. It is now time to consider a set of related questions: in a cosmology such as the one outlined above, in which all is predetermined, what point is there in undertaking any positive action to achieve an objective? And what is the point in planning for the future, since whatever one does or does not do would ultimately not change the course of things already laid down. What, for example, is the point in consulting the fakis and what of their claim that they are able not only to predict but also to control the course of future

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events? Furthermore, how do such beliefs compare with Christian notions of predestination? Does Insha'Allah have a paradoxical consequence such as discussed by Weber with regard to Christianity where, as it were, the sum total of human agency in a system that accepted the doctrine of predestination could lead to unenvisaged ends: namely, the rise of capitalism? (I am not here concerned with whether Weber’s controversial thesis was right or wrong. I am merely accepting the logic of the analysis and its heuristic potency for dealing with issues such as mine.) I shall attempt to deal with these questions here. Let me emphasise, however, that my aspiration is not to grapple with general Islamic notions of predestination and fatalism. My main concern is rather with the particular import accorded the notion of Insha'Allah by the West African pilgrims in Sudan and its consequences for their quest for the fulfilment of the pilgrimage. FAKIS AND DIVINE DESIGN

I have tried to show that Insha'Allah encompasses a world view among the pilgrims; that the predetermined nature of all things, present and to be, is the mainstay of their cosmology, yet inherent in the aforementioned myth and, in the orthodox Islamic views of death recounted above, is something that resembles personal responsibility - and strongly reminiscent of a freedom of the will - in determining one’s worldly affairs. For instance, in the above myth about the Hausa chief, we find the Angels of Death expressing surprise at the discrepancy between the mode and time of death the soul of the Hausa chief had chosen (presumably at some prenatal state) and the manner in which his death had occurred. It would seem that a person’s soul, at some stage in the process of being, has the freedom to choose its own destiny. Yet when the Angels found that this particular case did not fit the predetermined design, they still accepted the state of affairs because one could never know ‘the mysterious ways of God’. We need not wonder whether the contingent choice of fate by the soul is in accordance with God’s will, because it has to be by the logic of the system. But it is still difficult not to wonder what kind of ‘choice’ is operative here. Again, we saw that the Angels of Death, when conveying the soul of a deceased to the heavens, call it by ‘the best names’ he was known by in the world. Would these names take into account or reflect the kind of inversions of the social and cosmological worlds that, for example, the pilgrims believe their system to entail? In a word: how does this fit together with the version of predestina­ tion as embodied in the concept of Insha'Allah? What about the fakis: are they not by their very activities trying to change what God has already laid down? The idea that all that has transpired and will transpire, good as well as evil, results entirely from God’s will which has been fixed (written) and cannot be changed, is commonly accepted by the pilgrims. They believe

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that God has from the beginning chosen those he intends to save and those he intends to damn. This might be conceived as constituting the grand design. Encapsulated in the grand design is the individual’s lifespan, his day-to-day activities and whatever happens to him, all of which are similarly subject to an inexorable pattern of divine predetermination. The chosen ones include all the true communities of Islamic believers; and these, of course, include all the pilgrims. Malams quite often point out that this is an important aspect of their belief since the word Islam means surrender, i.e., surrendering oneself to God’s will. One important purpose of life, therefore, is living in harmony with a community of believers. But although these views appear to be coherent to some degree, the doctrine of predestination, which follows a logic similar to the one Ryle has described as ‘the argument from antecedent truth to the inevitability of what the antecedent truths are antecedently true about’ (Ryle 1954: 16), can only result in a paradox. The doctrine of predestination is in effect ‘a doubleedged philosophy’, as Lytton Strachey (1918:200) concluded, once perceiving its manifestation in the life of General Gordon, another staunch adherent with whom this doctrine had become transformed into a form of ardent fatalism. Strachey further observes that, ‘while, on the one hand, it reveals the minutest occurrences as the immutable result of a rigid chain of infinitely predestined causes, on the other, it invests the wildest incoherences of conduct or of circumstance with the sanctity of eternal law’ (loc. cit.). Pushed to the extreme it means that those who are chosen for salvation, irrespective of what they do and how they act, do so (and can only do so) in accordance with God’s will and cannot therefore act in any manner that would be in contravention of that will. Similarly, those who are damned, i.e. the unchosen ones, cannot but act as they do because they are merely agents fulfilling what was divinely determined, being, therefore, nothing but mere instruments in the fulfilment of that design. Hence they too cannot be held responsible for their actions irrespective of how they act. And yet despite such a rigid theory of divine design, one finds inherent in doctrines of both Christianity and Islam a clear message that one can achieve salvation through one’s own faith and good deeds. The Prophet Muhammed deemed it necessary to try to get people to change their wicked ways in order to be saved, as did Christ, whom Christians believe died for our sins.7 Their example reflects, in essence, what appears to be the fundamental role of prophets and prophecy in the history of the major scriptural religions. For example, most of the great prophets of the Old Testament proceeded by trying to induce people to alter their ways or suffer the wrath of God and frequently foretold what dire events would engulf the unrepentant. But the logic of their system contained a conditional allowance for the Almighty to change the ‘preordained’ order of things, should the people alter their way of life. Indeed, it mostly seems God only reluctantly resorted to His ultimate

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weapon of destruction and was pleased when people altered their ways and He did not have to punish them. The Bible often warns its reader’s against false prophets. From the point of view of prophets, however, a pressing dilemma they faced may well have been constituted in the role of the prophet itself; a role which must logically have involved constantly grappling with being a failed prophet or a successful prophet (rather than a false or a true prophet). That this has not always been easily resolved is made clear in the case of Jonah.8 Consider the hypothetical case of the true prophet who prophesies that certain dire events would occur to a given people if they did not alter their ways. If he succeeded in getting the people to alter their ways, he would find his predictions of divine wrath and punishment turn out to be false. If he did not succeed in getting the people to change their ways, they suffered the wrath of God and the prophet would have lost those to whom he had been sent to spread God’s word so that they might achieve salvation. In this latter instance, although his predictions came true, he would still in some senses be a failed prophet. Perhaps there is some truth to the old adage: ‘No prophet is accepted in his own country.’ It is chiefly because if he is a successful prophet his prophecies must come true and he will have no more people left since they would have been destroyed through the wrath of God. However, if he managed to get his people to heed the warnings of the impending apocalypse and thus altered their ways (as a result of which God, being merciful, had spared them, thereby implicitly rendering the prophet’s pro­ nouncements false), sceptics might regard him a false prophet. From an analytical point of view it might also be argued that the logic of prophecy could not encompass a fully fledged notion of a transcendental God whose design was pre-eminently rigid. In the notion of Insha'Allah, as the pilgrims conceive, this fundamental inconsistency still remains. Such issues, however, properly belong to the domain of theology, where they have persisted since the dawn of religious belief without any satisfactory resolution. Ordinary mortals, however, caught in the intricate maze of the contradictory tenets of their beliefs, go on functioning in this world despite these logical imperfections. And since we are concerned here with such ordinary people, the pilgrims, let us further pursue how they solve such inconsistencies. Although the doctrine of predestination denies the possibility of achieving salvation through personal faith, good deeds or the mediation of priests, it nevertheless contains a vital loophole that enables it to persist. And it is this loophole, too, that prevents adherents of this and similar doctrines from eventually succumbing to the sterile alienation and fatalism that might ulti­ mately have resulted from them. I maintain that this loophole is a key characteristic of doctrines of predestined fate. The loophole might be termed the uncertainty principle. I consider this an appropriate term because doc­

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trines of predestined fate are generally unable to point out with certainty or to know which persons or groups of persons have been chosen to be saved. (They are, however, able to point out those who belong to the damned.) With regard to the Christians, the Calvinists, for example, preached that all those who stayed outside the church were damned, whereas not all those who belonged to the church were to be regarded as among the elect (Weber 1930: 104).9 The doctrine, however, allowed some earthly sign(s) as indicative of those who may be among the chosen. In Calvinist beliefs one such sign was success in business, the result of working hard at one’s calling (Beruf, in Weber’s terms). A total devotion to one’s calling (with the high probability of becoming successful at it), was unequivocally an earthly sign that one was among those who were redeemed. I found no articulated concept of the ‘chosen’ in West African pilgrim discourse, but there is no doubt that notions of belonging to an exclusive class of people favoured by Allah exists in their ontology. They, too, similarly have signs that distinguish them from less favoured and, one might say, chosen people. Some such signs are the daily efforts of pilgrims to behave as true Muslims who are submitting of themselves to Islam and the Islamic community. Above all, such signs are also discernible in their general efforts to behave in a manner that would enable them to acquire all ‘the best names’ as members of the community of believers. In addition to going on the pilgrimage, the true pilgrim also strives to achieve a high level of piety in order to emulate one of the earthly signs of being among the chosen ones. The uncertainty principle, therefore, both rescues the doctrine of predestina­ tion from becoming a sterile paradox and offers those who accept its contra­ dictory messages, as it were, a safety valve from total apathy. Without this instance of uncertainty about who are or are not among the chosen, which at least allows people to act out roles as if they belonged to the chosen, adherents of this doctrine would logically have felt inclined to do nothing (since whatever action they put into their sociocultural environment in order to achieve envisaged goals would not alter what has already been designed for their lot). Alternatively, it is conceivable that they might do something but not act sufficiently in order to achieve such self-defined goals. The fact that people act or strive to achieve given goals at all, such doctrines notwithstanding, suggests that they are impelled by the need to display the earthly sign(s) indicative of those who belong to the divinely exclusive class in which they count themselves. This, indeed, was what Weber perceived to be the catalytic aspect of the doctrine of predestination among the Calvinists, the paradoxical outcome of which was the rise of capitalism (1930: 111). Faced with the doctrine of predestination, pastoral advice, Weber tells us, sought to convey the necessity of considering oneself ‘one of the chosen, and to combat all doubts as temptations of the devil’ (loc. cit.). One therefore tried to live a life that presumably showed the

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members of one’s community that one was among the elect, threatened daily with the knowledge of impending doom: ‘before the inexorable alternat­ ive, chosen or damned’ (Weber 1930: 115). One thus worked hard at one’s calling - it is a well-known fact that the devil finds work for idle hands and devotion to this-worldly asceticism inevitably led to reinvestment of the accumulated fruits of one’s toils, something that in turn necessitated the need for long-term planning. When such behaviour became sufficiently widespread, the foundation was laid for the psychological propensities (An­ trieb) among the Calvinists, resulting in an ethic which ultimately gave rise to capitalism. No matter what others have already said about this highly contro­ versial thesis, I must again stress that I am not concerned with its validity but with the similarity between its underlying trend of logic to that found to be the case with the pilgrims in Sudan. Before pursuing these similarities any further, let us return to one important implication of the desire of people to emulate some of the earthly signs of those who are among the chosen. Let us, for example, consider the hypothet­ ical believer who might have submitted himself to God’s will and who, through his good deeds, has acquired much grace and the ‘best of names’ in the world, but who somehow is not among the chosen. Would such a person be damned? The answer of the Calvinists would most certainly have been in the affirmative. In Muslim beliefs, as understood by the pilgrims, it would be difficult to consider such a person as damned, although by virtue of their doctrine of predestination such a person ought to be. Malams say that such a person receives what might inappropriately be termed the benefit of the doubt, or God’s mercy. This is because when, after death, the Angels are carrying the soul of such a person to the gates of heaven and they pause to give a resumé of his life to those who inquire about him, they would have to repeat ‘all the good names’ the person has acquired. It would be inconsistent with the formula to add in such an instance that: ‘This person is, however, not among God’s chosen people.’ A prerequisite for entry into heaven is the sum total of good deeds a believer has acquired on earth and this is what the Angels extol on the way to heaven. With the pilgrims, the uncertainty principle in their belief system has the procrustean effect of creating a uniformity of behavioural patterns, reflective of those who are fulfilling God’s will, as exemplified by Insha’Allah. And it is as a member of the Umma, the Islamic community, that this striving for religiously sanctioned behaviour receives its ultimate manifestation, whereby a person can acquire ‘good names’. To acquire these names, the pilgrim must lead a Muslim life in a Muslim community. The Umma, therefore, is of utmost importance in the life of the pilgrim and the pilgrim villages are perceived as offering the best means of achieving such a life. Fakis play a key role in the peaceful formation of the Islamic community. Earlier, I posed the question whether in striving to reach Mecca (and not

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succeeding) the pilgrims were not to be regarded as acting contrary to God’s will? This is where the fakis come in. Their role, I would maintain, is akin to that of the prophets; they are indeed small-scale prophets. They contribute to the smooth running of the community of believers, where the most important and valued axioms lead to the acquisition of ‘the best of names’. Fakis are privileged with a gift of insight into the overall parameters of the predetermined divine design. They are, however, prophets whose predictions can only be true. They can discern and prescribe the kind of action that would fit into that pattern and proscribe the kind that will not. Their most important function is to help people discover and follow the course of action that is harmonious with the preordained order of things. Action that is contrary to the predetermined pattern can only lead to conflict within the community. But, more importantly, such action can exhaust the individual’s potential as a tool for the execution of God’s will, the ultimate ontological purpose for the true believer. Unlike the greater prophets of old, fakis are not concerned with getting people to mend their ways; they merely direct them to the right path, a path that is already there. They are the microscopic lens, as it were, for the enhancement of the eyes of the believer. Their predictions, on the one hand, ease the path for the believer as an individual thereby enriching his private existence. On the other hand, the same predic­ tions serve to minimise conflict and generate solidarity in the community, thereby also enriching the social life of the individual. By and large, this prophylactic role of fakis is the most important aspect of their activities in the social structures of the pilgrim-villages. The integrity and harmony of the religious community of pilgrims depend, therefore, on the individual’s ability to live a life that is in harmony with divine intent. Now, how does the prophylactic role of the fakis fit in with activities such as doubling one’s money or seeking to harm one person on another’s behalf? Are these to be considered as congruent with the predestined pattern? Are they not potentially conflict-creating, as in a case when A succeeded in having his money doubled by a faki while B’s money was not and he lost his investment? Neither informants who work as fakis nor those who do not are clear about this. Some claim that doubling money or performing acts that are intended to hurt other people are contrary to Islamic teachings. Others invoke the principle of the predetermined cosmic order to legitimate the role fakis play. Still others claim that activities such as the malevolent use of charms to hurt other people are to be regarded as peripheral to the activities of fakis, but potent outside the universe of Islamic grace; in other words, fakis would undertake to perform such rites when the intended victim is not a Muslim and thus outside the sway of the Islamic cosmic order. When one points out that by their own logic even such people must be subject to the logic of Insha'Allah, they would agree but point out further that charms are anyway successful because of God’s will. This brings me back to the question

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I raised in Chapter 4 on how fakis, who claimed an ability to double money, for example, could go on functioning without occasionally encountering a credibility crisis. The posing of this question, I pointed out, was predicated on my own scepticism as regards such a claim. Doubling money by magical means, I contend, is something that is impossible within a rational universe in which the laws of cause and effect prevail. However, it remains a fact that people within this social system believe in the efficacy of whatever magical formulae fakis apply to achieve feats such as doubling money and consequently these fakis are still referred to as powerful persons. To accept the claim that a credibility crisis does not arise simply because fakis are truly powerful would not explain how their power works. That secret must unfortunately still remain with the fakis themselves. The issue of how people within this society believe in the power of the fakis is, however, a sociological problem for which I shall attempt in the following section to offer an anthropological explanation. In order to understand how the fakis can retain impeccable reputations within their local communities, we have to look at the belief system of the pilgrims as a whole. We have already noted that fakis, like prophets, apply to the activities of their contemporaries knowledge that is believed to derive from God. Through them we can discover how God’s will should be fulfilled in this world. Fakis are thus generally believed to be vessels for the fulfilment of God’s will. When they are successful in an enterprise, it is regarded as being the case because God has already ‘written’ that the enterprise shall be so. It follows, too, that when fakis ‘fail’ they are similarly fulfilling God’s will and as divine instruments are exonerated from any personal responsibility. So while it was very usual to hear widespread tales of the success of fakis in the pilgrim-villages, there was never one instance - as we could well imagine - where one heard of someone with whom fakis had been unsuccessful, or who had quite simply been cheated. A person who has lost money to a faki would be more liable to believe that the efficacy of the faki's formula had failed to function in this particular instance because of something iniquitous in his own past. Understandably, such a person would be inclined to go through a contrite period of soul-searching, perhaps to come to terms with imagined past transgressions of his, than announce to the world that he has not succeeded in getting his money doubled. It is, therefore, the ontological basis of the ideas on the role of fakis that makes their activities possible and enables them to persist without encountering crises of credibility. The belief system of the pilgrims, it would seem, is sufficiently immunised against the possibility of a scepticism as to the power of fakis. The regular reliance of the pilgrims on the concept of Insha'Allah to explain their action or non­ action, as well as the quality and consequence of either, must be seen as a manifestation of the wider implications of their total world view.10

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GOING THERE AND GETTING THERE

My principal task in this chapter has been to try to show how one key concept constitutes the ontological basis for a distinct set of ideas that permeates the lives of the pilgrims. I have tried to show how Insha’Allah plays the pivotal role of a key concept in the expression of a system in which all things are perceived as subject to a rigid order of divine design, encompass­ ing human beings as well as the physical world. Insha’Allah both epitomises and alludes to this system, perceived as something laid down by a transcend­ ental God whose design should never be questioned (nor should one strive to understand it). The true pilgrim only submits himself to that design. For the pilgrims, what is predestined is written and what is written - not only in the Holy Quran but what is to be fulfilled by divine decree - is sacrosanct. Through years of devotion to the Holy Quran and God’s grace acquired therefrom, it is sometimes possible for the more powerful fakis and malams to discern and show the right path, in order that the pilgrims may live fulfilling lives as Muslims. The lives of the leaders are, therefore, examples to be followed. Insha’Allah also connotes conformity to the prevailing ethic; and successful conformity in this context entails the acquisition of ‘the best of names’. Furthermore, another way in which Insha’Allah resembles the Christian concept of predestination is that it denies the existence of a free will that allows us to take our lives into our own hands and, as it were, to arrange our lives in accordance with or in contrast to the will of God. We might further note that both concepts play a role similar to that sometimes attributed to symbols in social life. We generally accept the relation between symbols and our social lives, sometimes even treating symbols as if they had some intrinsic qualities that impelled cultural beings to act and we generally proceed to analyse the action we adduce as being ‘sparked off’ by such symbols. We do not appear, however, to have always considered it as necessary - indeed if at all - to give weight to any concepts, terms, propositions or quite simply ‘symbols’ that could conversely induce non-action (or, indeed, impede action). I suspect this is because we are predisposed to regard symbols as essentially conative; it is thus their catalytic properties that we use to define them. I think it is clear, however, that if we admit the logical likelihood of such a class of symbols, their analysis in any society we study ought to be as important as those we postulate as catalytic to action. One good reason for this is that, ultimately, we could with good reason see the levels of social action (the main transformer of man’s sociocultural and physical environment) as relevant to our understanding of some of the variations in the levels of material achievement in the social formations we study. From Weber’s thesis, for example, we have seen that collective action ensuing from the protestant doctrine of predestination achieved a

