SwahiliPoetry

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Introduction: The Swahili Language and the Poetic Tradition.

Swahili is an East African Bantu language spoken by at least 50 million people, mostly as a second language, predominantly in the countries of Tanzania, Kenya, Uganda, and eastern Zaire.  It is historically and presently the first language of a relatively small but culturally important group of people who speak the language as their first language and who live along a thousand miles of East African coastline mostly centered in urban settings and on the offshore islands of eastern Africa, chief among them Zanzibar and Pemba(part of present-day Tanzania), the Lamu Archipelago (present-day Kenya), and others (for a recent study of Swahili society and culture see Middleton1992).  Most speakers in Tanzania and Kenya acquire Swahili as a second language, being native speakers of other African languages.  Many speakers of Swahili, especially those further in the interior of the continent (up-country) speak two or more other languages, and use Swahili as a lingua franca.  There is a growing number of first language speakers, however, in the urban areas of East Africa, where multi-ethnic communities prevail.  While it is Standard Swahili, a dialect based on Kiunguja of Zanzibar Town, which is best known and studied, and which has spread throughout eastern Africa and which clearly is the form of the language that the future of the language rests with, there are other dialects of the language which have received less attention, but which loom large in cultural and historical importance.  It is the northern cluster of dialects of the Lamu archipelago which have played an especially important role here: the long poetical tradition has been centered on these dialects and a large corpus of poetry exists in these dialects (see Knappert 1979 for a detailed literary history; also Harries1962).

Poetry and Swahili Society. Poetry has for a long time played a central role in Swahili society. This has not always been appreciatedby western students or scholars of the language who have focused on practicaland pragmatic reasons for studying the language (though clearly westernscholarship has played an important, if not crucial role, in preservingthe heritage). See Middleton (1992:188ff, 190) for a brief description ofthe role poetry plays in the life of the Swahili; Shariff's Tungo Zetu(1988) is also important here. Furthermore, a great deal of poetry iscomposed in nonstandard dialects which have been neglected in most studyprograms in this country and abroad. Swahili poetry is also stylisticallycomplicated and unfamiliar, largely because it has been unstudied and leftto specialists and to the Swahili, for whom the tradition is central. Thus, for these and other reasons, American scholarship has neglected Swahili poetry, although there are exceptions (e.g., Biersteker 1990, 1991a &b; Biersteker and Plane 1989; Biersteker and Shariff forthcoming; Campbell1983).  It is hoped that one effect of providing the tool envisioned by this project and described below (see §5) will be to stimulate scholarship in this rich area of culture and thought for a language that has already attracted our academic interest in other domains.  Another result will be to make this rich tradition accessible to our students and other Africanists who are interested in the culture, history, and society of the Swahili.

The Swahili Canon. The body of Swahili poetry is large and growing.   Some idea of the richness of this tradition can be had in material that has already appeared in published form (see for example Harries 1962; Knappert1979, etc.; Dammann 1940, 1993; and others too numerous to mention.  Another indication is seen in published bibliographies, especially Allen (1970) and van Spaandonck (1965) and in anthologies for use in East African schools (e.g. Kezilahabi 1974, Kahigi and Mulokozi 1976), and in studies by Swahili scholars, e.g. Chiraghdin 1987.  Also, the untapped oral material, as indicated in Biersteker's research with Prof. Abdulaziz (personal communication; see§3.2.l), indicates that we have barely begun to tap the artistic production of the Swahili poet. In the creation of the textbase that forms the core of STAT we will be guided by Prof. Abdulaziz and Mwalimu Nabhany (see §3.2.1& §3.2.4) in our selection of material (see further discussionin §5.4.1).

1.3. The Lexicographical Problem.  Because of a decision taken in the 1930s by colonial administrations to focus attention on the dialect of Zanzibar Town as the basis for the language of administration and education (see Whiteley 1969) the other dialects, have been neglected, especially those that have figured so prominently and historically in the literary traditions of the Swahili communities. With one exception--that of Sacleux'sdictionary (1939)--all lexicographical work (see Krapf, Johnson, Maden,and near or close derivatives of Johnson, e.g. the Kamusi ya KiswahiliSanifu or Lenselaer (1983)), has focused on the standard dialect, or on its linguistic basis, Kiunguja, or on closely related dialects, e.g.Krapf's dictionary which also attempts to record Kimvita, the dialect ofMombasa, as well as Kiunguja.

Sacleux's work is the only dictionary that systematically records lexis from the northern area Swahili dialects, as well as other dialects, and marks lexemes accordingly.  As important a source of information as this work is, it is out of print; available copies are scarce and printed on acid paper and are now deteriorating; furthermore, the work is in French making it inaccessible to most people in East Africa, including Swahili scholars, both traditional and western oriented who do not read French.  Furthermore, it is not complete.   In a sample of approximately 50 words in Abdulaziz's glossary in his Muyaka study (1979) that were checked in Sacleux'sdictionary, about 10% were not to be found.  Thus, there is a pressing need to have a reference work that will begin addressing the fundamental requirementof a glossary/dictionary that will serve as the key in making Swahili poetry easily available to students and scholars.

1.4. The Grammatical Problem.  Special lexis is not the only distinguishing feature of much Swahili poetry.  It also has grammatical features that are unfamiliar to students and non-Swahili specialists who are generally only familiar with the standard dialect or derivatives thereof.  Much of this has already been described (see, for example Nurse 1982, Miehe 1979,Nurse and Hinnebusch 1993 for recent studies, Sacleux 1909 for an earlier description), but again this descriptive material is not in a form that can be easily accessed by students and non-specialist scholars.  This project will include an online lookup feature that will allow students to understand the special structural features of Swahili poetry.

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