The Tribal and Aboriginal People

Currently it is difficult to think that in the world groups of persons exist still today, uniforms in tribe, than in absolute poverty, they fight for the respect of their traditions and their habits, on the contrary we can’t live without technology and comfort and we have abandoned completely the idea to respect our culture.

In Europe there isn’t a big presence of these people who reveal themselves who are more numerous in Africa, Asia and Oceania. For giving an idea of how much the existence of these people has been hard I have shortly examined their history.

The tribal people presents in Africa are the Maasai people, situated in Kenya, the Ogoni people in Nigeria, and the Tuareg people situated in an immense territory among Algeria, Burkina Faso, Libia, Mali and Niger.

The Maasai lived around to the 1500 near the lake Turkana, in the north of Kenya, and in the two following centuries they moved in western Africa and particular way in the Rift Valley. The economy was based on the bovine breeding and still the herds cover great importance. Currently the number of the Masaai is much limiting with approximately 220.000 individuals in Kenya and 150,000 in Tanzania; both groups then are subdivided in other said subgroups iloshon. Extremely legacies to the traditions, the Maasai apply to the young people between the 14 and 18 years the circoncisione and the training to the war. On the political plan the first organizations were set up in the first years ninety with the First Conference of the Maasai on the Culture and Development (in 1991) and the foundation of the Pastoralist Network (in 1992), but the participation of Maasai to the reunions carried out from the UN for the elaboration of the Universal Declaration of the Rights of the Aboriginal People has not given turns out to you.

The Ogoni people, that he counts approximately 500.000 individuals, live in the Rivers Been, one of the 30 federate to form the Nigeria; the discovery of great resources of oil in years ' 50 was the fundamental aspect of the tragedy of the Ogoni in how much many resources was and is still on their lands. The exploitation of the oil resources caused changes acclimatizes them by now deep having the territory reduced to an immense marsh of water and oil. Years ' 80 saw the increase of the aboriginal protest to realize itself in 1990 with the birth of the Movement for the Survival of the Ogoni People (MOSOP), concentrated against the oil multinationals, in particular the Shell, responsible of the ecocide completed on the earth, founded from writer Ken Saro-Wiwa. The prize took part also Nobel Wole Soyinka, than, to the beginning of years ' 90, it denounced the behaviour of the Nigerian government and the oil multinationals. In the 1992 the presentation to the Nigerian government of the Ogoni Bill of Rights was had, a document in which the regional autonomy is asked and a partial control for the natural resources, later on, in the spring of the 1995 arrested Saro-Wiwa and they hung it, but the battle of the firm Ogoni and the MOSOP cannot be counted on own centers opened in Great Britain, the United States and also to Rome.

The Tuareg is nomadic people whom it currently counts approximately 1.500.000 individuals dispersed on an immense territory (2,500,000 of kmq), they are equips you of one own language and just an alphabet; the name "blue men" drift from the natural indigo with which they dye the own garments. In 1986, after the numerous crashes with near populations and the French colonialism, the Algerian government decided the expulsion of hundred of families from just the territory. In the 1991 the Tuareg the region from they joins to form the Forehead United for the defence of the Azawad lived; the hard crashes lead in 1992 to the stipulated National Pact with the government of the Evils, but 2 years after resumed the crashes, feed to you also from inner conflicts between the Tuareg, than still they live like dispersed between many countries.

In Asia there are the people Adivasi, in India and the 26 Small People of the North in Siberia.

The term hindi Adivasi indicates all the aboriginal populations of India; the native populations are subdivided in 4 great groups based on the language: we have therefore the groups dravidico, munda, Mon-khmer and tibetano-birmano. There are approximately 250 tribes and the numerical total of the entirety is estimable around 60,000 million. The people Dared themselves more numerous are the Bhil people, present in the states of Gujarat, Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh and Rajasthan, that counts approximately 3.000.000 of individuals. A time the bhil lived of hunting, fishes and collection while hour they are dedicated above all to agriculture and to the breeding, they practice an own religion with the own ones of and speak a said specific language bhili.

The population total of the Siberia is gone around 25,000,000 million persons and of these, approximately a million and half a lot between they for language, culture and economy is constituted from one some thirty of different aboriginal people. Most numerous, the Jacuti and the Komi live in one own independent republic. The economy is based on the fish resources and from the breeding of the reindeer practiced in the tundra. The Revolution of October and the development of successive Soviet politics ulteriorly got worse the life of the aborigines, above all for the intensive exploitation of the Siberian natural resources.

In Europe the more famous tribal people are that one of the Lapponi or Samit a present nomadic group in Finland, Sweden (10-20,000 individuals), Norway (4-6,000 individuals) and Russia (2,000 individuals) for a total of approximately 50.000 individuals near which one is still alive not Indo-European language of ugrofinnico stock (analogous therefore to the Finn). Currently only 10% of lapponi the dedication to the breeding of the reindeer that still covers however a fundamental importance for the culture and the economy are Sami and to the missionaries the translation of the language Sami to the beginning of the 800; in 1962, legal status for the language lappone and some shapes of protection has obtained the acknowledgment of one. They are not from underrating the ecological problems that the earth inhabited from Sami me is forced to endure. The construction of dams, the exploitation of the oil up sea and the vicinity of centers them nuclear places to the survival of the people Sami in function also of the existing indestructible tie between the nature and the culture to me lappone.

In Oceania there are the Aboriginals in Australia, the Nativi Hawaiani in the islands Hawai' i, the Maori people in New Zelanda and the Kanak people in New Caledonia.

To the aboriginals until XX the century it did not come granted no acknowledgment, but in years fifty, the aboriginals began to organize themselves and, in 1959, it came founded the Federal Council for the Defence Of the Aboriginals; they succeeded sensitive the population and they obtained the Australian citizenship. With the Stolen Generation, happened between years ' 10 and ' 70, thousands of aboriginal children they were embezzled to the natural families for being entrusted adoptive families in order to weaken the aboriginal demographic resources.

The Hawaiian archipelago, culturally and geographically pertaining to the Oceania, has been annexed, against the will of the population, to the USA, and before the arrival of European it was subdivided in three classes very distinguished and was while still alive a monarchic government. In the 1987 the sisters Mililani and Haunani-Kay Trask fuse the Ka Lahui Hawai' i (Hawaiian Assembly) for being able to give voice to the protest of the native populations. Currently the archipelago counts 1,150,000 inhabitants of which 20 % they are aboriginal. Improvements in the conditions of the Hawaiian people have still today not been taken place.

In New Caledonia the Kanak people fight from many decades for the acknowledgment of the own rights on own lands, embezzled from the French colonization. In the ' 51 it came granted the ballot right to the aborigines and in the 1986 the Kanak obtained that New Caledonia came enrolled in the directory of the territories to decolonize.

The Maori people, for first, caught up the island, christened Aotearoa, in IV century of the first millennium. Their economy was based on hunting, peach, agriculture and webbing and social was uniform in five chaste ones: heads, clergymen, noble, warriors and enslaved. In the 1642 archipelago he came colonized and for the Maori became more and more difficult to stop the possession of lands. The Maori people have endured the common consequences to other tribal groups forced living in one situation stranger to the own traditional culture.

written by : Ilaria Moda ( free9@itcgbianchi.it )

HTML by: David Broad .