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positive outcome - however unforeseen and unintended - because of a loophole in the system that allowed the emulation of socially prescribed normative behaviour. It was, as Weber argued, a paradoxical outcome of this belief. Now, a similar trend of logic can be seen to be involved in Insha'Allah. However, its outcome, as I have tried to show, is anything but positive if one relates it to the professed aims of its adherents. Insha'Allah recurs as a fundamental concept in the vocabularies of action of the pilgrims who, as I reiterate, always cite it as an appendage to explana­ tions of the mechanical kind. Let us again draw attention to the fact that West African pilgrims use the concept retrospectively as well as prospectively. Their failure as well as success in any enterprise is explained in terms of this same concept. The non-undertaking of any enterprise, too, is seen as a manifestation of the same concept. Despite this, I will maintain that, though a causal term, Insha'Allah is, as in this instance, able to invoke a complex of attitudes towards the pursuit of cultural action, the results of which are the reverse of what normally result from catalytic symbols. In this sense, it might be said to be superbly sterile; it can provide a conceptual legitimation for failure in any state a person might be. And yet the rigidity of the world­ view the concept invokes is such that a person might deem it unnecessary to do anything about his prevailing circumstances, beyond the pursuit of rudi­ mentary action of the kind that any human organism must carry out in order to survive. Mandelbaum (1966) proposes a model to explain why religious people seem to function without difficulty in what amounts to contradictory spheres of belief and action. For example, how is it possible for religious people to believe in the unbending pattern of divine design and yet attempt through individual effort to change things in this life? Mandelbaum (ibid.) uses the terms the ‘transcendental’ and the ‘pragmatic complexes’ to describe comple­ mentary spheres of appropriate action in everyday life for the religious. The following seems a clear summary of his views: The transcendental complex is used to ensure the long-term welfare of society, to explain and help maintain village institutions, to guarantee the proper transition of individuals from stage to stage within the institutions. It is concerned with the ultimate purposes ofman. The pragmatic complex, by contrast, is used for local exigencies, for personal benefit, for individual welfare. While acts of the transcendental complex are directed toward such concerns as the proper fate of the soul after death and the proper maintenance of the social order, the pragmatic looks to the curing of a sick child, the location of a valuable victory in a local tussle. (Mandelbaum 1966: 1175, my emphasis)

Similar dual spheres of action are found in most religions. Even the admonition of Christ’s that we render unto Caesar what is Caesar’s and unto God what

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is God’s clearly reflects dualism of a similar kind, entailing the desirability of acting in a manner appropriate to either domain. However, to apply such a dualism to the religious belief of the West African Muslims in the Sudan would be both misleading and misplaced. As I have already pointed out, for the pilgrims the kind of action that would fall under ‘the pragmatic’ in the above scheme is to be subsumed under ‘the transcendental’. Any action in the pragmatic complex can only be conceived and performed in terms of its appropriateness to the transcendental complex. A dual conception here is thus not very satisfactory. No action in the lower domain should conceptually contradict the precepts of the higher domain. The necessities of circumstance and the constraints of context may occasionally impel action in a manner that is adverse to local norms and we have encountered several instances of that in the previous chapters of this book; but so long as perpetrators of such action see it as serving to fulfil the precepts of their religion, to get them ‘nearer to Mecca’, as the pilgrims would express it, that action is always right, irrespective of its local and contemporary definition. A pilgrim might and does, for example, bargain skilfully to sell a produce to make a profit and although the produce is defective and does not meet the qualities he extols of it, he would not see this as cheating. Let us pursue a little further the reason why a dualism of the sort outlined above would not be useful here. In daily life people must always pursue a certain degree of action to achieve desired ends, no matter what belief­ system they profess and in what social system they find themselves. Humans beings, therefore, generally pursue the mundane activities of fending for themselves and their dependents, caring for the sick, struggling for some locally appropriate values, etc. Such activities must be accepted as given. If we do not feed ourselves, however rigid our beliefs in the preordained order of things, we will die as a consequence, which in the eyes of the religious believers would be tantamount to taking our own lives. A certain level of action by humans in this world to achieve given ends is to be regarded as intrinsic to the very ontology of being. The separation of transcendental and pragmatic spheres is, therefore, in a sense redundant and unnecessary. But the kind of action that transforms our environment and achieves (emically) positive results is action that comes after the basic rudimentary action of the type we label as ‘pragmatic’. It is, if we might so term it, action of the second degree. This is a kind of action-input that is derived from and inspired, to a large extent, by belief. It is here that a given ontology might conceivably inhibit or impel action, thereby causing or subverting the attain­ ment of a desired goal. Insha’Allah and the ontology it represents belongs to this level. It inhibits, as it were, that propulsion or extra force of action that could impel the achievement of their professed aims. Let me pursue this argument with still one further example. During my fieldwork, the authorities in Egypt decided to declare an ‘anti-Malesh Week’.

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Malesh, it was reported, was an expression that pervaded all the avenues of life in Egypt. It was defined as standing for ‘it does not matter’; ‘I am sorry it has to be so’; etc.11 The Egyptian government had come to regard this concept as being the ‘cause of general lethargy’: it was used to explain whatever one did or did not do and was, therefore, regarded as inhibiting development. Among the examples given of the various usages of the concept was the following: that a person’s telephone is out of order, he reports it to the authorities in charge and they promise to come and repair it but do not. This person then calls on the relevant authorities to complain. They say ‘Malesh', promise again to take action immediately, but do not arrive for at least three weeks. One might be tempted to regard this concept, too, as mere cant. But for the owner of the telephone that is out of order, the invoking of Malesh to stop him from venting his anger and frustration at not getting his telephone repaired within a reasonable length of time, this concept has a distressing pervasiveness and a reality that is extra-linguistic. Such, apparently, was also the view of the government; hence the decision to counter the ethic of this concept with ‘the anti-Malesh week’. Malesh, then, is a concept similar to Insha'Allah. If its detrimental effects could concern governments, then the effects of an all-pervasive concept such as Insha'Allah, which provides the bases for an ontological system for the pilgrims, must interest the anthropologist. The inability of the pilgrims to achieve their ultimate goal can thus be explained in their own terms: as caused by the hierarchy of reasons from the mechanical to the metaphysical. However, although they sometimes seek to explain why they have not yet reached Mecca, more important for us here is the idea of the perpetuation of pilgrimage. As long as they are on the pilgrimage, they are in an extended state of grace and retain the ‘best of names’ for fulfilling God’s will. God’s will, as we have seen, though conceived as non-revocable, can be known through the divinations of fakis. This fore-knowledge is the essence of their ontology. To quote Malam Abubakar (in Chapter 2) again. ‘Death is for all. What one should be frightened of in this world are the prob­ lems of this world.’ This might be interpreted as meaning that we do not fear death because of its pressing finality. Death for them as ‘pilgrims on their way to Mecca’ also leads to an assured place in heaven. It is the problems of this world, however, that are uncertain and that is why the fakis have such a vital role to perform among the pilgrims. Admittedly, what they term ‘the problems of this world’, such as illness or dire poverty, sometimes turn out to be an immediate prelude to our demise; stages preceding the certainty of death. The pilgrims accept this fact, but regard the vicissitudes and the uncertainties that precede the certainty and finality of death as that which is disconcerting (see Yamba 1992). Certainty ceases to be contingent through the mediation of the fakis. And once that occurs, they know what awaits them and can meekly accept the will of God.

7 THE PILGRIMAGE AS A PARADIGM FOR LIFE

THE MASTER OF THE CARAVAN:

But who are ye in rags and rotten shoes, You dirt-bearded, blocking the way? ishak: We are the Pilgrims, Master; we shall go Always a little further;. . .

We travel not for trafficking alone; By hotter Winds our fiery hearts are fanned: For lust of knowing what should not be known, We take the Golden Road to Samarkand.1

The story told here began with a specific kind of migration connected with religious belief. The conjuncture of a set of factors, some of which we have already dealt with, sparked off the movements: the spread of Islam in Northern Nigeria, widespread beliefs in an imminent End-of-Time and colonial rule. Certain conditions sustained them up to a certain level: improved communications, rising economic opportunities in the Sudan, the gradual establishment of West African villages along the route and the likelihood of finding emotional and practical support of friends and relatives in these. The movements then went on until the process had acquired sufficient momentum to sustain itself. Once in their adopted country, these migrants found that new, harsh conditions there made the realisation of their singular objective of reaching Mecca unattainable. They were faced, as it were, with the choice either of giving up their ideology or making it fit the new socioeconomic and cultural context. They appear to have chosen rather to retain their ideology and to recreate their context by making it fit that ideology. In the ontology of the West African pilgrims, there are two major ways in which a believer can achieve transcendental value. The first is through pilgrimage that entails a visit to the home of the Prophet. The second is through jihad, in which

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unbelievers are vanquished or forced into the fold. These twin values, as it were, both cancel one another out and compete with one another. In times of peace it is the pilgrimage that is in the ascendant; all believers strive for it at least once in their lifetime. The road to Mecca, then, is the way for Muslims to achieve that value. However, were all or even most Muslims to leave for Mecca, the social and political organisations which uphold those values that are constitutive of Islam would cease to exist, so, occasionally, jihad emerges or is even invoked. During jihad the road to Mecca is, of necessity, closed both in reality and symbolically. The necessity of retaining people to combat the unbelievers then supersedes the obligation to visit the home of the Prophet. Muslims are even forcefully prevented from making their way to Mecca. These beliefs appear, therefore, to have a logic of their own and are thus able to reproduce and perpetuate themselves. During the Mahdist period in the Sudan (1881-98) many pilgrims were prevented from continuing to Mecca. Instead they were made to fight in the jihad against the British. This resulted in many pilgrims settling in or around Omdurman near Khar­ toum and thereby contributing to the traditional movement of immigrants from the West. In this whole process pilgrimage, though already important to the West African migrants to Sudan, now acquired a new role in their lives, serving, above all, to define them as a distinct group in their adopted country. Pilgrimage provided the total context for daily life; it became the ruling metaphor of life, so to speak, generating social action within a process in which the striving for the pilgrimage to Mecca was constantly renewed. All this is well and proper. The oddity is the non-achievement of the pilgrimage as normally conceived; a situation that enables me to speak of a non-fit between thought and motive, on the one hand, and action, on the other. We shall pursue this oddity a little further. For the moment, however, let us see how what I have called the total context of pilgrimage among the West Africans acquires legitimacy in present social action. One important prerequisite for a process such as the one described here - in which a context is redefined and an ideology retained - to persist, is that its perpetrators be acutely aware of and believe in a distinct historical heritage. Their conception of this history need not necessarily be only in its factual form; indeed, it must necessarily exist as a mythical heritage that has the function of legitimating present action. It is through an awareness of this kind that the past of a people is finked to their present, thereby making their present action meaningful. To emphasise the vitality of this heritage among the pilgrims and to contextualise their history, I presented brief life-histories of two pilgrims - grandparents with numerous descendants - arguing that their experiences are generally representative of the pilgrims in the Sudan. Of necessity their history as they constructed it was factually different from the written history of

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Northern Nigeria. But the primacy of and belief in a unique historical heritage of West Africans is not merely an etic construct, derived from the anthropologist; it is something brought home nightly in the pilgrims’ villages, whenever scores of youngsters sit round hurricane lanterns to listen to tales of the past deeds of their ancestors; tales all tailored to emphasise the pre­ eminence of the pilgrimage in West African Muslim life, their ultimate reason for being in Sudan. My efforts at showing how the grasp of a people’s unique past enhances an understanding of their present action led me to attempt to resort to an idea of history which, as I think, might be fruitfully applied to an anthropolo­ gical investigation. The perspective, as I have pointed out, is derived from two tenets of Collingwood’s: namely, his view of history as, on the one hand, the study of past thought that underpins particular actions encapsul­ ated in present thinking; and, on the other, his contention that such history is derived from the ability of the historian to enter into the ‘mode of ex­ perience’ of the epochs involved. Now this might seem a curious choice of paradigm for a view of history such as mine, that claims to be dissatisfied with histories of West African migration to Sudan that are merely assem­ blages of antecedent facts. Is not my own historical exegesis just one more facet of the kind of traditional historical programmes; the kind that, for example, proponents of the Annales school of history deride? (see Furet 1983). And would not their own style of history have been more suitable for my interest in accounting for how the structures of a particular thought system have reproduced a particular type of behaviour in another context? It may well be so. Although I found myself dissatisfied with traditional accounts of these migrations, my own ambition at grappling with the his­ tory of these people was a modest one. What suited my purpose was, in Furet’s terms (ibid: 404), not ‘history as interpretation’ but ‘history as a reconstruction’ in order to account for a (postulated) reproduction and trans­ formation of past structures in the present lives of the pilgrims. Colling­ wood’s idea of history, although it certainly belongs to the brand that is susceptible to Annales onslaught (Furet ibid), is fully adequate for my purpose. However, while I find Collingwood’s views on this subject congenial, I have some reservations regarding his second tenet: that is, the issue of whose experience the subject matter of history is made of. MacIver (1954: 187) anticipates my reservations when he writes as follows on Collingwood’s ‘mode of experience’: The ultimate stuff of history is the countless individual doings of indi­ vidual human beings through the ages, . . . Collingwood calls the history of (let us say) the Peloponnesian War a ‘mode of experience’, meaning by this his own experience in his twentieth-century Oxford or Cambridge

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college room, forgetting that what made the history was experience all right, but the experience of thousands of poor devils two dozen centuries ago. (MacIver 1954: 187) Although the point MacIver makes is pertinent, his choice of example cannot be regarded as a very appropriate one. With so remote an occurrence as the Peloponnesian War, it might be true that the poor devils involved in that process made that history possible in the first place, but it is mainly through the ‘mode of experience’ of particular historians that we now, in our own times, have access to this history. The fact that history becomes available to us through the mediation of historians cannot be denied. What is questionable is whether such mediated accounts alone are complete as histories of particular epochs; so complete as to discount the experiences of those who, at any given instance, were themselves involved in creating a given history. My contention is that if history can be derived from the modes of experience of historians, through their re-enactment of past thought, then it is valid to appeal to and, where possible, tap the experiences of those who were themselves a part of any history in recent times. Such reasoning leads me to regard the history of the migrations of West African Muslims to Sudan as comprising what is to be derived from the ‘mode of experience’, not only of historians, anthropologists and other writers on West African themes (by virtue of their introspective ability and their ability to decode written sources), but, to my mind, the experiences of the very people whose behaviour furnished that history (by virtue of their retrospective scrutiny of the events they ‘caused’). The history of the movement of these pilgrims towards Mecca as dealt with here does not adequately address, nor does it for that matter explain, the socioeconomic origins of their migration. The main reason for this is that explanations of the economic circumstances that might have caused these migrations is outside the scope of this book. A further reason, as I have made clear, is that the pilgrims tend to underemphasise the importance of any such factors, not only with regard to their initial migration but also in their daily lives. Obviously the beliefs that impelled these people to act as they did and gave meaning to that action did not arise out of a vacuum. The shape and direction of that ideology, the beliefs that comprised it and the action that emerged from the efforts of various individuals to achieve the aims it dictated were themselves influenced by external factors in the socioeconomic environ­ ment. Nonetheless, we can thus validly ask: what role did economic factors play in their migration? And we can examine this question, bearing in mind the two qualifications above. When we pose such a question to recent West African immigrants in Sudan, we will promptly find them asserting that they did not come to Sudan for

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economic reasons. They will say that if economic motives had carried any weight in their decision, they would have been less likely to have left oil­ rich Nigeria for Sudan. They would even claim that they had left their homes without knowing that there were any opportunities for finding work in the Gezira, imputing the diverse income opportunities they found in the Gezira to God’s will. Both claims would be true but only partially so. Although one would think that returning pilgrims, few though they are, would be likely to spread information about the economic niches that are available en route, it is my impression that most pilgrims appear not to have known in any detail that there were possibilities for earning a livelihood in Sudan. Nevertheless, some of them, no doubt, were aware that such opportun­ ities existed. We know, for instance, that one of the factors that Hajiya had to take into account before leaving home was that her husband was somewhere in the east. Similarly, Malam Abubakar knew he had a sister in the east. We can never tell how much such knowledge helped tilt their decision on the side of ‘going on the pilgrimage’. Most probably, however, the knowledge that they were not wandering into unknown places, inhabited only by com­ plete strangers, must have made them feel some degree of security in their undertaking. While we cannot assign a precise value to such security as a ‘pull’ mechanism in migrations, it is, nonetheless, likely to enhance rather than hinder the undertaking of a journey. As regards Nigeria being richer than Sudan, it is probably the case that its oil wealth may not necessarily have made a difference to recent pilgrims or been within their reach. But it is perhaps possible that the knowledge that one is living in a ‘wealthy’ country would make one unlikely to move to another, believed to be less wealthy, unless one were prompted by something deemed to be more important than mere wealth. Although these pilgrims discount economic concerns as a factor in their migration, it has been necessary to examine whether such factors may be said objectively to affect their lives. Yet, despite this attempt, it seems to me that there is no satisfactory way we can approach this issue without recourse to the explanations of the pilgrims themselves. I submit this is something that we cannot validly do beyond the strategy attempted here, unless we choose to present their whole effort as a form of false consciousness or a delusion. We have already seen how - even though aware of the need for making pragmatic choices in daily life - the pilgrims still view all their efforts as ultimately shaped by God’s will. We know that economic considerations, such as the availability of sharecropping opportunities, play a role in the pilgrims’ choice of one village rather than another. However, they would assert that it is the charismatic attraction of religious Sheikhs that is the main criterion for such a choice, and see no necessary difference between

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the abundance of sharecropping opportunities in a given village and the forceful personality of its virtuous Sheikh. In their conception, the rewards of secular life are indicative of, and result from, the grace of West African village Sheikhs. When looking for a village in which to reside, apart from taking ties of kinship into account, a pilgrim first looks for one with a charismatic leader, particularly a Sheikh newly acclaimed. The rewards of a prudent choice, in effect one of its bonuses, is a good livelihood and the strengthening of one’s spiritual resolve. Considerations such as these lead me to maintain that the outcome of any efforts to explain the perpetuity of pilgrimage must be examined in terms of whether or not the explanations are consistent with the logic of the belief­ system of the pilgrims as a whole, rather than in terms of whether they are right or wrong. Therefore, although it has been necessary to consider whether economic incentives or any such motives underlay the migration of the pilgrims, I suggest that it would be reasonable to subsume these - as they themselves would do - under the compulsion of religion. The next question for us to consider pertains to whether or not these pilgrims are victims of mystification. Is their pilgrimage based on a false consciousness, a delusion invented to smooth the rough realities of life? Those who agree with Marx’s famous pronouncement on religion as the opiate of the people would do so on two grounds. First, as Marx must have supposed, that it is pacifying and thus inimical to positive action in life. And second, that it helps maintain the status quo, i.e. the prevailing hege­ mony. It is my hope that this study has shown the first not to be the case and that the latter claim can only be valid if it could be held that the pilgrims are the victims of mystification. From the evidence of this study we can conclude that far from being an opiate, religion can become propulsive to human action. It is one of the things which is able to fire the passions of those who believe in it. What is problematical is the issue of the ends towards which the action called forth by religion is employed and in what direction it is steered. We may feel inclined to regard the outcome of a certain type of religious commitment as positive or negative, depending on what yardstick we employ. We would, however, be treading on shifting ground here because, obviously, to those who are under the influence of a particular religion, its force can only be positive. That we may sometimes consider a given set of religious beliefs and practices as having an inhibiting effect on the action of a particular group of people, at some given point in their history, must partly be due to differences between emic and etic evaluations and partly to an unintended consequence rather than the outcome of religion as such. The force of religious belief and the central role it can play in human life cannot be disputed. This is a fact that has always been apparent to the leaders of organised religion - as represented historically through churches

