Countries and Their Cultures
Countries and Their Cultures: Kongo
The BaKongo, numbering three to four million, live in west-central Africa The unitary character of the Kongo group and the identity of the various subgroups are artifacts of colonial rule and ethnography. Most men and many women work, or...
Countries and Their Cultures
Countries and Their Cultures: Tropical Forest Foragers
The term "tropical-forest foragers," or "pygmies," refers to ethno-linguistically diverse peoples distributed across the forested regions of Central Africa who are particularly short in stature and who traditionally have lived by...
Smithsonian Institution
National Museum of Natural History: African Voices
This site is the web presence of "African Voices," a permanent exhibition at the National Museum of Natural History. It explores the "diversity, dynamism, and global influence of Africa's peoples and cultures." Includes art, texts, and...
Peace Corps
Peace Corps: Stories
This resource shares many stories of volunteers and their experiences helping people in different lands.
Countries and Their Cultures
Countries and Their Cultures: Fipa
The Fipa are a Bantu-speaking people of southwestern Tanzania in East-Central Africa. The name "Fipa" appears to have been bestowed on them by nineteenth-century traders and means "people of the escarpment." It was later adopted by...
Countries and Their Cultures
Countries and Their Cultures: Lunda
"Lunda" is the most widely used English term to refer to literally hundreds of social groups whose oral histories link them in varying ways to a far-flung empire that controlled trade and tribute in much of Central Africa from the...
Curated OER
Educational Technology Clearinghouse: Maps Etc: Africa, 1906
A map of the African continent in 1906 showing European land claims such as British East Africa, German East Africa, Portuguese East Africa, Italian Somalia, and others, and European colonies and corporate states such as Cape Colony,...
Curated OER
Educational Technology Clearinghouse: Maps Etc: Pre Colonial Africa, 1872
A map of Africa showing the continent prior to the Berlin Conference of 1885, when the most powerful countries in Europe at the time convened to make their territorial claims on Africa and establish their colonial borders at the start of...
Curated OER
Educational Technology Clearinghouse: Maps Etc: Colonial Africa, 1904
A map of Africa shortly after the Berlin Conference of 1885, which established the European colonial territory claims on the continent. These European and independent boundaries include Algeria and the Saharan Sphere of French Influence,...
Curated OER
Etc: Maps Etc: Africa Before the Berlin Conference, 1882
A map of Africa as it was known in 1882 before the Berlin Conference of 1885, when the most powerful countries in Europe at the time convened to make their territorial claims on Africa and establish their colonial borders at the start of...
Curated OER
Etc: Maps Etc: Sketch Map of Mid Century Africa, Circa 1850
A map of Africa around the middle of the nineteenth century showing European interests on the continent prior to the Berlin Conference of 1885, which established their territorial claims. The majority of the continent was unexplored at...
Countries and Their Cultures
Countries and Their Cultures: Rukuba
The Rukuba live in central Nigeria, on the High Plateau at some 30 kilometers west of the town of Jos, capital of Plateau State. They are one among the numerous small groups inhabiting the region. These groups are, by African standards,...
Countries and Their Cultures
Countries and Their Cultures: Iraqw
The Iraqw are an agrico-pastoral people who live in north-central Tanzania. With the expansion of their territory, the Iraqw have come to interact and coexist with other ethnic groups. Maize is the staple crop of the Iraqw; it is...
Countries and Their Cultures
Countries and Their Cultures: Dyula
"Dyula" is a Manding word typically referring to "traders" as a socio-professional category, particularly to Muslim long-distance traders who speak one or another dialect of Manding. The name is used as an ethnic label by...
Countries and Their Cultures
Countries and Their Cultures: Bakhtiari
The term "Bakhtiari" refers to a group of people and the area they occupy. The Bakhtiari inhabit the central Zagros Mountains of Iran. The Bakhtiari are traditionally nomadic pastoralists who make their winter encampments in the low...
Countries and Their Cultures
Countries and Their Cultures: Mongo
The Mongo inhabit the Congo Basin of central Zaire. They speak a dialect or language within a larger group of Mongo languages. Ideological and moral principles and social reality are mirrored in the culture of the Mongo, particularly in...
Countries and Their Cultures
Countries and Their Cultures: Nyamwezi and Sukuma
The Nyamwezi and Sukuma are two closely related ethnic groups that live mostly in the region to the south of Lake Victoria in west-central Tanzania. Beliefs in a High God are widely held but involve no special cult. Belief in witchcraft...
Central Intelligence Agency
Cia: World Factbook: Regional and World Maps
Maps of major areas of the world can be downloaded here. The maps have excellent detail and are in color.
Curated OER
Educational Technology Clearinghouse: Maps Etc: Congo State, 1893
Map showing the location of the Congo State within the African continent, with the equator and Congo River indicated. The Congo State, controlled by Leopold II of Belgium, was established in 1885 as a corporate state similar to the...
Countries and Their Cultures
Countries and Their Cultures: Suku
"Suku" is the term now accepted by the Suku themselves and in Zaire and in the ethnographic literature. Just before and after 1900, they were often referred to as "Yaka" or, more specifically, "Yaka of MiniKongo" -- in contrast with...
Countries and Their Cultures
Countries and Their Cultures: Kanuri
The Kanuri are the dominant ethnic group of Borno Province in northeastern Nigeria. They number over 3 million in Nigeria, about 500,000 in Niger, 100,000 in Chad, and 60,000 in Cameroon. They are called "Beri-beri" by the Hausa, but...
Countries and Their Cultures
Countries and Their Cultures: Jews of Iran
Until mass emigration began in 1948, Jews constituted one of the largest and longest-settled non-Muslim populations in Iran. Dispersed in every city and town in the country, Iranian Jews were almost always a minority except in a few...
Countries and Their Cultures
Countries and Their Cultures: Akan
The Akan comprise a cluster of peoples living in southern and central Ghana and in southeastern Ivory Coast. They form a series of distinct kingdoms and share a common language, known as Twi, which has many dialects. Twi is a tonal...
Countries and Their Cultures
Countries and Their Cultures: Okiek
"Okiek" is the name of a Kenyan people who formerly lived by hunting game, making beehives, and gathering and trading honey; it is also the name of their language. The collective name "Okiek" includes over two dozen local groups, each...