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- and by those social classes who have a vested interest in preserving its sway over the multitudes. It is also a fact that has also become increasingly obvious to anthropologists. We therefore find Geertz, a self-professed non­ believer (1968: 99), perhaps with a licence of transcendence of the kind that makes, say, world-renouncers legitimate commentators on the world, remind­ ing us of the ‘all-pervasive’ force of religious symbols. In some of his earlier pronouncements, Geertz saw religious belief as providing the framework for action in this world (see Geertz 1968: 1973). Other anthropologists have increasingly drawn attention to the power of religious belief in the contempor­ ary world (Cohen 1969; Kapferer 1988). Indeed, we are now being reminded that the resurgent force of nationalist ideologies in the world today derive primarily from their religiosification, which raises such ideologies, as it were, on to a higher plane and presents them as symbolising a higher purpose (Kapferer 1988). But whether or not religion contributes to the hegemony of a particular group is a much larger question; it is also another matter altogether and beyond the scope of this study. In this context, however, we might ask: is the whole self-perpetuating circumstance in which the pilgrims find themselves partly the result of their being mystified by their own leaders and by their Sudanese hosts - or by any others who might have a vested interest in the retention of the ideology of pilgrimage? Let us now examine this question. As we have seen, the West African villages in Sudan cluster around one principal idea, the pilgrimage to Mecca, which is both maintained and generated by the leaders of these communities. The role of the leaders is central here. Although there was no evidence of exploitation of the ordinary inhabitants by the leaders in the villages where I did fieldwork, other writers (see Birk 1978, for example) report instances where corrupt leaders go to questionable lengths to cheat their own people. In contrast to such cases, my own data show the leaders of the West African villages in the Gezira as being epitomes of virtue itself. Exemplary Sheikhs, who are also believed to have a great deal of baraka, are usually a common topic of conversation and, as we have seen, attract the influx of pilgrims to their villages. As these leaders usually have some secular business in addition to their spiritual activities, it would be reasonable to assume that they have a vested interest in keeping the pilgrimage as the defining principle for lives of West African Muslims in Sudan. However, lest we be tempted to see the recurrent pilgrimages of these leaders as evidence of an ulterior motive, a mystifying activity, for instance, let us take a closer look at the leaders themselves. When we do, we find that they too have a price to pay for their hegemony. That they go again and again on the pilgrimage is evidence of an effort to legitimate and retain leadership through the constant acquisition and renewal of baraka. Thus, the same recurrent pilgrimages of the leaders also constitute a necessary

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regeneration of pilgrimage as the defining symbol of West African identity in Sudan. The vicariousness that characterises the general conception of pilgrimage by the ordinary West African immigrants in Sudan receives its ‘reality’ from its contrast to real pilgrimages as enacted in this world. However, it is through the attainment of pilgrimage by a few and the potential achieve­ ment of pilgrimage by many that the loftiness of ‘pilgrimage’ is maintained. We might with good reason argue that these leaders acquire grace on behalf of the pilgrims as a whole. It would, therefore, be a simplification to divide the West Africans in the Sudan into two categories, the mystifiers and the mystified, not least because the landlords, malams and fakis themselves share the same ontological logic. If the lower classes are victims of that logic, so are the leaders. Like the Kola Man we met in Chapter 4, these leaders may display their Sudanese and Nigerian passports to visitors with pride. They may distribute expensive kola nuts to callers, feed dozens who visit them daily or strive hard to acquire money to go on their yearly pilgrimages and yet still reside under the same deprived and limiting conditions. This certainly is too high a price to pay for being able to ‘mystify’ others. Even if it could be held that these leaders derive some satisfaction from the achievement of ‘lofty’ positions among the pilgrims, we still have to see such rewards as reasonably incommen­ surable with the costs. The heights they strive for and sometimes attain have non-secular aspects, which is why they are regarded as worthwhile to pursue. We need, therefore, to view all their efforts in transcendental terms, just as they themselves do, in order not to impose our own criteria on what is commensurable in costs in their value system. It is only in terms of transcend­ ence that we can understand, for example, why pilgrims can consider their deprived villages as rustic centres for good living that are holier and better than towns, or consider the arrival of a new Sheikh as a symbolic progression to Mecca. Similarly, we must see the non-secular aspects of the daily attempts by pilgrim-leaders to retain secular ‘loftiness’ - if one could rightly regard it as such - as similarly entailing costs. The poor pilgrims, in a sense, transcend their surroundings, just as the leaders strive, through secular transactions, to attain value that also transcends its material substance. The values both categories strive for are equivalent. Failure to see religious belief in transcend­ ental terms leads inevitably to a sociologistic propensity that regards other peoples’ beliefs as forms of false consciousness. It seems to me that it is on similar grounds that Bloch regards the idea of mystification, conceived with a mystifying agent, as implausible. As Bloch (1986: 7-8 and 177) has argued, this would imply a particular group inventing cunning ritual devices to mystify and dominate others. This, he argues, would presuppose the unlikely scenario of power-holders having come together somewhere along the line to invent these subtle forms of domination.

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Bloch therefore concludes - just as I have found it expedient to do - that quite often the parties to relationships that are described as ‘mystifying’ are themselves usually quite mystified by the same phenomenon. Bloch further suggests that to regard ‘ideology as a falsehood fails to explain the compulsive power of the ideas it contains’ (ibid: 177).2 But, as social phenomena, mystification and false consciousness can exist without a mystifying agent or agents. Given this, we need, as Parkin (1978) suggests, to go beyond merely postulating the prevalence of such phenomena in any society to finding out what functions they serve. Unlike Bloch, therefore, Parkin does not reject the idea of mystification. He would, however, regard it, in effect, as an unintended consequence of social relationships (cf. Parkin 1972: 98); of necessity an etic construct that need not coincide with emic views of the same relations. Such a conception would fit the issue raised in Chapter 3 regarding credit-ties between the pilgrims and local Sudanese share-contract partners. In the case of ‘warm debts’, I argued that one of their objective effects was to prevent the pilgrims from moving towards Mecca. It must be repeated that the pilgrims themselves do not see such relationships as being in any way exploitative. For instance, they refuse to see the sense of converting farm produce used to pay a cash debt into its current market (cash) value. They would, however, accept the fact that debt relationships partly keep them from moving on. It is clear that the type of transactions taking place here are possible because they are conceived of in religious terms, which enables their perpet­ rators to refuse to consider them as being in any way questionable. A related issue to consider, therefore, is whether we can apply ethical terms to mystification: that is, relate it to a normative scale of sorts as, for example, a phenomenon that we can regard as good, less good, or bad, something that has a detrimental effect on those who are under its thumb, so to speak. My contention is that we can validly do so only if we regard mystification as a paradoxical (therefore unintended) consequence of social action. It is, therefore, necessary to limit mystification to the particular social context in which it occurs. Since one major effect of mystification here is to prevent pilgrims, through the transaction of ‘warm debts’, from moving on to Mecca, we can hold that mystification is inimical to the achievement of normally conceived pilgrimage. However, this is not enough. Parkin (1978: ix) shows how, for displaced ethnic groups, mystification can both serve to mask cleavages arising from their displacement, as well as shape the manner of response with which members of such groups face that displacement. This is an important point: it urges us to go beyond any facile objections we might make of this phenomenon and to come to grips with whatever functions might underlie the postulate itself. Among the pilgrims, for example, one can discern a set of underlying func­ tions at work. What could be regarded as mystifying relationships at once serve

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to undercommunicate cleavages between the pilgrims and the leaders of their communities. It also enables the pilgrims, through these self-same leaders, to counter their subordinate position in Sudanese society by citing the attributes of those leaders as counter-examples to Sudanese hegemony. One almost gets the impression that the hierarchical structure of relationships with their own leaders is unquestionably positive and welcome. Consequently, it is not uncommon to hear pilgrims extol the magnificence of a leader’s entourage as he strolls to the main mosque for the Friday noon prayers, in contrast to the local Sudanese Sheikhs who go individually; or to hear them boast of the ‘hidden’ wealth of West African Sheikhs, which by far surpasses that of the wealthiest Sudanese in the locality. Again, one sometimes hears them praising someone in another town, reputed to be extremely rich who, they claim, is really of West African descent. In doing so, they would be trying to convey the impression that even the West African pilgrims, with all the unflattering stereotype notions held about them by their hosts, can still live in style. And yet, in almost the same breath, they will denounce such persons for having given up their pilgrim-intent and posing as Sudanese.3 In order to further understand the wider role and significance of mystifica­ tion in this context, let us dwell on it for a moment longer. In what seems to me to be the only valid sense in which the concept of mystification can apply, it is no more than an etic abstraction from the facts on the ground. Whether the parties involved in a relationship that is in effect asymmetrical share the same ideological universe or not, does not invalidate the fact that the observing analyst can show that objectively one of the parties gains some value at the expense of the other(s). Though this is a valid point, the difficulty remains that in positing a negative consequence for a social relation­ ship that is not so perceived at the emic level, the anthropologist risks the charge of being ethnocentric. This is one further pressing reason why we need to go beyond descriptions of relationships we term mystifying and behaviour we regard as evidence of a false consciousness, to find out what logic enables these phenomena to obtain, with meanings and consequences different from those discerned by the anthropologist (cf. Parkin 1978: ix). The occasional discrepancies between emically conceived consequences and the anthropologist’s own perceptions of these, further show that it is pre­ eminently necessary to pursue an analysis of the total universe from which these discordant notions emerge. We have to realise that every partial treat­ ment of our object of study falls short of the total context which gives sense to it. Such an approach is particularly important here because in religious belief, as Geertz, for instance, has pointed out, motive, meaning and action are fused. The social action therefore that we use as the unit for observation (which we then relate to the motives and intentions, as an index of what are the aimed objectives of others) cannot fall short of anything but itself, which would be absurd.

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Even though I have found it necessary to apply pragmatic and transcend­ ental terms of reference to my analysis, I realise the absurdity of the approach. I have sought to counter this by also addressing the problem of how the actions of the pilgrims come to be generated as pragmatic or transcendental. This was done by viewing the belief system of the pilgrims as constituting an ontology (Kapferer 1988) that generates a world view around which they organise their lives. Barth has pointed out that: 'It is insufficient to delimit the object of anthropological study to study of [the] ideas, collective representations, or cultural forms: we need to locate them in a system wider than that which the cultural itself encompasses’ (Barth 1987: 87). Barth would do so by urging anthropologists to ‘get [their] ontology right’ (ibid: 18) so as not to misrepresent their objects of study. However, the ‘objects’ anthropologists study have, presumably, ontologies of their own, in which they are able to represent the world to each other and with which they exchange ideas and theories of their own distinction as beings in this world. It is, therefore, necessary, to relate our ontology to theirs and, particularly where metaphysical issues are concerned, to subordinate our ontologies to those of the Other, the objects of study. It is only when we aim for such a wider compass, that is, the kind that proceeds with an examination of ontologies - not only the anthropologists’ but also those of the people we study - can we hope to do justice to such issues. The reproduction of pilgrimage in the lives of West Africans in Sudan is achieved through a series of daily micro-dramas and rituals, in which the centrality of this value is symbolically re-enacted. These recur in the harvest rituals, in the Quranic schools, in everyday life where pilgrims attempt to legitimate and differentiate themselves from other categories of immigrants, in the admonitions of the village leaders and landlords and, above all, in the prophecies of the fakis who through their insight into what is in accordance with divine will, pave the way for an adherence to that will. Once in the Sudan, the pilgrims indiscriminately carry out all kinds of activities to enable them to proceed to Mecca, but paradoxically it is the very religiosification of some of these activities - through ‘warm debts’ for example - that mars their journey. Where they are able to save enough money for the journey, they find that pragmatic constraints - lack of passports and fear of losing one’s established place in the village-sharecropping system prevent them from leaving. Rather than accept the force of such adversity, they translate the adversity of pragmatic constraints into religious terms so that it is God’s will that again rules supreme. In trying to present Insha'Allah as one of the ultimate reasons why the pilgrims have not yet reached Mecca, I have treated it as a key concept that influences the action of the pilgrims. This might perhaps have conveyed the impression that all the West Africans in Sudan adhere to the force of the

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concept or follow the logic of the beliefs presented here. This is not quite the case. There are always bound to be a number of interpretations within any one conceptual universe and, therefore, there are bound to be those who do not accept the common interpretation of these doctrines. For example, the dissenters, whom we introduced briefly in Chapter 5, do not believe in the cognitive map(s) Insha’Allah conjures. Such dissenters would only use Insha’Allah prospectively, in accordance with ordinary Sudanese usage. The same may apply to those who have succeeded in hiding their West African background. But it is worth noting that the strength of these beliefs is acknowledged through the very vehemence with which these same dissenters deny adherence to the doctrines or to the West African origins. The West African dissenters of pilgrimage in Sudan spend their entire lives disguising their background and spend a lot of effort actively mocking religion. From my observations and through my interaction with some of this category of West Africans, I must conclude that they appear to be perpetually engaged in defining and redefining their everyday life by acting in opposition to the pilgrimage as a paradigm for life. Thus, implicitly through their activities, they affirm the force of the very ideas they reject. These dissenters of pilgrimage, therefore, unwittingly contribute to its retention as a potent force around which most West African Muslims in Sudan organise their lives. It is necessary to reiterate the point that the fakis play such a vital role in the reproduction of the whole system because they alone can ascertain the uncertainties of life. As I have already argued, one of the certainties the pilgrims have to contend with is the fact that they are on the pilgrimage. This fact, however, entails a fundamental ambiguity: were that certainty to be achieved, the whole enterprise would have to start again and a new period of uncertainty begin. (We have seen that those who have successfully completed the journey to Mecca invariably return again and again.) The non-achievement of pilgrimage might also be seen as deriving from the effort of these pilgrims to turn the immanence of Mecca into a transcendental spot, an uncontaminated holy spot. Tales of West African pilgrims and other illegal immigrants being arrested or even shot in Mecca are often heard among the pilgrims. It is my contention that, with these Muslims, such factors contribute to making the holiest centre of Islam a centre that is not ‘out there’, but an ideal and unreachable one that is within themselves (Yamba 1992). That, too, is why they live it rather than reach it. It must be emphasised that one important reason why West African Islam in Sudan has received such a distinctive characteristic is the virtual isolation of the pilgrim communities. There is very little Islamic ecumenicalism be­ tween the pilgrims and their hosts, beyond the occasional visit of pilgrims to Sudanese mosques for the main Friday prayers in the towns. West African malams rarely, if ever, discuss the Quran with their Sudanese counterparts.

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The wider Islamic context, therefore, does not very much affect the lives of the pilgrims. One factor that might have some relevance for their beliefs and their lives in future is the divide between indigenous fundamentalists and those regarded as lax Muslims. The pilgrims would cast their lot with the fundamentalists, believing them to be true believers, notwithstanding the fact that the latter are not great adherents of pilgrimage. One cannot help noting, however, that the recent resurgence of fundamentalism in Sudan has added an uncertain factor to the continued course of the beliefs outlined in this study. Yet, as long as the pilgrims live in virtual isolation from the hosts, the logic of the beliefs outlined here are most likely to prevail. Albert Camus (1959), in an interesting essay on Sisyphus and his fate, speculates on what must go on in the mind of this hapless hero. Sisyphus for his iniquities, has been condemned by the gods to an absurd punishment in hell. His task is to roll a large stone to the top of a hill. When the stone reaches the top, it rolls down to the foot of the hill, so that he has to start all over again. His punishment is thus eternal. Camus is interested in what must go on in Sisyphus’ mind while he pursues his task. He imagines Sisyphus making his way again and again from the top to the foot of the hill, perhaps pausing for a while before beginning his task again. And yet Camus declares that ‘we must imagine Sisyphus happy’ (ibid: 91). Camus the existentialist must have had his own reasons for arriving at such a startling conclusion. There is, however, something in his conclusion which I must borrow that parallels the case of the pilgrims. From the perspective of the pilgrims Sisyphus would, indeed, be considered happy because of the ‘finiteness’ of his task. He knows exactly what is in store for him; and he knows what he has to do. There are no uncertainties he has to fear. It is a clarity and finiteness of a similar kind that the pilgrims seek and the fakis approximate the fulfilment of this function by showing them the way. If the pilgrims, too, could achieve the sort of certainty and fore­ knowledge that is Sisyphus’ lot, regardless of the magnitude of his task, they too would be ‘happy’. It is in striving towards certainty of a similar kind, a certainty that is also to be seen as the manifestation of God’s will, that they must ‘go always a little further’. That, at least, provides them with the one certain fact on which to construct a perspective and, hence, a philosophy of life.

Appendix I IN THE FIELD

PREAMBLE

Anthropology, defined as a study of ‘other’ cultures, with fieldwork as its most distinctive methodology, raises some logical snags that preoccupy an African anthropologist such as myself. I have already recounted my field experiences in detail elsewhere (see Yamba 1985). Here, I shall deal with a few themes relevant to my fieldwork in Sudan that have some bearing on the manner in which the data for this study were collected. Anthropologists are said to study the ‘Other’, meaning by this that com­ monly, the objects of anthropological inquiry are defined in terms of their difference from ‘Us’, which is why we deem the ‘Other’ interesting enough to study. Embedded here is the idea that while on some fundamental level the social form(s) that comprise the ‘Other’ are similar to us, on another level - and due to the intrusion of some unknown factors, which are themselves further interesting objects of inquiry - those who comprise the ‘Other’ are, or have become, different from us. The crux of the matter, however, is that were the ‘Other’ we study to be too different from us, we should not be able to successfully arrive at any understandings of it. This is what the ‘Man from Mars paradigm’ attempts to convey: namely, that a celestial researcher attempting to do ‘social’ research here would be bound to fail because such a person(?) would just not know where to begin. On the other hand, if we study the ‘Other’ because there are some grounds for similarity - that is, because we share some basic universal attribute(s) - then there is no reason why anthropology should at all be defined as concerned with the study of the ‘Other’, and no reason why anthropologists need to go elsewhere to look, as it were, for grounds to test their models. Anthropology might thus, in a sense, be said to be predicated on a paradox. This paradox seems to me to parallel an issue discussed by Agar in his book The Professional Stranger. He divides anthropologists into ‘area’ or ‘theory’ people. He sees the activities of anthropologists of the former category

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as illustrating one of the key premises of the discipline: namely, the crosscultural perspective, which proceeds on the assumption that by studying an area intensively, we are able to derive sets of hypotheses or theories which can be compared with (and tested on) those derived from another area. Theory people, on the other hand, select an area with a given theory in mind, but their choice of an area is directed by the theory they are interested in. For instance: an interest in, say, economics might lead an anthropologist to look at the jajmani system with its locus in India (1980: 22). Now, it is clear that these are false dichotomies. Those we designate the ‘Other’ are presumably more similar to us than we explicitly acknowledge. (Perhaps it is this kind of a similarity that we have in mind when we speak of ‘the metaphysical unity of mankind’.) Regarding Agar’s example, it must further be noted that even the anthropologist who is initially steered by a theory does not get his pet theory out of the blue, so to speak. It is something that is, more often than not, derived from the observation of social facts collected from an area somewhere. Therefore, if it is theory that comes first, predicated on, say, the metaphysical unity of mankind, then we should be able to test that theory anywhere human beings are found. Likewise, if we start with an area and that area were expected to generate a theory or set of theories, then we ought to be able to discard or modify such theories when any instance of refutation arises from the evidence available from anywhere else. It is therefore evident that this ‘chicken or egg: which comes first?’ problematisation of the anthropologists’ work is not very useful. The mistake here is that of viewing the task of the anthropologists as solely concerned with studying ‘others’, or even seeking to establish general theories of human society. Perhaps this is why many anthropologists would be inclined to agree with Evans-Pritchard’s (and Geertz’) idea of anthropology as a discipline concerned with the recording and interpreting of ethnographical processes and variations, rather than seeking social laws. It seem to me, moreover, that this paradox evaporates once we see anthropological research as aimed at dealing with specific social problems, an enterprise in which the recording and interpreting of facts, contingently about others, are of a primary importance. BLUNDERS, FALSE STARTS, KNOWLEDGE?

Yet anthropology is still predominantly the study of the ‘Other’ and this has some consequences for anthropologists who belong to the category commonly defined as the ‘Other’ in anthropological discourse. An African anthropolo­ gist, for example, finds it fruitful to ponder on this manner of problematising anthropological research, because the issues raised by the dichotomies out­ lined above proliferate into entrenched positions in the discipline which have implications for any novice and are thus bound to influence the choice of a field for research. Any anthropologist would be familiar with the position

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of proponents of the view, for instance, that if anthropological knowledge emerges from the study of contrasting forms of life, then it follows that those who are themselves members of a given group could better enter into the true experiences of the members of their own group. And those of the opinion that the only proper understanding of any social forms can be reached by researchers who are most different from their potential groups of study, the singular point which necessitates what Gellner calls ‘knowledge by total immersion’ (Gellner 1973: 126). These two positions are certainly refractions of the dichotomy. Maxwell Owusu, an African anthropologist working in the United States, was (once at any rate) a representative of views derived from the former position, reflected in his paper ‘Ethnography of Africa: the usefulness of the useless’ (1978). Owusu held that the quality of the data white anthropolo­ gists collected in Africa was bound to be dubious because they could not have properly understood the languages of the people they studied. Although he was criticising non-local anthropologists in general, Owusu’s main targets appear to have been the African monographs of Meyer Fortes and EvansPritchard, as well as comparatively recent works such as Dunn and Robertson (1974). Fortes is accused of having misunderstood the Tallensi. Similarly Dunn and Robertson (specifically Robertson) are accused of having misunder­ stood Twi concepts which informed their analysis. Owusu framed his critique in terms of language competence, but there is little doubt that his assumption - and this is implicit in his argument - was that an African anthropologist would have done a better job of studying these diverse African folks than the Europeans did. Surely, for a graduate student embarking on a first fieldwork, such pro­ nouncements must carry the impression that the choice of area in which one enjoys some affinity with the social forms there would enhance research. For my part, I cannot quite say to what extent I entertained similar ideas. However, I certainly saw the fact that I spoke Hausa and could easily pass as one of the pilgrims as an asset (indeed, the fact that my academic principals thought the topic an almost tailormade one for me was partly predicated on this fact). But any illusions on the ease of working among my own kind were soon shattered when I found myself stranded at Kano Airport, even before I had reached Sudan to begin fieldwork. On my way to Sudan, I had decided to fly via Ghana to visit my ailing father. A travel agent in Accra, Ghana, booked my connecting flights to Lagos, Kano, and then with Sudan Airways to Khartoum. There were ‘OK’ stickers on my tickets confirming the dates and times for all the transfers. On reaching Kano, however, I found that Sudan Airways, the sole carrier servicing the Kano-Khartoum route, had some days earlier cancelled its flights for a month. The airline’s representative assured me that all ‘serious’ travel agents had been informed of the cancellations and would, consequently,

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have known that the flights on which my reservations were confirmed did not exist. Sudan Airways was, therefore, not responsible for providing me with a hotel or finding me a flight from Kano to Khartoum. Nigeria Airways, the airline which had brought me to Kano, offered me accommodation for one night in an hotel that charged £50 in sterling a night. This was the sum I would have to pay unless I soon found a way of leaving Kano. Since there were no direct flights to Khartoum, the only reasonable alternative was to catch an Egypt Air flight to Cairo and from there to Khartoum. The next day I approached Egypt Air’s agent, a Hausa speaker, and tried to communicate my predicament. The agent said he was ‘too busy’ to speak to me or to sell me a ticket. He sat in his cubicle reading newspapers. My persisted interruptions soon began to bother him so he condescended to give me a piece of advice: if I really wanted to get on a flight, I should speak to a pedlar who was hanging about the terminal: a man apparently with no official standing with Egypt Air, but who sold seats on departing planes for the agent. This pedlar told me that if I would pay the sum I had paid for my hotel room to the agent, he would promise in the name of Allah to get me on the next flight to Cairo. I had a good ‘Business Class’ ticket and saw no reason why I should pay the fellow any money, so I declined. This resulted in my sitting at the airport the whole day and watching a number of planes depart for Cairo. At dusk I returned to the my £50-a-night hotel, the only one I knew. The next day I returned to the airport. A similar scene was enacted before my eyes. Flights arrived and the only persons who got boarding cards and embarked without bribing the agent (through his pedlar) were white travellers. (One of these whites, with whom I later became acquainted, turned out to be a Dutch anthropologist on his way home after a year’s fieldwork in Northern Nigeria.) The prospects of further nights in Kano at the rate of £50-a-night out of my own pocket were not attractive, so principle gave way to pragmatism. I paid the £50 in sterling demanded of me. The agent could not work out a fare based on my ticket’s IATA milage rates and therefore sold me another ticket for the route Kano-Cairo-Khartoum. I could later get a refund for my old ticket in Sweden. For reasons I could not then fathom, I was not given the ticket until five minutes before the flight was about to take off. The agent then ran alongside me and literally shoved me aboard just as the gangway was being removed. Once airborne I examined the tickets to discover that instead of a ticket to Khartoum via Cairo, I had been given a single ticket from Kano to Cairo. No complaints at the Cairo Office of Egypt Air could rectify this. In answer to a query by his superiors the Kano agent said he remembered the transaction with me, but claimed I had bought a single ticket through someone unknown. I had thus to scrape some further funds to buy another ticket for Khartoum. My own kind had swindled me of the sum of roughly £250 sterling even

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before I had reached the field to start my work. Would the fieldwork itself be easier for me than it would be for, say, a white anthropologist? An initial-planning trip to Sudan in 1980, made possible by a planning grant, one of the unique and gratifying things about our Stockholm depart­ ment at the time, had enabled me to single out Wad Medani as my base and given me a few friends and informants there. And thither I proceeded. Rather than install myself in one of the immigrant enclaves, I initially found accommodation through the university. As must have become clear in this study, the pilgrims have a wide network of relationships with each other, an important prerequisite to their whole existence as stranger-communities. A fieldwork approach that would enable me to explore linkages between the pilgrim communities would be the best. With Medani as my base, I would be able to follow contacts between West Africans that emanated from the urban centre, to which most newcomers first went, before they sought suitable communities in which to settle. Wad Medani had the added advantage of allowing me to gain insight into the urban and rural livelihoods of the West Africans and how they compared with each other. I had to travel widely, using contacts with informants as starting points. I would, for example, follow an informant to the funeral of some West African in one of the villages and be introduced to the bereaved as a fellow countryman (whom they had met in the house of one of the prominent Hausa traders in town) who was interested in their life in the Sudan. This was usually sufficient as an initial contact. I could then return later on my own and, from that link, go on to other West Africans I was able to meet through my new acquaintances. In this manner, I was able to observe how pilgrims moved from one village to another; and although I did not collect data on marriages, I was able to observe how potential marriage partners were found and what preceded and facilitated an alliance. The fieldwork strategy I adopted was very time-consuming. It entailed travelling frequently between nine different villages and covering an area of about forty square miles. As there was an acute shortage of transportation and an even acuter shortage of petrol, I was often stranded in villages where I knew no one. This meant, more or less, that I had to go through a process not very different from the one a Hausa immigrant, who arrives a total stranger in a new community, goes through. I would strike up a conversation with some Hausa who would take me to the Sarikin Hausawa (chief of the Hausa community). As often as not, there would be someone present who remembered me from a meeting in the home of one of the urban West Africans or had also met me in some other village. I therefore always found myself welcome, as a result of which I was able to start collecting data in new settings without having to worry about first introducing myself and waiting to gain their confidence. The Gezira Scheme in Sudan is perhaps one of the most researched

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projects in the world. Hardly a week passes when the inhabitants of the Gezira region do not have to listen to the queries of one of the numerous researchers, each trying to resolve some perceived socioeconomic problem pertaining to the scheme. Take, for example, the experience of a rather ordinary week during my fieldwork when I encountered six researchers on ‘my’ patch. They were two American social scientists, a Dutch medical officer, a Sudanese anthropologist working from Sussex, a Japanese immuno­ logist and a German dietician. All these people arrived in their Landcruisers and Landrovers, subjected the villagers to formal interviews through inter­ preters and then disappeared as fast as they had appeared. Not surprisingly, the villagers sometimes ask these fleeting researchers what is in it for them and tend to give the most facetious responses to the questionnaires. They feel they have been answering such questions for years, without seeing any change in their circumstances. One consequence of this is that local people are rather sceptical of researchers, while the immigrants, because of the added fact that they have mostly entered Sudan illegally, are downright afraid of them. Therefore, despite the congeniality of my relation­ ships with the West Africans, in a village where no one had heard of me it often took days - and sometimes weeks - before they accepted me as someone who was not a government agent, a person to whom they could communicate without fear. One cannot help the feeling that much of what passes for research in the region is probably doomed to failure and that only long-term research of the anthropological kind has any prospect of success. With no Arabic at all beyond some Quranic verses I had learned by heart as a child in a Quranic school, it seemed prudent to acquire the services of an assistant. I soon found an able one in a young student of West African extraction who had initially entreated me not to reveal his immigrant back­ ground to his fellow students. He was a third-semester medical student who was born in the Sudan and spoke Hausa and Arabic flawlessly. With his help I was also able to translate Arabic documents and to conduct interviews with local Sudanese patrons of the immigrants. His help, too, enhanced my acceptance in some of the villages as a fellow West African. The anthropologist who studies an immigrant group invariably discovers that his or her social field of study extends beyond the group to include encapsulating groups. This also inevitably extends the field for analysis. I therefore often found it rewarding to engage in conversations with Sudanese students in Wad Medani, in order to find out how their idea of Islam and their usage of some key Islamic concepts differed from those of the pilgrims. One of the more interesting aspects of my research was the nature of my interaction with the local Sudanese. Since most of them saw the West Africans in a stigmatised light, they did not quite know what role to accord me because I was both a Fellata and a Swedish researcher. This resulted in

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some awkward and, in retrospect, amusing situations, some of which I have recounted in detail elsewhere (see Yamba 1985). For instance, trying to get relevant permits to work in archives or to take photographs could mean waiting weeks outside the door of some official. In such instances being a Fellata visitor did not help matters. White permit-seekers, on the other hand, usually got theirs the same day. On one occasion, when I had failed to get a letter that would enable me to gain access to an archive in which there were some vital data for my research I proceeded, nonetheless, to the archive in the company of a white Cambridge anthropologist who had the relevant permits. Upon our arrival, he was sent to the head of the Institution that kept the archive, while I was told to proceed to the reading-room. I went with him. The Cambridge anthropologist was warmly received. After reading his letters of introduction and permits, he was told by an official that the archives were closed for reorganisation and that he should come back the next day. My white friend was intrigued with the discrepant information we had received. However, he thought it wise to return the next day as he had been instructed. I, on the other hand, proceeded to the archive as I had been instructed at the reception. The archive was operative and I was given all the items I needed to look at. I was reading in the archive when a messenger arrived with a note. After reading the note, the archivist and his assistants started to clean up the place and seemed generally agitated. They later invited me to lunch and it was then that I discovered the cause of their agitation. They had received instructions from their superiors to clean up the archive because they were to receive a very important visitor from Cambridge the next day. These and similar experiences made me see my relationship with my local Sudanese hosts as a part of my field research. I consequently made it a point to keep notes of all my experiences in the field. The ease of my acceptance by the West Africans - partly a consequence of speaking their language and being identified as one of them - entailed some obligations, the fulfilment of which might have compromised my role as an impartial researcher. For instance, although my informants would generally answer all the questions I put to them, sometimes during formal interviews they would ask me to switch off my tape-recorder to tell me a ‘secret’ which I was not to put into my study, lest it reinforce some of the prejudices their Sudanese hosts have about ‘us’ West Africans in general. In such situations, I felt as though I were a co-conspirator. However, when it came to converting the recordings into notes or writing down my notes, which I did every evening, I had to face the dilemma of whether or not to include the off-the-record remarks I had been entrusted with. No doubt such confidential information enriched my understanding of their lives in the Sudan, but could I really keep such data from my published analysis later? In specific instances, there were portions of the data I was privy to

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but had specifically been told not to use in print; in other instances, there were other items of data that I had been encouraged to use by my informants because, it will show ‘us’ (West Africans) in a positive light. On one occasion, the Sheikh of one village made me record a broadcast in support of the then president of Nigeria, Mr Shehu Shagari. The Sheikh and his Hausa villagers had heard that there were going to be elections in Nigeria and wanted to show Nigeria Radio that Mr Shagari had a ‘great many people who like him in Sudan’. Rather than tell the Sheikh that, as far as I could ascertain, there were no such elections pending in Nigeria, I obliged and even helped them to send off the tape by post. Apart from such voluntary involvements in the lives of the pilgrims during participant observation, there were involuntary ones such as my often being passed off as an example of the successful West African academic whenever the villagers introduced me to their Sudanese neighbours. These are some of the difficulties the ‘insider’ anthropologist faces. My informants appeared not to have the smallest doubt that my study would show them in a positive light and strove, as it were, to censure what would be detrimental to them - but not before they had intimated such facts to me. Such ethical problems are commonly encountered by fieldworkers in some form or degree. There are no rules of thumb on how to resolve these issues, beyond what the ethical imperatives and predispositions of each researcher would dictate. What I am attempting to highlight, however, is that such problems become most acute when the anthropologist is defined as a member of the group he or she studies. If such affinity is the basis for access to data that is of a sensitive nature, the problem becomes compounded. Being so defined has its advantages; but it has also its disadvantages. In other words, either of these positions: studying one’s own kind or studying the ‘Other’, has its benefits as well as its costs. Be this as it may, one fact that cannot be disputed in either case is that there are no short cuts to the acquisition of knowledge.

Appendix II SOME BRIEF BIOGRAPHICAL NOTES ON THE KEY INFORMANTS QUOTED IN THE TEXT

Faki Abudulai Ahmed (quoted on pp. 144, 174) is a seventy-nine-year-old pilgrim who arrived in the Sudan in 1960. He lost two sons during the journey from Maiduguri in Northern Nigeria where he was a praise singer. Initially, he made a living as a praise singer in Sudan but gave it up for farmwork because there was not much need of his services. Despite his age he is a keen student of the Quran who attends adult Quranic school in Wad Fellata, where he has lived since his arrival in Sudan. Ahmed is also a tireless campaigner for the preservation of the Hausa language and customs. Unis Baba Ahmed (quoted on p. 148) is a twenty-five-year-old Hausa man who sells vegetables for his Arab landlord. I first met him during my visit to Sudan in 1980. He told me then that he wanted to return to Nigeria but lacked the funds. I employed him as an interpreter for six weeks, during which he earned enough money to augment what he already had to buy a ticket to Nigeria. However, when I returned to begin fieldwork proper two years later, he was still in Wad Medani. His rejection of the pilgrimage had become intensified.

Malam Mumuni (quoted on pp. 155, 157) is a fifty-six-year-old pilgrim who arrived in Sudan in the company of a family from Sokoto district. A successful sharecropper, he has two wives and six children. He lives in a Sudanese village where he teaches in a Quranic school catering solely for West African children. He has lived in Sudan since 1956 but still regards himself as one who hopes to reach Mecca some day. Alhaji Hassan Ibrahim (quoted on p. 155), now in his late eighties, is a grandfather to more than twenty-two children. Though a successful sharecropper, he has not yet succeeded - despite his name - in fulfilling his dreams of reaching Mecca. He imputes his lack of success to ‘debts and social relationships’ but hopes to reach Mecca some day in accordance with God’s will. Sheikh Rahman Ahmed (quoted on p. 165) is a Sheikh in one of the pilgrim villages. Sixty-five years of age and a very learned and successful faki, he teaches adult Quranic school in his village. He is also regarded as being well-versed in Islamic metaphysics even by educated Sudanese students of the Quran. He does not hesitate to discourse on the plight of West Africans in the Sudan generally. He has performed the pilgrimage yearly since 1960.

GLOSSARY

The glossary contains foreign words in the book which have specific meanings or connotations in the context of the study, the understanding of which will enhance the reader’s understanding of the book. The full meaning of the Hausa and Arabic words are not given. agashe Alhaji 'Al-hamdu lillah’ alim (pl. ulama) Allah i keka Makkah’

'Allah Kareem' al majirai angereeb baki banza baraka bashi birni (pl. birane) ‘Bismillahi'

bongo bori cult chauta

dain Dajjal dan kassa (yan kassa)

dar el harb dar el Islam duniyammun ga durra fadel

(Hausa) hotly-spiced meat grilled on charcoal title of address for a male pilgrim (Arabic) Thank God (Arabic) Muslim learned man, teacher ‘May Allah send you to Mecca’, a Hausa greeting of West African pilgrims in Sudan (Arabic) Allah will provide pupils (Arabic) Sudanese rope bed (Hausa) strangers (Hausa) worthless blessing or grace that can be passed on by a Muslim holy man to his followers (Hausa) debts (Hausa) walled city (Arabic) formula said before doing something, for instance, beginning to eat, sitting down, starting work marijuana spirit possession cult of the Hausa (Hausa) term for gifts, as opposed to bashi which denotes debts (Arabic) debt contracted with some definite conditions of fixed payment, as opposed to qard (Arabic) Antichrist (Hausa) son of the land, local person, as opposed to us who are baki (strangers) (Arabic) non-Muslim territory (Arabic) territory in which Islamic rule has been established (Hausa) literally this world of ours a kind of sorghum grown in Sudan welcome

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faki

feddan fellata

fiqh gari (pl. garuruwa) Hajiya haj Hijra idonsaya bude

iliyun 'Insha’Allah’ istita a jangali jellabiya jihads kadanka halalbiyya

kadanka hausawiyya

kafir khalifa khalwa (khalawi)

kisra madhab (pl. madhahib) maigida malaku al-maut malam (mul’allim) ‘malesh’ marabout mujaddid

muqaddam qard rahila riga sadaka Salat el-Fatih salat sarauta sarki (pl. sarakuna) sawm

PERMANENT PILGRIMS

(Arabic) religious person believed in Sudan to be able to use his Quranic scholarship to achieve extraordinary feats 1 feddan = 0.42 hectares (Arabic) term with some negative connotations used by the Sudanese to denote West African Muslims in Sudan, the latter preferring to be referred to as takari (Arabic) theoretical Islamic law (Hausa) town (Hausa) title of address for a female pilgrim pilgrimage (Arabic) emigration for religious reasons literally, ‘his eye is open’. A person whose ‘eyes are open’ is smart and knows his way around the intricate maze of the Sudanese bureaucracy book in which the names of believers are written 'It is God’s will’ ability (to carry out the pilgrimage) tax on the cattle of nomads long, loose gown worn by Sudanese men Islamic holy wars (Arabic) long-handle hoe that is operated from a virtually standing position (Arabic) short-handle hoe originating from West Africa, now also common in Sudan (Arabic) pagan, non-believer (Arabic) caliph, political and religious leader of a global Islamic community (Arabic) Quranic school in which the Quran and rudimentary arithmetic are taught, the emphasis being on learning the texts by heart (Arabic) kind of unleavened bread (Arabic) legal rite or system of Islam (Hausa) landlord or master (literally, houseowner), often used as a sign of respect (Arabic) Angel of Death Hausa term for the Arabic alim, learned man, teacher (Arabic) ‘it does not matter’ (Arabic) religious notable (Arabic) the ‘Renewer’, whom God sends once in every century to prepare the way for the Mahdi (Arabic) leader, one who has the authority to initiate other into the faith (Arabic) loan with no fixed conditions for repayment (Arabic) means of transport for going on the pilgrimage (Hausa) loose embroidered gown worn by the Hausa (Hausa) alms a special prayer in praise of the Prophet Muhammad (Arabic) prayer (Hausa) ruler, authority (Hausa) chief, king (Arabic) fasting

GLOSSARY

shaitan sharia sharik sheikh

Sijjin takari tariqa (pl. turuq) tuwo umma wakil

wando wannan duniya wird yawon dandi zad zakat zongo

205

(Arabic) the devil the Islamic canon law (Arabic) share-cropper on a specified crop on the Gezira scheme (Arabic) used in the Sudan as leader of a pilgrim community; otherwise head of a Muslim community book in which the names of the wicked are written a preferred term of self ascription by West African Muslims in Sudan a Sufi brotherhood (Hausa) thick West African porridge the Muslim community a custodian of a tenancy within the Gezira Scheme, some­ times sub-divided into Sharia Wakil, a wakil sanctioned by sharia law, and Wakil Maktab, one recognised by the Gezira Scheme’s authorities (Hausa) trousers worn by men (Hausa) the cosmological world (Arabic) Sufi litany (Hausa) roaming the world, a Hausa category of migration (Arabic) funds required for going on the pilgrimage (Arabic) religious alms required of all Muslims (Hausa) strangers’ quarters in West African towns

NOTES

CHAPTER 1

1. My use of the term social action here conflates two main distinctions similar to the ones Weber makes in his typology of action: (a) wertrational (evaluatively or value rational) action and zweckrational (purposive, or instrumental) action (see Weber 1947: 115-18). Both types of action are ultimately predicated on an inherent intersubjective meaningfulness to both the social actor and the observer of the actor’s action. Needless to say that knowledge of the social context within which a particular action occurs is prerequisite to our being able to attribute ‘meaning’ to it, or being able to classify a perceivable sequence of observable movements as merely callisthenic or culturally meaningful ‘action’. Action is moreover directed at a goal. Using the word ‘goal’ in an extended sense, to encompass (a) goal as a desired end, and (b) goal as embedded in a criterion seen as fulfilling certain descriptions (see Taylor 1964: 27-89). An example of (a) must be ‘the pilgrim left home to go to Mecca’, where the goal is clear, and (b) ‘The Fulani seized power during the jihads in Nigeria’, where a description is prerequisite to (and adequate enough for) our discernment of the ‘goal’. This distinction obscures many borderline cases, where the intentions of the perpet­ rators of action are not unambiguous. However, such problems do not concern me here. I further conflate the two notions in Weber’s typology of action because for the pilgrims, as will be made clear in the course of this study, all action is subjectively meaningful only if it is value rational, which is, in some sense or other, defined and sanctioned by the Umma (the Muslims’ community and the universe of thought of which the pilgrim is a member). Furthermore, although such action must also be purposive, it must not be instrumental in a sense of subordinating morality to the achievement of some given aim. 2. Various other eastward routes have been more commonly used at different times in the past, but the route through the Sudan appears to be the most significant and the most common one since the mid-nineteenth century. 3. For instance, in the Sudan during the Mahadiya, or the Mahdist years (1881-98), the numbers of pilgrims dropped because the Mahdi declared that to be in his ranks was as meritorious as undertaking the pilgrimage (see Balamoan 1976: 156). 4. A West African informant once explained to me what appears to be a representative view of why the immigrants object to being called Fellata. ‘When they call us “Fellata" they mean we are bush people, or that we are slaves, and foreigners.

NOTES

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6.

7.

8.

9.

207

And so whenever they want to say: “Nigerian go back to your country”, they always say “Fellata go home”. They always call you “Fellata" when they want to say something bad to you.’ However, I also found that the Sudanese often called their West African friends Fellata, clearly without any intention of being offensive. I myself was on many occasions described as ‘Our Fellata visitor’ by persons who had invited me to their homes and went to considerable trouble to feed and entertain me. The 1956 Sudan national census put the figure of West Africans at 8.8 per cent of the total population of ten million inhabitants. However, Balamoan (1976), a population expert, in an extensively researched book argues forcefully that well over one-half of the total population of the Sudan at the time of independence (1956) could themselves have been immigrants from West Africa or children of parents who had migrated to Sudan at the close of the Mahdist regime in 1898. His main reason for this conclusion was that it would otherwise not have been possible for the population of Sudan which was around two million at the turn of the century to have increased so much. Birks (1978) puts the figure of West Africans at something between 800,000 and 1,000,000. The anthropologist is still the odd man out in an interdisciplinary gathering for the study of pilgrimage. See, for instance, Bowman (1988) for a report of one such conference where the differing disciplinary perspectives were clearly pro­ nounced. Bowman reports one non-anthropologist as saying at one stage ‘Now that the anthropologists are away we can begin to speak about pilgrimage.’ I thus thoroughly agree with Jarvie (1984: 13-14), who holds that conjecture and speculation must be a ‘necessary’ part of anthropological inquiry, because the central problems of the discipline are ‘moral and metaphysical’. I do not, however, think the subordinate role he prescribes for empirical study in such inquiry, particularly his rejection of fieldwork as a prerequisite for research in (academic) anthropology, is justified. Conjecture and speculation in anthropology ought to, and must, start from ethnographic facts. Indeed, conjecture and specula­ tion can only be inspired by such facts - which are ultimately available to us through empirical study of the type Jarvie derides in traditional anthropology. The rejection of metaphysical description is also a stance of the later Leach, in so far as his works were, one might say, structuralist. By implication the same holds for most anthropologists who are interested in postulated structures beneath the level of consciousness. As Overing (1985) has argued, and I think correctly, when we impose order on our data and see uniform structures as underlying the data, we rule out ‘the possibility of learning the metaphysics of others’. Overing is of the opinion that what emerges from such analyses results from ‘the sophistica­ tion of the investigators’ techniques, not through the acquisition of others’ knowledge or learning their presuppositions about the world’ (Overing 1985: 20). She observes further: ‘To use the methods of structuralism can lead one therefore to underestimate the sophistication of others in the construction of their worlds; for through them the content, form, and richness of these worlds are reduced to cognitive processes, that of analogical thought through classifica­ tion’ (Overing loc. cit.). From an anthropological perspective, it is important to realise further that the structures that constrain individual motives also provide the language for defining motives and actions, as well as constitute, generally, the socioeconomic forces of the environment within which the individual exists. Social actions that emanate in any society, then, are derived from a dialectical interplay of several factors (cf. Mills 1940).

208

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10. This is not the place in an anthropological text to go into the definition of so common a term as ‘symbol’, but my point is significantly highlighted by Ortner’s (1973) statement. The fact is that what we are given is the potential range of things that can become symbols, but not in what their potentiality or transforma­ tion lies. It might well be said then of anything, that it is a ‘symbol’. Perhaps it is also worth adding at this stage that, in what follows, I sometimes use the term ‘symbols’ as a short-hand label for ‘concepts and precepts’, the latter in the sense of normative labels for what actions are prescribed by societies. 11. Firth writes, for example: ‘The essence of symbolism lies in the recognition of one thing as standing for (re-presenting) another, the relation between them normally being that of concrete to abstract, particular to general. The relation is such that the symbol by itself appears capable of generating and receiving effects otherwise reserved for the object to which it refers - and such effects are often of high emotional charge (Firth 1973: 15-16)’. It is this emotional charge that produces the catalytic effect that anthropologists postulate as ‘causing’ or impelling action. 12. Other anthropologists have also made this rather untenable distinction between symbol and sign. See, for example, Turner 1964. 13. Geertz’s famous article ‘Religion as a Cultural System’ first appeared in 1966. 14. For a critique of the Geertzian position on symbols and action, which is pertinent to the points I make on the relation of thought to action in anthropology, see Austin 1979. 15. Something must be said on the notion of ontology, to highlight the special sense in which Kapferer uses the term. Ontology, particularly its substantival usage, is perhaps a word that many anthropologists would instinctively be inclined to steer clear of. It connotes far too much and has far too general referents for comfort. Besides, it belongs to a class of terms that have given philosophers far too many headaches (if the literature is anything to go by). But terminology aside, in so far as anthropologists have been studying ‘other cultures’ - perhaps even their own included - they could not have avoided dealing with these entities in some substantialising terms or other. We are often more comfortable with concepts such as ‘key symbols’, ‘root paradigms’, ‘deep structures’, etc. And yet, although such terms do not accurately refer to a theory of ‘being’, or even (to use Quine’s famous phrase) ‘what can be really said to exist’, such terms, nonetheless, presuppose a given group of beings and some underlying charter with which such beings have a meaningful relation. They further presup­ pose that such a relation (emically) defines the scope of life as well as life­ chances and life-purpose. It is important to note, also, that notions such as key symbols, deep structures and the like - even if this is not always clear when they are operationalised in anthropological monographs - have a constituting and constitutive characteristic, a double aspect which is an essential aspect in any conception of ontology. This seems to me to be partly the logic behind classical questions in philosophy on whether or not existence is a predicate (see, for example, Moore 1953; and Kant, who also considered this issue in the Critique: ‘Being . . . obviously is no real predicate, that is, a concept of something that may be added to the concept of a thing. It is merely the positing of a thing, of certain determinations, in themselves’ 1982: 192). In what might be regarded as an extended sociological usage, Kapferer’s ‘ontology’ is something that is predicat­ ive, rather than constitutive, of being. People have an ontology, rather than constitute an ontology. In my view, employed even in this extended sociological sense, ontology cannot only be a predicate of something that is, say, of a

NOTES

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culture. Asserting that x (has such and such) an ontology must itself derive from some precondition(s) under which such a postulate is justifiable, and that is itself an ontological problem. I see no contradiction in holding that that which is predicative of existence must itself constitute it (existence) as well. 16. This, I think, is the sense in which Eliade uses the term when he speaks of ‘primitive ontology’ as representing a metaphysics of reality as perceived by archaic man. There is, however, a difference here. Eliade was trying to show that primitive man’s ontology was represented by material things because, being unschooled, he could not deal with abstract concepts. As will become abundantly clear in this study, the ontology of the pilgrims comprises rather of abstract concepts which are the subject of discussions and analysis in the adult Quranic schools. CHAPTER 2

1. There is an overwhelming inclination in the world of the educated to predicate the emergence of civilisation, development, and even accuracy and truth, on the existence of literacy within a given social system. And it is partly this that has, by implication, led to some of the asymmetry we find between the First - and the other Worlds. The supremacy of literate cultures is based on the presence of writing, followed by an epistemology that enhances the transformation of what is written into the building of machines that can be used to control the environ­ ment. This combination has given rise to the conceptualisation, these days, of the term ‘developed’ with its related concept, ‘civilised’; a conceptualisation that is ultimately predicated on the presence of written sources. Occasionally, one encounters a charitable distinction between writing that has led to ‘development’ and ‘civilisation’ and that which has not, but the superiority of writing still underlies the distinction. Thus, Sir Harry Johnston, that unsung hero of British imperialism, thought that the white races had a moral right to exploit the African continent more than Asia, because Asia, at least, possessed ‘a latent and reviving civilization of its own’ (Oliver 1957: 141). Presumably, Asia’s past could be found in written documents while Africa’s could not. Scholars these days admit that a significant part of Africa’s past can be found in written Arabic documents, but formerly this was not considered a possibility. Cultures without writing just could have no history. Lest one think this represents the unenlightened view, it must be pointed out that even so distinguished an Africanist as Margery Perham could write in 1951: ‘until the recent penetration of Europe the greater part of the African continent was without the wheel, the plough or the transport animal; without stone houses or clothes except skins; without writing and so without history' (cited in Crowder 1968: 10, my emphasis). 2. What comes immediately to mind is the case of the Kano Chronicle which, some historians usually cite without decoding it, regarding it as a reliable source on West African history. Yet the Chronicle, which purports to describe Hausa history, was passed down by word of mouth for centuries until it was finally written down - assuming Palmer’s dating is right - in the latter part of the decade 1883-93. Apart from it being said to be consistent and to offer some evidence that can be corroborated, the Chronicle’s reliability depends, I think, on the fact that it is finally a written document. Had it persisted as a verbal tradition, it is unlikely that it would have been so highly esteemed as it is today. Other works which have become instant histories in a similar manner, illustrative of this point, are the works of Rattray and Fortes. Not only are they accepted as

210

3.

4.

5. 6.

7.

8.

9. 10. 11.

PERMANENT PILGRIMS

definitive classics by the academic fraternity, but they have became sources to which educated Asante and Tallensi turn when they are looking for facts about their past. The late Professor Fortes, though certainly moved by the gesture, also expressed a mild amusement at discovering from a primary school teacher in Tongo, Ghana, that his two Tallensi monographs were being used to ‘teach Talle history’ in a primary school. These same monographs were being used to ‘teach’ postgraduates anthropological theory in the University of London. (From Professor Meyer Fortes at the MPhil Seminars, SOAS, London, Spring 1979.) Consequently, the chapters in the following books, which deal with the migration of West Africans to Sudan, read like a composite of the same historical documents: Birks 1978; Works Jr. 1976; Duffield 1981; and Al-Naqar 1972. The current documented history of the events that I shall deal with here constitute a minefield of contested interpretations and meanings. Not only has a new and rich historiography emerged in Nigeria that views the occurrences in a new light, but the novice is bound to find that of the great number of sources at his disposal some are either dated or inaccurate. To give some indication of the volume of the recent works on Islam and the Jihads in Northern Nigeria, Brenner (1992: 41) refers to Elizabeth Hodgkin who in a research visit to Nigeria in 1990 compiled a list of ‘over 800 theses (PhD, MA, BA) on Islamic subjects compiled since independence’. He notes that the list does not include all the universities of Nigeria. A comprehensive account or discussion of the new historiography is outside the scope of this book. My main effort is to show the sharp break between scholarly rendering and interpretations of that history and the romanticised interpretations of ‘facts’ of that same history that the pilgrims in the Sudan still have, which legitimates and gives meaning to their lives in Sudan. It is perhaps for such reasons that Middleton (1970) regretted having only read Collingwood’s The Idea of History at the end of his fieldwork. From that delightful play that touches on the pilgrimage theme by James Elroy Flecker (1922) Hassan, p. 98, London: Heinemann (1966 edition). Mansa Musa’s celebrated journey (1324) is perhaps a good example of this kind of pilgrimage. So fabulous was his wealth and so prodigious his spending of gold en route during his pilgrimage that he is alleged almost single-handedly to have caused a severe period of inflation of the price of gold in Cairo where he spent some time (Bovill 1958: 85ff.). There are the writings of Leo Africanus, who must count as a European visitor, although he was originally Hassan ibn Muhammad al-Wazzan az-Zayyati, an Arab born in Muslim Spain, before he was captured by Roman slavers. The perspective from which he viewed Africa was that of a European and a Christian. He is often at pains in his descriptions (of Hausaland, for instance) to show his readers that the Africans were ‘actually very civilized’ not because of any inherent characteristics but because - this is about Gobir - they had ‘many weavers and shoemakers who make shoes like what the Romans used to wear . . .’. Or - this is about Kano: ‘Its inhabitants are civilized handicraft workers and rich mer­ chants.’ Cited in Davidson 1965: 120. Robinson published a paper called ‘Manchester of Africa’ in The Pall Mall Gazette. Mentioned in Robinson 1896: v. Ulama, plural of alim. ‘One who knows; learned; a scholar’, is the Arabic equivalent of ‘malam’ in Hausa (who) is simply a teacher in Islam. This idea of Fulani as comprising two distinct categories: settled ones (town)

NOTES

12.

13.

14. 15.

16.

17.

18.

19.

211

and pastoralists (rural and nomadic) is possibly a late-nineteenth-century phenom­ enon. Following Hopen (1958), we must also regard the division of the Fulani into two categories as an oversimplification, which is resorted to, as is the case here, as a matter of convenience. Hopen further enumerates at least four categories of Fulani: (1) The Bororo’en, who are the quintessential Fulani nomads because they shunned settled groups and have thus never resorted to intermarriage with others; (2) the Fulbe nai who are semi-sedentary pastoralists; (3) the Torodbe, and (4) the Fulbe sure, former pastoralists who have been forced into a sedentary existence, having lost their stocks to disease or other disasters (see Hopen 1958: 1-3). The Fulani often married their Hausa slaves and produced offspring who were physically not very different from the Hausa. See Azarya 1978: 34. Barth thought, on the one hand, that intermarriage had not done harm to the Fulani, as far as he could see: ‘their original type has been well preserved as yet’. But he found, on the other hand, that they had become degenerate, ‘their warlike character impaired’ by their acquisition of wealth and the comforts of town life. Henry Barth, quoted in Hodgkin 1960: 363. Al-Maghili of Tuat, whose influence spans many centuries of West African Islam (Fisher 1970: 353), was a zealot who had been involved in the massacre of Jews and the destruction of a synagogue in his homeland before visiting West Africa. In his day, he vehemently attacked the fake ulama, who, he alleged, were not sufficiently literate to interpret the Quran (Fisher loc. cit.; Hiskett 1984: 316). This is highly significant, as will become clear later in this book: the craving for a mastery of Arabic and, by extension, Arabness, which is found among the West African pilgrims, can be traced back to such beginnings. See Chapter 5. The Obligations of Princes is translated by T. S. Baldwin (1932). The literature on works related to the Shehu is vast and still growing (cf. footnote 4 of this chapter). A full-length study still remains Hiskett 1973. Scholars who want more analysis in the style of the current historiography of Nigeria would find the treatment of the Shehu in Last 1989 and Mahadi 1985 perhaps more reflective of the complexities of the man and his times. Jibril bin ’Umar of Agades was once the Shehu’s tutor, a radical cleric who had made the pilgrimage twice and had spent a length of time in Egypt. A fierce opponent of syncretism in Islam, he had a considerable influence on the Shehu and his brother Abdullahi. See Martin 1976: 18-19; Last 1987. Clapperton tells us how the Caliph Bello asked him many questions about Europe and on theological issues he ‘felt embarrassed’ at not being able to answer. On his second visit he brought Bello, among other presents, a copy of Euclid’s Geometry. The next morning he found the Caliph ‘sitting in the inner apartment of his house with a copy of Euclid before him ... He said that he had had a copy brought by one of their relations from Mecca; that it had been destroyed by fire, and he observed that they could not but feel very much obliged to the King of England for sending him so valuable a present.’ Cited in Hodgkin 1960: 214-15. Of relevance here too, is Hiskett, 1957. See M. G. Smith (1966) for a discussion of the different assessments of the jihad and an early questioning of the traditional view. For particularly a discussion of the racial element in the alignments for the jihad see Robinson Waldman (1966). There appears to have been a prevailing ideology on the non-enslavement of Mus­ lims by other Muslims during the time of the Shehu, according to informants in

212

20. 21. 22.

23.

24. 25.

26. 27.

28.

29.

PERMANENT PILGRIMS

Sudan. Tradition has it that the Shehu usually freed Muslim slaves whenever he came across them. I have not been able to substantiate this in the literature, but this belief is widespread. It must, therefore, have come as a great disappointment to many Hausa when the institution of slavery was strengthened again during the Muslim Caliphate. It was not unusual for a man to own about 1000 slaves in Hausaland during the period. Indeed, Robinson (1896) begins his chapter on slavery with the startling statement that ‘One out of every three hundred persons now living in the world is a Hausa-speaking slave.’ He placed the Hausaspeaking population in the 1890s at about fifteen million, then about one per cent of the world’s population. Even though the social relations between master and slave differed from, say, its American form, slavery was still an institution that is difficult to defend. Not surprisingly, enforcing the ban on slavery was also one of the moral justifications the imperial powers gave for imposing their rule on the states in West Africa. In Sudan, informants told me how the Sudanese had sinned grievously because in the past they sometimes enslaved fellow Muslims even when they knew that they were pilgrims on their way to Mecca. Hiskett 1960 provides a translation and a commentary on this work. One advantage of operating independently for the Shehus’ forces was that ‘disaster in one battle did not endanger the whole movement’ (Last 1989: 559). ‘The success of outnumbered, out-equipped Muslims reformers . . . seem to them both a miracle and proof of the rightness of their cause; the parallel, again, with the Prophet’s success at the battle of Badr only confirmed it’ (Last loc. cit.). Scholars of West African Islamic history list Last (1967) as the best available work on the Sokoto Caliphate. Other works include Paden (1973); Hiskett (1984), as well as some of the growing new historiography of Nigeria, some of which have been mentioned here. Some writers have tried to show that the incorporation of many non-Islamic practices is still characteristic of West African Islam. (See particularly Chapter 5 of Trimingham (1959).) Besides Goody (1968), perhaps the best example of the belief in the literal power of books that prevailed in the region is found in the Tarikh al Sudan, cited by Clarke (1982: 36). The ruler of Farma sought protection against a rival by ‘putting his books on his head and saying: “I put myself under the protection of these books”.’ It was also partly for the belief in the ‘strong book of the Muslims that the Ashanti king employed Muslims’. See also Levtzion 1968: 182ff. An allusion to Tacitus, Agricola 30 ‘Ubi solitudinem faciunt, pacem appellant.’ In Sudan the term the pilgrims commonly used for colonialism or colonial rule was the Arabic word Ista'mar. When talking about the past, older informants date all events as being ‘during Ista’mar' or ‘after Ista'mar' which might be translated as during and after colonialism. This is not surprising when one discovers from other travellers that it was not unusual for them to spend sometimes up to about seven years before reaching the Gezira region in Sudan. Even if Hajiya’s first impression in Sudan was that the Hausa immigrants had a great command of Arabic, this was in fact mistaken. As will later become clear in this book (see Chapter 5, for example), most West African pilgrims are unable to learn proper Sudanese Arabic. This serves to disqualify them from Sudanese citizenship, since a good command of Arabic is an important prerequisite for Sudanese citizenship.

NOTES

213

30. It is interesting to compare Hajiya’s experiences with those of Malcolm X (see Malcolm X 1966: 333-9, 340.) Hajiya regards her first experiences of discrimina­ tion in Mecca as contrary to the spirit of the universal brotherhood of Islam (which existed there to some degree). While to Malcolm X, who had encountered discrimination all his life, what was for him novel and unique was the integrative aspect of the pilgrimage. He saw ‘tens of thousands of pilgrims, from all over the world. They were of all colours, from blue-eyed blondes to black-skinned Africans. But we were all participating in the same ritual, displaying a spirit of unity and brotherhood.’ 31. Crocodile-catching appears to have long been a West African niche in Sudan. See Hussey (1918). According to Malam Abubakar, the crocodile-catcher wades through the waters at night with a powerful torch attached to his forehead. When he finds a place where crocodiles are likely to swim by, he goes down on his knees in the water and waits for a crocodile. The waiting is the most difficult part. It requires a lot of bravery, patience and experience. When a crocodile is found the trapper moves slowly towards it, holding the lamp steadily in its eyes. The powerful beam blinds the beast and it is then pierced. According to Malam Abubakar, crocodile-catchers were mainly Hausa immigrants. But sometimes one encountered a number of Dinka. Malam Abubakar believes that Nigerian crocodiles are more dangerous than Sudanese ones. He points out that in Nigeria it sometimes happened that hunters were killed by crocodiles but in his two years as a catcher of crocodiles in Sudan, there was not a single case of this having happened. And yet, he adds, the Sudanese regard catching crocodiles as a dangerous occupation. The price of skins varied. The most sought-after skins were the white ones which in 1962 fetched about £20. The black skins fetched £15 and those skins with stones in them fetched £10. It was on the whole an uncertain livelihood. Sometimes the catchers went for weeks without a single catch but, with luck, one could make about £40 in a single night. 32. For a detailed discussion of the role of the West African faki in Sudan, see Chapter 4, infra. 33. Once in Sudan, many pilgrims simply follow the railway track, camping alongside it while making their way slowly toward the Red Sea. See Birks 1978. 34. Balamoan’s own appendix (1976: 321ff.) contains an exchange of letters between the colonial administrations of the Gold Coast, Nigeria and Sudan on the repatri­ ation of destitute pilgrims to their various homes in West Africa. 35. Hassoun (1952) recounts that it was the policy of some of the Block Inspectors of the Gezira Scheme to engage only West African tenants because they regarded them as better workers. This theme will be dealt with in the next chapter. CHAPTER 3

1. Of the many works on the involvement of immigrants in the economic life of Sudan, I have relied mainly on Barnett (1977) and Robertson (1987). The former work still remains an unrivalled source on the Gezira Scheme, while the latter, though primarily concerned with sharecropping contracts, provides a concise and lucid analysis of the role West African immigrants play and have played in the Gezira, based on relatively recent data. 2. Information received from an official of the Ministry of Interior, Khartoum, November 1983. 3. Nayal, in his thesis The Sudan Chad Boundary, even attributes the spread of leprosy to the West Africans who enter the Sudan illegally. Birks (1978) inexplicably lists el

214

4.

5.

6. 7.

8.

9. 10.

11.

PERMANENT PILGRIMS

Nayal’s work as ‘Nyala [sic], el T. The Sudan Chad Border'. The author’s name and the title are inaccurate. Idris el Tahir Nayal, in his handwritten MA thesis (in geography, presented at the University of Khartoum), begins by examining different concepts denoting demarcations between states to justify his choice of the word ‘boundary’. As to the name, I have been unable to find any work by a Mr Nyala and can only surmise that Birks must have confused the author’s name with the town of Nyala in the Sudan. Apart from Gaitskell (1958) and Barnett (1978), the best-known of these, there are scores of unpublished reports in the Gezira Board Archives at Barakat, Sudan, pertaining to different aspects of the Gezira. Notable exceptions here are Barnett (1977) and Robertson (1987). There are also a number of unpublished works in Sudan which deal with West African workers on the Gezira. Many of such works, however, usually treat the West Africans as ‘Westerners’, a category which covers Sudanese from the western parts of the country as well as West Africans. Barnett (1977) had initially hoped to conduct a study of the West African workers on the Gezira Scheme but found it unfeasible, chiefly because of difficulties in conducting fieldwork among them. Gaitskell (1928) in Box 418/3, The Sudan Archive, Durham University. At the beginning of my fieldwork the West African communities in and around Wad Medani were still recovering from what they referred to as ‘The problems of Tuttu Matta’.Tuttu Matta was a West African village that stood on the site of the present campus of the University of Gezira. The whole settlement was bulldozed to the ground and the villagers were reallocated to Awuda, about three kilometres outside Wad Medani. Undoubtedly, the new village was an improvement on the old one. They now had piped water and latrines. But the forceful manner in which they were evicted was traumatic for the inhabitants. Some of them were physically pulled out of their huts and all their belongings were thrown out while their houses were destroyed. Many West Africans claim that it was after the Tuttu Matta affair that they first realised they were without any rights whatsoever in Sudan. A number of cases I came across in which pilgrims had returned to Nigeria could be traced to the aftermath of this occur­ rence. Villages of about 4000 or more have a right to a clinic, piped water and electricity. Perhaps because of this, immigrant villagers often exaggerate the population of their communities when one attempts to find out the number of inhabitants. In the case of the West Africans, however, their actual numbers make no difference since they live in what are classified as ‘camps’, not permanent settlements. The tactic of inflating their numbers nonetheless, enhances the impression, which they always seek to convey, that they are not being treated on equal terms with the Sudanese villagers. Personal communication from a visiting midwife from the Local Health Ministry, Wad Medani, December 1983. The neighbours of the pilgrims were a group of Darfurians who lived in a camp next to the West Africans. They were not Muslims and they used to brew a sort of alcoholic drink from dhurra, something of which the West Africans emphatically disapproved. This is a widely held view. Balamoan (in his 1976 book and also in comments written to me in response to an unpublished paper of mine) is perhaps the only one who refuses to accept this as a fact, not because it is not a view held by a many Sudanese but because he happens to know several counter-examples to the

215

NOTES

claim that West Africans do not aspire to higher education. Be that as it may, West Africans immigrants in Sudan were (and still are) regarded as ‘ignorant and uneducated’ just as Nayal (1969) describes them. My experiences during fieldwork confirm this. I was told, for instance, that I would not find a single West African pursuing higher education at Gezira University. I discovered this to be wrong (see Yamba 1985). 12. For a lengthy discussion of the measures the SGB considered in its attempt to curb the practice of sharecropping, particularly the cultivation of groundnuts, see Abdalla Omar Tamin (1980). 13. Sura 2, 276ff. of the Quran is very clear on this. Those who practise usury both forfeit God’s blessings in this world, and are doomed to eternal hellfire in the next. chapter

4

1. Wad Medani, the capital of the Blue Nile Province, had a population of 194,774 according to figures supplied by the Sudan Gezira Board quoted in El Arifa (1982). 2. Stray dogs were a true menace in Wad Medani during my fieldwork. In the nights their howls reverberated over the wide open spaces like a strange music. In the daytime they roamed about in packs and occasionally bit someone. During my fieldwork, a campaign to destroy stray dogs was started in Khartoum in an effort to reduce the threat of rabies. In three weeks alone 11,886 dogs were shot in (and around) Khartoum. See Sudannow, Vol. 8, No. 5, May 1985. No such campaign was initiated in Wad Medani. 3. The wording of the photographic licence issued to me by the security authorities in Wad Medani, 1983. 4. One of these informants was a female university student, herself married with two children. I have since discovered that notions of sexual pollution are also common in West Africa. Bathing is believed to be able to wash away sexual pollution. A man would wash meticulously before touching his talismans and amulets. I am indebted to Dr Ulla Wagner for this information. 5. This kind of hospitality is also common enough in West Africa. Many of the groups there have a special greeting with which to greet someone who is passing by when one is eating. And there is always the counter-greeting of ‘thanks for the invitation’. But this is a matter of form. The invited do not expect the stranger actually to sit down and eat with them. In the Sudan, however, such appears to be the case. Strangers do sometimes sit down to a meal just because they happen to be at the place at that point in time and no one appears to be in the least surprised. The West African behaviour of indiscriminate commensality here, therefore, is partly an extension of their own custom, reinforced by the great Sudanese custom of hospitality. 6. This is very common Sudanese (Islamic) behaviour although many Sudanese would also have washed their hands before the meal. 7. In 1983, during my fieldwork, the Sudanese pound was valued at c. 50 pence. 8. See Chapter 5 on the difficulties involved in trying to obtain documents of citizenship. Unfortunately I was unable to find out in what manner this sum of money was to be used for getting a passport. It was certainly not a sum that was meant to cover a mere passport fee. 9. In Ibadan, Cohen (1969: 58) found out that a man who has performed ablution for prayers would have to perform that ablution again if in the meantime he had talked

216

10.

11.

12.

13.

14.

15. 16.

PERMANENT PILGRIMS

with his wife, 'let alone come into physical contact with her’. Alhaji Ahmed and his entourage refused to shake hands with an important European lady visitor when they were on their way to the mosque. I mentioned this to some Sudanese informants who commented that the pilgrims must have been rude not to have shaken the lady’s hand. They had themselves shaken hands with pilgrims on countless occasions without being snubbed. Though Muslims, they did not appear to see any religious ground for the refusal to shake hands. It is interesting to note that the pilgrims would perhaps prefer to perform ritual ablution twice rather than offend their Sudanese hosts, while they chose to demonstratively decline to shake hands with a European visitor to emphasise their religion, even though such a visitor is regarded by them as of a higher status than themselves. These figures are based on data collected on twelve weddings which took place in Wad Medani during the course of my fieldwork. One Sudanese wedding, that of a young man just returned from Saudi Arabia, had 500 guests, all of whom were fed a rich four-course meal, each guest getting at least a bottle of Pepsi Cola or Fanta, and sweet tea afterwards. I was unable to find out the cost of this wedding, but the Khartoum musicians who entertained the guests charged a fee of £S1000 per evening. Another Sudanese wedding, of a young man employed as a driver in a government office, had about forty guests who were provided only with Pepsi Cola and other soft drinks and sweets. In contrast, the West African weddings I attended, when they were of an elaborate size, had at most between twenty and thirty guests. None of them provided meals. The usual arrangement was to have some form of an ‘open house’ and people came and went without any formality. From a tape-recording outside the home of the Kola Man, Wad Medani, 4 October 1983. My use of the phrase ‘mumbo jumbo’ here is deliberate. Since it is undoubtedly a value judgement, some qualification is required. My point of departure is that it is impossible to double money by magical means, a point of view I must necessarily hold in order to examine later, as I propose to do, how fakis can persist as respectable members of their own communities, despite their activities. But although, as the observing analyst, I regard their activities as dubious - a prerequisite to the posing of any questions on why they persist - my scepticism must not be taken to mean a denial that beliefs in their powers exist or that those who believe in such powers are fools, for example. My value judgement thus reflects my own scepticism as regards the professed powers of fakis rather than a denial of prevailing ontological beliefs in their powers, which, as an anthropologist, I must accept as given and valid. An exception here is the Senegambia region where many of the ‘marabouts’ have a residential base where they function locally and carry out some extraordin­ ary feats yet are respected members of the community. See Cruise O’Brien (1971). Gaily’s paper is full of interesting ethnographic detail. One aspect of particular interest is that Gaily shows how even facts about the powers of a fictitious faki, invented by a group of students, took on more and more fantastical proportions so that later on it was difficult to convince some of these people that this particular faki in fact did not exist. In Wad Medani (in 1983) about 200 grammes of agashe sold for £S1, while the price of a whole kilo of meat was £S0.85. I am indebted to an anonymous reader for the IAI for pointing out that in Nigeria, too, agashe with its special spices is known for exciting sexual potency.

NOTES

217

CHAPTER 5

1. The numbers of pilgrims from West Africa have steadily increased since the 1950s. In 1957 about 49,000 Nigerians made the pilgrimage and by 1977 the number had risen to 106,000, the second highest in the world. It must be remembered that this increase took place despite governmental attempts to reduce the numbers of pilgrims through currency exchange restrictions and the barring of pregnant women, for example. See Clarke 1982: 246-7. 2. Robinson makes too much out of the Hausa Muslims purported inclination towards lying. He believes that Hausa pilgrims probably never enter the enclosure in Mecca where the Kaaba is placed since ‘he who enters there must vow never again to lie’ (1896). He cites Burton (1855) on a Hindu who tells of how he had not performed his pilgrimage properly, as it would have entailed that he ceases ever to tell a lie and that, he felt, would have ruined him. Robinson then quotes Burton (who makes the point) that ‘Lying to the Oriental is meat and drink and roof that shelter him’ (Robinson 1896: 200). One cannot help wondering if Robinson himself was not a victim of a version of the liar paradox. He reports elsewhere (ibid.: 92) that he heard a Hausa say ‘We Hausa are all liars, but these English are not,’ and yet he evidently must have believed this particular Hausa, thus reinforcing his conviction that all Hausa are liars. 3. M. G. Smith is not primarily concerned with diaspora formation or the weakness of Hausa kinship structure, but he contributes to such a thesis by implication. He points out that there is a rigorous avoidance of the first-born among the Hausa: ‘Throughout their lives, a parent of either sex and the first-born child observe a rigorous avoidance-relation, which is hardly relaxed even in private . . .’ (1964: 26). Tensions resulting from such a relationship might easily lead first-born children (males in particular) eventually to seek their fortunes else­ where. Cohen (1969), however, makes a strong case on how the weakness of Hausa bilateral kinship structure leads to a lack of ‘pull’ factors in Hausaland for the Hausa immigrants in Sabo. He shows, for example, that many of the immigrants do not remember the names of their grandparents on either side. He points out that this, together with a high rate of divorce and child-fostering, has led to a weakening of primary family ties. Hence Cohen draws the following conclusion: ‘this means that the moral pressure on a man to return to the North to fulfil obligations to kin is not a very strong one’ (1969: 43). By contrast, he points out that in other parts of Africa, immigrants keep in touch with their kinsmen, send them remittances, visit them regularly and eventually return to their native areas during old age or in time of need (Cohen loc. cit.). In this manner an emotional and institutional relationship is maintained over time and the ‘pull’ of home is kept alive. This provides, I believe, a convincing explanation of why members of such societies which have strong kinships bonds (Cohen takes migrants in East African societies as an example of this kind ) are not very likely to form diasporas. 4. I know of only one attempt that comes close to the effort to reduce the whole pilgrimage-urge into clearcut hypotheses derived from correlations between variables as regards motives for the actors. These were then systematically examined against ethnographic evidence, ending with what seems to me to have been disastrous results. Even if the approach was methodically and scientifically correct, it was an example of scientism at its most extreme. See Hickey et al., 1979. 5. See Azarya 1978: 89 for a clear exposition of this point of view.

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6. See Levtzion (1983) and Al-Naqar (1972) for excellent accounts of this long tradition of royal pilgrims in West Africa. 7. Indeed, Al-Naqar holds that ‘it was the eventual [political] successes of FellataHajj Umar which focused attention on his pilgrimage’. 8. Madhahib, schools of interpretation of Muslim Law. There are four orthodox schools of interpretation, namely (1) The Maliki founded by Imam Malik b. Amas (d.799); (2) The Hanbali founded by Imam Ahmad b. Hanbal (d. 855); (3) The al Shafii founded by Imam Muhammad al-Shafii (d. 820); and (4) The Hanifa founded by Imam Abu Hanifa. See Encyclopaedia of Islam. 9. Not all of those who have performed the pilgrimage were Muslims. A number of invaluable accounts we have on the pilgrimage were left by non-Muslims who managed to perform the pilgrimage to Mecca (or just to visit Mecca), in disguise. See, for example, Burckhardt (1829); Burton (1855); and Keane (1887) for some of these accounts of Mecca in the last century. 10. The Al Shafii school allows the pilgrimage to be performed on behalf of a dead person who has left a will stating such a request. In this manner a person can, as it were, perform the pilgrimage from beyond the grave, through the hiring of a deputy out of the person’s estate. 11. See ‘Hadjdj’ in Encyclopaedia of Islam. 12. Apart from his supreme role in spreading the Tijaniyya order in the Western Sudan, Al Hajj Umar was to lead a great Jihad of his own against local unbelievers and the French. His close relationships with the contemporary rulers of Burno, Sokoto and with Macina (Mali), as well as his own Futa Toro, reinforces the picture I tried to paint in Chapter 2 of the existence of what might have been an Islamic Commonwealth of ideas and beliefs at that time. I believe J. D. Hargreaves must have had something similar in mind when he speaks - rather modestly - of the ‘underlying unity of West African Islam,’ it was certainly something more than that. See Hargreaves (1963). Also quoted in Crowder 1968: 38. 13. According to Trimingham 1959: 90, Dan Fodio himself discouraged tomb rever­ ence. 14. But desirable, certainly from the point of view of African politicians who would advocate a melting-pot ideology since they would see the transference of local/ethnic loyalties to state/national loyalties as a prerequisite to nation-building and nationhood. 15. My dissatisfaction with this view must result from the very fact that much of what anthropologists have discussed under the rubric of ethnicity is derived from the substitution of an emic term, tribalism, supposedly purged of its valueloadedness, for ethnicity, a more sociologically potent term, because its proponents would hold it is, in Weberian terms, wertfrei. Tribalism is not ethnicity as described in the British context or as observed in America. There may be structural similarities between the two types of phenomena observed in two separate contexts. But a rejection of emic terms because they are value-laden for etic terms that are supposedly better analytical tools is only a form of essentialism that can result in misleading generalisation in the hands of the less wary. Such, unfortunately, is the case with the term ethnicity which has been very much in vogue in anthropology since the latter part of the 1960s. 16. But the rigar saki, a gown made from handwoven and embroidered material, and the wandon saki, likewise, trousers made from handwoven cloth, would be much more suitable for finer occasions, or for one who can afford to pay for them. 17. Cf. the comparative price of a fine jellabiya in Wad Medani (1982) which cost under £S20.

NOTES

219

18. I once heard a young pilgrim, who had lived for some time in Syria, try in vain to convince some fellow pilgrims that he had once worked for a Christian Arab family. His listeners said that he must be mistaken; that the family had probably Greek ancestry or some other European background and who somewhere along the line had adopted Arabic as their language because it was superior to their own. When the young man pointed out that there were many Copts in nearby Wad Medani who were Christians and yet spoke Arabic, they saw this as only confirming their point: Copts were actually Turawa, Europeans, they held. 19. Supplement No. 1 To the Sudan Nationality Act 1957, Nr 22, Part 2 rules that one can become a Sudanese citizen if one is of ‘Sudanese descent’ and if at the coming into force of the Act one has been domiciled since December 1897 or else whose ancestors in the direct male line since that date have been domiciled [in the Sudan]. This rules out many West Africans but the same Act allows that one can also become a citizen through nationalisation if one has resided for ten years in the country, ‘is of age and capacity, and domiciled immediately proceeding the application’. This is for those who have a command of good Arabic. Those without a ‘good’ grasp of Arabic require twenty years before they can become citizens, but all these requirements are qualified by the demand that one be ‘of a good character’. This legal doublethink (or talk) contains enough to make it almost impossible for many to become citizens irrespective of the number of years they have lived in the Sudan. In the late 1970s the Sudan Nationality Regulations underwent a basic amendment whereby the date 1897 is changed into 1924. I am indebted to an unknown reader for the IAI for pointing out this fact to me. 20. It would be fair to point out that it is not only West African pilgrims who have difficulties proving they are citizens of Sudan. During my fieldwork a young man from southern Sudan employed by the University of Gezira was refused nationality papers by the authorities on the grounds that he could not speak Arabic properly. In this case things were quite easily resolved, as the young man in question needed a passport to travel to Europe for some training sponsored by a European university. 21. Kirk-Greene (1963), in a very interesting analysis, has shown how the Hausa lan­ guage always turns first to Arabic to borrow terms for foreign words that are new to its own culture, or how, not finding a satisfactory term it incorporates the foreign term, or paraphrases it in a manner not very dissimilar to the examples I give above. 22. I am indebted to Angela Bowyer who conducted fieldwork among Sudanese Arab women at the time of my fieldwork for this information. 23. It is difficult to receive Nigerian radio broadcasts in the Gezira region, even on a reasonably powerful wireless receiver, although one can easily to get the BBC World Service Hausa broadcasts. 24. The young man in question later married an Arab woman and compounded his misdeeds by not inviting a single one of his West African relatives the wedding. Later on, when I got to know him, his marriage had broker down and he had left the police force and moved to Khartoum where he had become an untiring propagator for West African pilgrim rights. He kept waging a battle against the Nigerian Embassy which, because of his perfect Arabic and inadequate Hausa, would not give him a passport. 25. It came as a surprise to one of my informants that his village was labelled as a ‘camp’ by the authorities: ‘I had always thought that when we say “campo” we mean those settlements in which you find all these Sudanese unbelievers from

220

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the West and the South who do not pray, and who brew alcohol. They usually cater for the Sudanese who arrive in the evenings in their cars to drink. Why do they call our villages “campos”?’ 26. From an informant in Wad Fellata. CHAPTER 6

1. See Chapter 1 on the issue of metaphysical speculation in anthropology. 2. The inhabitants of Wad Fellata are almost to a man the supporters of the Muslim Brotherhood and the Ansar party. They were jubilant when Sharia law was imposed on the entire country and approved the first publicised amputations of the hands of two thieves towards the end of my fieldwork. 3. Boswell reports Johnson as saying to him: ‘My dear friend . . .You may say talk as other people do: you may say: “Sir, I am your humble servant”. You are not his humble servant. You tell a man, “I am sorry you had bad weather . . .” You don’t care a sixpence whether he was wet or dry. You may talk in this manner; it is the mode of talking in society: but do not think foolishly’ (1783). 4. This is because a speaker who invokes the concept is, as it were, waving a flag that he belongs to the same normative system, the precepts of which he adheres to as much as those whom he addresses. Malam Abubakar expressed his suspicion on the contents of a letter he received from a purported relation which did not begin with the formula ‘Bismillah Praise to Allah the most merciful’. This provided sufficient grounds for him to doubt the information it contained. Similarly, any use of Insha’Allah precludes any grounds for doubt as a point of departure. 5. For the various Sudanese usages of this concept, I am indebted to students of the University of Gezira, with whom I had many informal discussions. I own a specific debt, however, to the second-semester students of rural development (1983-4) of the same university, for many illuminating discussions and for essays they wrote on this theme. The general line that emerged from these essays was: ‘We use Insha'Allah because we are a religious people. You say to somebody you will see him tomorrow, Insha'Allah, because you don’t know what Allah has planned for you tomorrow. It is just to guard yourself. But we also use it because that is the proper way of talking.’ This was certainly the educated and reflected view. My first encounter with Insha'Allah in Sudan was in a different domain. A gregarious taxi-driver, whom I hired at the start of my fieldwork, drove at an immense speed although he seemed to be able to stop the car only after stepping on and pumping his brakes several times before they had any effect at all. Terrified, I asked him kindly to slow down. He said. ‘My friend if it is written that you will die in Sudan you will die. Nothing I do can change that, Insha’Allah.' 6. This is also an instance in which commonly held beliefs among the pilgrims differ from orthodox Sunni views. For instance, Al-Naqar (1972: 130) notes that there are three major views in Islam on the pilgrimage as absolution: the first holds that the pilgrimage, atones for all sins, the second that it atones for all but major sins, kaba ir, while the third holds that it atones for the sins of one year, that is, between one pilgrimage period and the next (loc. cit.). As Al-Naqar further notes, it is true that: ‘the belief in this attribute of the pilgrimage is a major motive for Muslims to make the pilgrimage’ (loc. cit.). I think it could be plausibly argued that traditionally it is this third view that is predominant in West Africa.We might extrapolate the following from the above: theoretically,

NOTES

7.

8.

9. 10.

11.

221

the belief that the pilgrimage redeems sins between one pilgrimage period and the next will require that in order to be free from sins, a person must either abstain from sins or go recurrently on the pilgrimage. This yields a certain logic to the recurrent pilgrimages that are common among the pilgrims. Some post-Reformation churches went so far as to reject this fundamental Chris­ tian teaching, holding instead that Christ died for the chosen ones alone (see Weber 1930: 104). This is very clear in the Bible from the Book of Jonah, perhaps one of the most human of the prophets. Jonah is commanded by God to go to Nineveh (an Assyrian city) to warn the inhabitants to change their ways or suffer God’s wrath. Jonah does not want to prophesy because of the possibility that the city would repent and therefore be saved. So he decides to escape, boarding a ship that sails in the opposite direction. A severe storm strikes the vessel and nothing the crew do seems to help, the storm neither ceasing nor founding the ship. Jonah confesses that it is his presence on board that is causing the storm and asks the crew to throw him overboard. They do so and the storm subsides. How he is swallowed by the great whale and how he prays for mercy and is vomited out on dry land is all well-known. What is less well-known is that God again commands him to go to Nineveh. Jonah now obeys. He prophesies doom; the people repent and God spares them. But then Jonah becomes angry and leaves the city, still hoping that God would destroy it just as he has prophesied. A plant grows overnight and provides him with shelter but a great worm emerges and destroys the plant. Jonah is embittered by this. It is then that God admonishes Jonah by saying ‘You pity the plant for which you did not labour, nor did you make it grow . . . And should not I pity Nineveh, that great city in which there are more than a hundred and twenty thousand persons who do not know their right hand from their left, and also much cattle?’ I am most grateful to Rabbi Morton Narrowe for calling my attention to this important aspect of prophecy in religious life. The pilgrims, as we have seen, similarly rule that all those who reject the pilgrimage are to be considered damned. Polanyi’s comments on the persistence of the Zande beliefs in witchcraft, despite adverse evidence, is pertinent to the pilgrims’ beliefs in the power of fakis and the force of Insha’Allah. According to Polanyi (1958) the stability of such beliefs rests on their circularity, followed by the automatic expansion of the circle to incorporate subsidiary interpretations within the system, resulting finally in what he calls the principle of suppressed nucleation. With the Azande, ‘the contradiction between one mystical notion is explained by reference to another mystical notion’ (Evans-Pritchard 1937: 339). Circularity and self-expansion, he notes, ‘protect an existing system of belief against doubts arising from any adverse piece of evidence’, while ‘supressed nucleation prevents the germination of alternative concepts on the basis of any such evidence’ (Polanyi 1958: 290-1). From a correspondent of the BBC in an edition of the programme ‘Focus on Africa’, Autumn 1983. CHAPTER 7

1. The closing scene of Fleckers’ (1922) play. 2. There is an interesting side issue here to the whole question of mystification in anthropology. In dealing with certain types of phenomena we label mystifying, we have to grapple with this issue: whether or not we can validly reject emic

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views of reality where some of the phenomena which make up that reality can be shown as objectively contradicting professed aims, or producing some conse­ quence (or a set of consequences) which the people themselves neither see nor accept. Early anthropological assumptions on the role of symbols in social life would have unhesitatingly answered in the affirmative (although one of the pro­ fessed strengths of functionalist anthropology was the ability to present explan­ atory models which were closer to indigenous ones). For example, Fortes and Evans-Pritchard (1940: 17-18) could attribute the efficacy of kingship symbols among certain African groups to their inability to grasp the symbols objectively. However sceptically this might be viewed by anthropologists today, it must, nevertheless, be conceded that a strong case could be made for this claim: for any symbols to be efficacious and conative they must have some built-in mystifying aspect. 3. In a similar manner, I often found myself introduced by the pilgrims to their Sudanese acquaintances with the words: ‘This is one of our people. He is a “Fellata”, but he is here from a European university, and lives in the University here. He has a room at the university, too, and has a Landrover and a driver [which I did not].’ As I have recounted elsewhere (see Yamba 1985), some of the West Africans resented the fact that I was not treated with, or did not command the respect they felt was deserving of a visiting Swedish researcher who happened to be black and originally from West Africa. Such ambivalence permeated most aspects of my relationship with the pilgrims as well as my Sudanese hosts.

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The Holy Bible The Holy Quran

INDEX

Abdul-Kerim, 112,117 Abdullahi of Gwandu, 46 Abu Hanifa, Imam, 130,131,218n Abubakar Faki Ahmed, Malam, 58-63,96, 156,157,158,162-3,169,180,185,213n Abun-Nasr, J. M., 134 Adeleye, R. A., 49 Agar, M. H., 194-5 agashe (spiced meat), 76,99, 103, 113, 216n Ahmed, Alhaji, the Kola Man, 101-5,106, 144, 188,216n Ahmed Beita Yusuf, 8 Ajayi, J. F. A., 49 Alhaji, pilgrim title, 77-9, 126, 127, 155, 202 Allah i keka Makkah (may Allah send you to Mecca), 136 Al-Maghili, Muhammad, of Tuat, 39,41,211n Al-Naqar, U., 5,28,34,48,129-31,132,133, 134, 135, 151,220n Amin, Idi, 66 animism, 36, 37-8, 39 Ansar Party, 220n Arabia, 4, 41, 49; see also Saudi Arabia Arabic language, 1, 80, 101, 106,114, 118, 139, 141, 142, 143, 144-5, 148, 151, 199, 211n,212n,219n Arensberg, C., 87 Asante (Ashanti), 107,210n, 212n Askia Dawud, Songhay ruler, 37 Askiya Muhammed, 37 Attahiru, Caliph, 50 avoidance-relations (between first-born and parents), 217n Azande, 14, 111, 163,221n Azarya, V., 122, 126, 129, 211n

baki (strangers), 138 Balamoan, G. A., 5,64,68,206n, 207n, 213n, 214n

Balewa, Alhaji the Hon. Sir Tafawa, 127 baraka (divine grace), 6, 73, 97, 100, 187 Barnett, T., 69, 86,213n, 214n Barth, F., 35, 138, 191,211n Barth, Henry, 211n Bateson, G., 89 Bawa Jan Gwarzo, Sarkin Gobir, 42,45 Bedouin, 71-2 begging, beggars, 11,95,98,99,100,114,118, 119; formula-chanting, 115; religious, 115 Bello, Alhaji the Hon. Sir Ahmadu, 127-8,129 Bemba, Ahmadu, 135 Biobaku, S. and Al-Hajj, M., 48 birane (sing. birni: walled cities), 35 Birks, J. S., 7,63, 66,67,68, 150, 187, 213-14n Blackwell, H. F., 50 Bloch, M., 188-9 Blue Nile, river, 94,166 Blue Nile Province, 103, 150,215n Bokassa, ruler of Central African Republic, 66 bongo (marijuana), 71,106,147 bori (Hausa divination cult), 98 Borno,37,134 Boswell, J., 220n boundary maintenance (between groups), 138, 146 Bovill, E. W. H.,210n Bowman, G., 6, 8, 207n Bowyer, Angela, 219n Boyd, A., 35 Brenner, L., 210n brides, 91,105-6,146 bridewealth, 24 British colonial rule, 4, 5, 31, 33,46,48,49, 1,53, 5058, 59, 63-4, 181 Buddhism, Sri Lankan, 25 Buhari, Waziri, 50 Bunyan, John, 9,10

232

PERMANENT PILGRIMS

Burckhardt, J. L., 218n Burmi, battle of (1903), 50, 51 Burton, R. F., 217n, 218n butchers, 98,99, 113

Calvinists, 173-4 Camus, Albert, 193 capitalism, predestination and rise of, 170, 173-4, 177-8 Caplan, L., 87, 88 ‘Cecilia’, American teacher, 166-8 Central African Republic, 66 Chad, 5, 33, 55, 60,65,66, 67, 74; civil war in, 66,67 charms, selling of, 98,99, 107, 108, 119,175 Christianity, 49, 122, 123, 126, 128, 136, 170, 171-2 173, 177-8, 179,219n, 221n circumcision, female and male, 13 city-states, 35-6 Clapperton, H., 35,211n Clarke, B. P., 212n clothing, Islamic/Hausa, 139, 140-1, 146 Cohen, Abner, 19, 20,21,22,24, 87, 88,96, 98,101,108,114,124,126,127,129,130, 134, 136, 138, 140, 187, 217n Collingwood, Robin, 13,27, 30, 32, 153, 183-4,210 concepts, key verbal, 23-6 ‘cosmological’ world (wannan duniya), pil­ grims’ concept of, 158-9,160 cotton production, 68, 69, 70, 74, 77, 84, 85, 86,112,117 credit relations, 85-6, 87-91, 92, 113, 118, 189; see also debts crocodile-catching, 62,213n cultural propensities model, 122-5 Culwick, G. M., 86,91,116 Dagomba malams, 107 Dan Fodio, see Usman dan Fodio dan/yan kassa (children of the land), 138,139 Darfur, Sudan, 33 Daura city state, 36 deaths, views on, 82, 164-6, 170, 174, 180 debts (bashi), indebtedness, 12, 28, 65, 86-91, 92,93,118,124,155,156,161,189;cold, 88-9; warm, 89-91, 118, 189, 191 dhurra, cultivation of, 84, 85 diseases and illness, 76; sexually transmitted, 82-3 dissenters, 147-50, 192 diviners, divination, 98, 100, 166, 180 Dobyns, H. F., 7-8 Duffield, M., 2, 5,40, 58, 142, 148, 149 Dunn, J. and Robertson, A. F., 196 education, Quranic, 28, 57, 58-9, 76, 79-83,

191, 196, 199,209n; secular, Western­ style, 80-1 Egypt, 41, 66,180 Eickelman, D. F., 8, 9,97 El Fasher, 55, 56 El Geneina, 60 El Hosh, western Gezira, 147 Eliade, M., 13, 209n End of Time, Islamic belief in imminent, 4-5, 33,46,48, 161, 181 ethnic difference, symbolism of, 138 Evans-Pritchard, E. E., 14,20, 33, 111, 163, 195, 196,221n, 222n

Faki Abdulai Ahmed, 144, 202 fakis, 28-9, 73, 83, 92,94,96-8, 99, 100, 103, 107-12,118,119,140,146,147,157,168, 170, 177, 180, 191, 192, 193,213n, 216n; and divine design, 174—6 false consciousness, notion of, 29, 186, 188, 189,190 farm work, 83-7,98, 116 fasting (sawm), 130 Feinberg, R., 17 Fellata (West Africans living in Sudan), 5-6, 137, 140, 145, 148, 151, 155, 199,200, 206-7n fiqh (theoretical Islamic law), 132 Firth, R., 19, 87, 88,90,208n Fisher, H. J., 35, 36, 37 Flecker, James Elroy, 210n Flint, J. E.,49 Fort Lamy, 55, 60 Fortes, Meyer, 166, 196, 209-101n, 222n fortune-tellers, 98, 111 Fuglestad, F., 35, 36 Fulani, 3, 5, 38-47,48,49,74, 110-11, 149, 210-11n; and British colonial rule, 49-51, 53, 59, 63; jihads, 34, 35, 37, 39,40-2, 45-7, 50, 59, 124, 132, 134; nomadic pas­ toralists, 39,42,45, 211n; settled town, 39,40, 210-11n Fulbe, 123 fundamentalists, 1,193 funerals/burials, 91, 105, 150, 198 Furet, F., 183 FutaToro, 39,40, 134,218n Gaily, A., 110,216n Gaitskell, Arthur, 64,67,70, 214n Galgani, Blue Nile Province, 150 gari (settlements), 35 Gari Baki (village of strangers), 102 Geertz, Clifford, 20-1, 187, 190, 195,208n Gellner, E., 14, 15, 38,47,71, 72, 196 Gezira (Sudan), 6, 11, 56, 57, 58,61-2,65, 67,68,95, 147-8, 149, 151, 160, 185;

INDEX complementarity of town and country, 117-18,119-20; ethnic groups in, 137; inter-village relationships, 91-2; rural dwellers, 27-8,65-93,94,98,106-7; Uni­ versity of, 81,147, 214n, 215n, 219n, 220n; urban centres, 93, 94—120; Wad Fellata, 72-92; Wad Medani, 94-117 Gezira Scheme, 64,65, 72, 74, 81, 84-6, 95, 119, 148,198-9, 214n; tenants of, 69, 70, 71, 73, 74, 77, 84-5, 86, 88-9,90, 213n; wakil system, 69, 70, 82, 84-5, 86; and West Africans, 68-70 al-Ghali, Muhammad, 134 Ghana, 3, 5, 107, 138, 139, 196 gifts (chauta) and counter-gifts, 156-7, 167, 168; see also credit; debts Giriama, 93 Gobir city-state, 36,40,41,42,210n Goody, J., 47, 212n Gordon, General, 171 graves of religious leaders, visits to, 135 Great Nubian Desert, 34 Greenberg, J. H., 130 groundnuts, 84, 85, 86, 89, 106,215n Gwandu, 46, 59,61 Habal, Ahmad B., 136 Hajiya, 52-8, 59,64, 81-2, 141, 185,212n, 213n Hanbali school of interpretation, 130,131, 218n Hanifa school of interpretation, 130,131,218n Hannerz, U., 137 Hargreaves, J. D., 218n Hassan, Alhaji, polygynous family of, 77-9 Hassan Ibrahim, Alhaji, 155, 202 Hassoun, I. A., 64,69, 70,213n Hausa, Hausaland, 1, 2, 3-6, 22, 36, 38, 95, 96,98, 101, 103, 104, 107, 112, 114, 118, 127,138,139-40,143,156,157,166,196, 211n, 212n, 213n, 217n; before the Fulani jihads, 35-7,40; British colonial rule, 4, 5,48, 49, 50-1, 53, 59; conversion to Islam, 3, 36-7; culture, 2, 3, 136; dis­ senters and potential conflict, 148, 149, 150; ethnic embroidered dress and cap, 139, 140-1, 146; greetings, 121; jihads, 4, 34, 35, 37, 39,40-2,45-7, 50, 52, 59; Kano Chronicle, 36-7, 38, 39, 209n; lan­ guage, 2, 3-4, 5, 74,96, 142, 143-5, 146, 149, 151, 196, 199, 219n; long-distance trade, 3, 38, 124; and Mahdism, 48-9; maigidas, 96; migration, 50-2, 53-64, 67, 124-5; Sokoto Caliphate, 4, 5,47,49-50; yawon Dandi, concept of, 124-5; see also Islam; Northern Nigeria; West African pilgrims in Sudan

233

health and hygiene, 76,106 Heathcote, D., 140 Hijra (emigration for religious reasons), 41,48, 2,53 51Hill, Polly, 129 Hiskett, M., 40, 41,42,46,48, 211n, 212n historical heritage of West African pilgrims, 182-4 history: Collingwood’s views on, 27,32,183-4; as ‘modes of experience’, 32, 183-4; ‘mythical’, 30, 182; as a reconstruction, 183; and social anthropology, 30-3; of West African migrations to Sudan, 33-64, 183, 184, 210n Hodgkin, Elizabeth, 210n, 211n hoe, West African (kadanka Hausawiyya), 150-1 Holden, D. and Johns, R., 4 Hopen, C. E., 211n Horton, R., 166 Hughes, T. P., 91,165 Hunwick, J. O., 37 Hussey, E. J., 213n

Ibn Hanbali, school of, 130,131,218n Ibn Khaldun, 71-2 Ibn Saud, 4 Idrissu, pilgrim, 142-3 Insha’Allah (God’s will), concept of, 15,28, 83, 86,155-6, 159, 160-7,172, 174, 175, 176, 177, 178-80, 191-2,220n Iran-Iraq war, 82 irrigation projects, 64,65,68-70 Islam, Islamisation, 3,4-5,6,28,33, 34-5, 36,49, 181; conversion in Hausaland to, 3, 36-47; culture, 49, 70-1; fiqh (theoret­ ical law), 132; Five Pillars of, 28,121,132, 136; fundamentalism, 1,193; fusion of an­ imism and, 37-8; Insha’Allah, concept of, 15, 28, 83, 86, 155-6, 159, 160-70, 172, 174, 175, 176, 177, 178-80, 191-2, 220n; jihads, 34, 35, 37, 39-47, 50, 59,91, 124, 132, 134, 164, 181-2, 211n, 218n; liter­ acy, 46, 47; madhabib schools, 130-3, 218n; metaphysics, 82, 83; mosques, 74—5, 104, 147, 150, 190, 192; pilgrim dress, 139, 140—1, 146; Quranic schools, 28, 57, 58-9, 76, 79-83, 106, 191, 199, 209n; sharia (canon law), 49,90, 167-8, 220n; the turuq and the power of dogma, 129-36; universalism of, 40; vital role of city life, 70-1 Islamic pilgrimage to Mecca (haj), 1,2,4, 6, 8, 12-13, 15, 17, 18, 26,28, 33-5,40-1, 46, 51-2, 53, 54-8, 59-63,64,67, 74, 78, 86, 102, 115, 152—80; cultural propen­ sities, 122-5; key concepts and precepts

234

PERMANENT PILGRIMS

of West African pilgrims, 154-70; as a paradigm for life, 12,181-93; pilgrims completing, 152, 153; power-prestige hypothesis, 122,125-9; and West African pilgrim subculture in Sudan, 121-51,152; see also West African pilgrims in Sudan istita a (ability to carry out pilgrimage), 130

James, F. L., 33-4,126 jangali (tax on cattle), 42,45 Jarvie, I. C., 12,207n Jawharat-el-Kamal (prayer), 133 Jibril bin ’Umar of Agades, 211n jihads (holy wars), 91,181-2, 211n, 218n; Fulani, 34, 35, 37, 39,40-2,45-6, 59, 124,132,134,164; some consequences of, 46-7 Johnston, H. A. S., 39,41,49, 50, 51 Johnston, Sir Harry, 209n Kachin, 14 Kano, 36-7, 38, 39, 50, 55, 59-60,61, 196, 197,210n Kano Chronicle, 36-7, 38, 39, 209n Kant, I., 208n Kapferer, B., 23,25,26, 187, 191,208n Katsina city-state, 36, 42 Keane, T. F.,218n Khartoum, 57,94,95,103,142,168,182,196, 197,215n King, R., 7 Kirk-Greene, A. H. M., 219n Kitab al Farq (Dan Fodio), 45 kola trade, 102, 104, 141, 188 Kumm, Karl, 35, 122, 123, 126

landlords, 28, 77, 118, 119, 146; absentee, 70, 84; urban, 92,94, 96,98,99, 101-7, 108, 113,118 landlord-fakis, 98, 99, 108, 109 language, 141-5,146,151 Last, D. M., 38, 39,41,45,46,47,49, 212n Leach, Sir Edmund, 14, 15, 16, 87,207n Leo Africanus, 210n Levtzion, N., 107,212n Lewis, I. M., 122 Libya, 66 literacy, Islamic, 35, 36,46,47, 132, 209n loans, 77, 89-90; interest on, 90 lorry-drivers, 3, 28,92,98,99, 101, 113-14, 118,119 Lugard, Lord, 48, 50, 51 Luo, 23, 24 MacIntyre, A., 14,17, 23 MacIver, A. M., 183-4 McLoughlin, P. F., 86,116,119

madhahib (Islamic schools of interpretation), 130-3, 218n Mahadi, Abdulahi, 47,211n Mahdi, Mahdism (in Sudan, 1881-98), 4-5, 31,46,48-9, 58,64,68, 123, 141, 182, 206n,207n maigida (Hausa house-owner), 96 malams, 3, 28, 54, 56, 57,83,92,94,96,97, 98,99, 107-8, 118, 124, 126, 158, 159, 166, 171, 174, 177, 192; solicitation of alms by, 115; talisman-selling, 107 Malcolm X, 213n malesh (‘it does not matter’) concept of, 180 Mali, 5, 36, 38, 39,218n Maliki doctrine, 130, 131, 133, 158,218n Mandelbaum, D., 15,178 Mansa Musa, 210n maraboutism, 97, 107, 108,216n Martin, B.G., 39,134 martyrdom, 133 Marx, Emanuel, 8,128 Marx, Karl, 186 Mayer, A. C., 87 Mecca, see Islamic pilgrimage to Mecca Medina, 8,41,49,135 Messerschmidt, D. A. and Sharma, J., 11 metaphysical and pragmatic views in social ex­ planation, 12-16 Mills, C. Wright, 207n missionaries, Christian, 49,123 money-doubling, 107, 109, 110-11, 175, 170 money-lenders/usury, 90,215n Monteil, V., 97,108 Moore, G. E., 208n Morinis, E. Allan, 7, 9 mosques, 74-5, 104, 147, 150, 190, 192 Mossi, 107 Mourides, 135 Muhammad the Prophet, 41,52,91,117,133, 136, 141, 152, 171, 181, 182 Muhammad Bello, Caliph, 46, 132-3, 134, 211n, The Tanbih, 132 Muhammad Rumfa, King of Kano, 39 Mumuni, Malam, 154-5,202 Muslim Brotherhood, 220n mystification, notion of, 29, 186-90, 221-2n

Nairobi, 24 name-giving ceremony, 91 Nass-al-gharib (Mahdist regime), 5 el Nayal, I. el T., 66,67,213-14n, 215n Nigeria, 66,67,73,74,77,102,103,106,114, 142-3, 147, 148, 155, 156, 159, 169, 185, 217; see also Northern Nigeria North Africa, 36,39,41; Muslim brotherhoods in, 39-40 Northern Nigeria, 3, 34,45,48-52, 102, 111,

INDEX 112, 123, 127, 135, 136, 140,154, 164, 181,183; colonial rule in, 4,5,31,33,46, 48,49,50-2,53,59,63; pilgrim migration to Mecca from, 1-3,4-6, 27, 33-5, 51-2, 53-8, 59-63,65-6; see also Hausa; West African pilgrims Nuer, 14,137 Nyala, 60,61, 67 The Obligations of Princes, 39 Oliver, R., 209n Olofson, H., 124,125 Omdurman, 4,182 ontology, notion of, 25-6, 28,208-9n oracles, 163 Ortner, S., 19,21, 208n Overing, Joanna, 12,207n Owusu, Maxwell, 196

Paden, J. N., 212n Palmer, H. R., 36, 37, 38, 39, 209n Parkin, D. J., 23-4, 26, 32,93, 153, 189, 190 Perham, Margery, 209n pilgrim villages in Gezira (Sudan: ‘work camps’), 1-3, 5, 6, 27-8, 56, 58, 65, 95, 106-7, 175, 183, 185-6, 187, 188, 198, 201,214n; changing names of, 72-3; in­ ter-village relationships, 91-2; Sheikhs of, 72-4,75, 77, 78, 101, 106-7, 185-6, 187-8, 190, 201; urban pilgrims’ seasonal visits to, 117-18; Wad Fellata, 58-9, 61-2,72-92, 146, 151, 161,216n, 220; see also West African pilgrims in Sudan pilgrimage, anthropologists and the study of, 6-12; as a paradigm for life, 181-93 poetry, Islamic, 135 Polanyi, Michael, 221n polygyny, 24, 77-9, 91, 146 Popper, K. R., 13, 23 Port Sudan, 11, 33, 57, 62, 155 power-prestige hypothesis, 122, 125-9 prayer(s) (salat), 100, 102, 104, 106, 130, 136, 190,192 predestination, doctrine of, 170, 171, 172-4, 175, 177; see also Insha’Allah prestige, see power-prestige hypothesis priest-chiefs, animist, 35 prophets, prophecy, 171—2, 175, 176, 191

Qadiriyya, 41,133,135 Quran, 3, 39,41,47,48,49, 59, 74, 80, 83, 96, 97, 98, 99,100, 104, 106, 107, 108, 141, 142, 144, 146, 147, 177,211n Quranic schools (khalwas), 28, 57, 58-9, 76, 79-83, 106, 191, 199, 209n Radcliffe-Brown, A. R., 30

235

Rahman Ahmed, Sheikh, 164-5, 202 Rattray, R. S., 209-10n Red Sea, 1,2, 33, 56,62, 142, 155, 213n Redfield, Robert, 7 religion, religious beliefs, 7,16,21,186-7,190 religious festivals, 7-8 rite of passage, 9 Robertson, A. F., 84, 107,213n, 214n Robinson, C. H., 35, 122-3, 125,217n rural dwellers, 27-8,65-93, 94,98, 106-7; complementarity of town and country, 117-18,119-20; cold and warm debts, 87-91; Gezira Scheme, 65,68-70, 71,72, 73, 74, 77, 81, 84-6, 88-9,90; inter-vil­ lage relationships, 91-2; polygynous pil­ grim family, 77-9; Quranic schools, 79-83; sharecropping and farm work, 83-7; Wad Fellata, 58-9, 61-2, 72-92 Ryle, G., 171

Sabo,Ibadan, 127, 217n saint worship, cult of, 135 salat (Islamic prayer), 130,136 Salat el-Fatih (special prayer in praise of Muhammad), 133 Sallnow, M. J., 6, 7,9,11,128 Sarauta (kingship) system, 47 sarki (Hausa chief), 35, 36 Saudi Arabia, 2, 57,62, 111, 147,155 segmentary lineage organisation, 24 sexual pollution, 100-1,215n Al-Shafii school ofinterpretation, 130,131,218n Shagari, Shehu, 201 sharecropping (sharik), 70, 74, 77, 78, 79, 82, 83-4, 85-6,90,93, 155, 185, 186, 191, 213n,215n sharia (Islamic canon law), 45, 85, 90, 167-8, 220n Sharia Wakil, 84, 85 Sheikhs, 161; of the khalwas, 79; West African village, 72-4, 75, 77, 78, 101, 106-7, 185-6, 187-8, 190, 201 Shekkarau, Sarki of Kano, 36-7 slavery, 45, 130, 211n, 212n Smith, H. F.C.,4 Smith, M. G., 33,42,118,124,126,129,211n, 217n social action and thought, analysis of, 16-23, 24,25,26 Sokoto Caliphate, 4, 5,47,49-59, 52, 134-5, 148,212n Sokoto province, 59, 73, 77-8, 112,218n Songhay, 37, 39 Strachey, Lytton, 171 stranger communities, see zongos Strong Form symbol (action) theory, 19-20, 21,23

236

PERMANENT PILGRIMS

subculture, notion of, 137-8 Sudan, colonialism in, 63-4; entering and leav­ ing from West Africa, 65-8; fieldwork in (App. I), 194-201; fundamentalism in, 1, 193; Gezira Scheme, 64,65,68-70,71, 72, 74, 77, 84-6, 88-9,90, 198-9; illegal immigrants, 66-8, 75; Islamic pilgrimage and West African subculture in, 121-51; isolation of pilgrim communities in, 192-3; Mahdism in, 4-5, 31,46,48-9, 58,64,68, 123, 141, 182; percentage of West African population in, 207n; poten­ tial conflict and the dissenters, 146—51, 192; rural dwellers, 66-93, 196; urban dwellers, 70, 71, 72, 74-5,93,94-120, 198; West African migration to, 1-6,27, 30, 50-64, 65-8; see also Wad Fellata; Wad Medani; West African pilgrims in Sudan Sudan Airways, 196-7 Sudan Gezira Board (SGB), 69,73,74,75, 84, 85,215n Sudan Nationality Act (1957), 142, 219n Suleman, Alih, 74 Sumption, J., 7 Sunni views, 165, 220n symbols, symbol-action theory, 19-22,23-4, 27,208n tailors, tailoring, 28,98, 99, 112, 118, 140 Takari (West African Muslims), 5-6, 56,61, 137, 142, 148 Takroori, 33-4 Tallensi, 166, 196, 210n Tamin, Omar Abdalla, 215n Ta’rikh al-Fattash, 37 Ta’rikh al Sudan, 212n tariqa, see turuq tenant-farmers, 95 theft, 166-8 Tijaniyya, 98, 129, 133-5, 218n Timbuktu, 38 Torodbe (Fulani), 39,40, 134 trading, Hausa, 3, 38,124 traditions, concepts of little and great, 7-8 travelling funds, pilgrims’, 157,158 Trimingham, J. Spencer, 40, 122, 123-4, 133, 134, 135, 136 Tuareg, 42 Turner, Victor, 7, 8, 9-11,12,19 Turner, V. and Turner, E., 8,10,128 turuq (sing, tariqa, religious orders), 129,133-5 Tuttu Matta village, 214n ‘two worlds’, pilgrims’ notion of, 158-60

ulama (Muslim clerics), 36, 38, 39,40,42,96, 210n,211n

Umar, Alhaji, 134-5,218n Umma (Muslim community), 174, 206n uncertainty principle, 172-3 Unis Baba Ahmad, 147-8,202 urban dwellers/pilgrims, 28, 70, 71, 72, 74-5, 93,94-120; complementarity of town and country, 117-18,119-20; fakis, 92, 94, 96-8,99,100,103,107-12; landlords, 92, 94, 96, 98, 99, 101-7, 118; lower occupa­ tional roles, 98,99,112-17,118; malams, 94,96,97, 98,99; Wad Medani, 94-117, 118 Usman dan Fodio, Shehu, 40,41-2,45,46, 48,49, 50,51, 134, 135,218n

vegetable-sellers/greengrocers, 98,99, 112, 113,118 Wad Ahmed, 62-3 Wad Fellata village, Gezira, 58-9,61-2,72-92, 152,161,216n, 220; cold and warm debts, 86-91; Alhaji Hassan’s polygynous family, 77-9; inter-village relationships, 91-2; Quranic schools, 79-83; Sheikh of, 73-4, 75, 77, 78 Wad Medani (town in Gezira), 6, 58,61, 72, 73-4,76,79,82,89,92,94-117,118,146, 147, 151, 167, 168, 198,214n, 215n, 219n; fakis, 94,96-8,99, 100, 103, 107—12; fieldwork in, 198,199; landlords, 92,94,96, 98,99, 101—7; lower occupa­ tional roles, 98,99,112-17; stray dogs in, 95,215n; two sets of occupational cat­ egories in, 96-101 Wad Numan, 81 Wagner, Dr Ulla, 215n Wahlquist, H., 88 wakils (agents for absentee landlords), 69, 70, 82, 84-5, 86, 90; Maktab, 84-5; Sharia, 84, 85 Waldman, Robinson, 211n Wangarawa traders and clerics, 36, 38 wasau (seizing of private property), 47 water, piped, 75,113,214n water-vendors, 98, 99, 112-13 wazifa (Islamic ritual duty), 133 Weber, Max, 16,170,173-4, 177-8,206n weddings, 91,195-6, 216n Werbner, R.P.,8,11 West African pilgrims in Sudan, 1-6, 27, 64, 52152-80; clothing and language: symbols of distinctiveness, 140-6; con­ cept of Insha'Allah, 15,28,83,86,155-6, 159, 160-70, 172, 174, 175, 176, 177, 178-80, 191-2; cultural propensities, 122-5; fakis and divine design, 170-6; Gezira Scheme, 68-70; historical heritage,

INDEX

182-4; Islamic pilgrimage and subculture, 121-51,152; isolation of, 192-3; key con­ cepts and precepts in ontology of, 154-70; the pilgrimage as a paradigm for life, 181-93; polygyny among, 77-9, 146; potential conflict and the dissenters, 146-51, 192; power-prestige hypothesis, 122, 125-9, 151; role of economic factors in migration of, 16,184-6; rural dwellers, 65-93; subordinate status, 160; ‘them and us’: primordial sentiments and objective difference, 136-40; urban dwellers, 94-120; as victims of mystification, 186, 187, 188-90; see also Islamic pilgrimage to Mecca wife-seclusion, 79,146

237

Willis, C. A., 107, 109, 125 wird (Sufi litany), 133 Wolof malams, 107 Works Jr, J., 7,96, 126, 136 Yakubu, King of Kano, 38, 39,40 Yamba, C. B.,40,81,180,192,194,200,222n yawon Dandi (‘roaming the world’), Hausa con­ cept, 124 Yunfa, King of Kano, 40,41-2 zakat (Islamic alms), 131 Zaria city-state, 36 zongos (stranger communities), 3,55,56,60-1, 138-9