Africa

III

The People

The Sahara serves as a dividing line between the peoples of northern Africa and those of sub-Saharan Africa—although historically it has not acted as a barrier to trade or dissemination of ideas between the north and west of the continent. Numerous classification systems have been applied to the people of the continent, many of them of dubious nature, being based on essentially racist assumptions. The geographical division appears the most useful today.

A

Ethnography

In the northern portion of the continent, including the Sahara, Caucasoid peoples—mainly Berbers and Arabs—predominate. People of Arab descent are also found along the east African coast. Caucasoid peoples constitute about one-quarter of the continent's population. South of the Sahara, Bantu-speaking peoples, constituting some 70 per cent of Africa's population, predominate. Pockets of Khoisan peoples, the San (formerly called Bushmen) and Khoikhoi (formerly called Hottentots), are located in southern Africa. The Pygmies are concentrated in the Congo basin. Scattered through Africa, but primarily concentrated in southern Africa, are some 5 million people of European descent. An Indian population, numbering some 1 million, is concentrated along the eastern African coast and in southern Africa.

More than 3,000 distinct ethnic groups have been classified in Africa. The extended family is the basic social unit of most of these peoples. In much of Africa the family is linked to a larger society through kin groups such as lineages and clans. Kin groups generally tend to exclude marriage among their members. The village is frequently constituted of a single kin group united by either male or female descent.

B

Demography

Although Africa covers about one-fifth of the total world land surface, it has only about 12 per cent of its population. In 2008 the total population of the continent was estimated at 955,006,740. Average density, some 32 people per sq km (83 per sq mi; 2008 estimate), is just above half the world average. This figure includes large areas, such as the Sahara and Kalahari deserts, which are virtually uninhabited, and smaller areas, such as the Nile Valley, of very high population density. When the population living on arable or productive land is calculated, the average density increases to some 139 people per sq km (362 per sq mi). The most densely settled areas of the continent are those along the northern and western coasts; in the Nile, Niger, Congo, and Sénégal river basins; and in the eastern African plateau. Nigeria, with a population of 138,283,240 (2008 estimate), is the most populous nation in Africa.

Africa's rate of population growth averages about 2.08 per cent a year; in contrast the growth rate in Europe is about -0.01, and in Latin America is 2 per cent. The spread of medical services since World War II has been responsible for a sharp decrease in the death rate, which averages about 15 per 1,000 but varies considerably between countries. The age distribution is weighted heavily towards the young. In most African countries, about half the population is 15 years of age or younger.

Africa's population remains predominantly rural, with only about one-fifth of the population living in towns of more than 20,000 inhabitants. Northern Africa is the most urbanized region, but there are individual countries with high levels of urbanization, such as Zambia (50 per cent urbanized), and major cities are located in every part of the continent. African cities that have populations of more than 1 million include Cairo, Alexandria, and Giza in Egypt; Algiers, Algeria; Casablanca, Morocco; Lagos, Nigeria; Addis Ababa, Ethiopia; Abidjan, Côte d'Ivoire; Kinshasa, Democratic Republic of the Congo; and Johannesburg, Cape Town, and Soweto in South Africa. The urban centres act as magnets, attracting large numbers of rural migrants who come either as permanent settlers or as short-term workers. Urban growth has been particularly rapid since the 1950s. A substantial international labour migration has also developed, particularly of Africans from central Africa to the mines and factories of Zambia, Zimbabwe, and South Africa, and of North and West Africans to France and Italy, and, more recently, to the European Union as a whole. Civil wars in a number of countries in recent years—notably Angola, Mozambique, Ethiopia, Sudan, Liberia, and Rwanda—have led to a massive displacement of population, as have droughts and famines. Africa has the world's largest concentration of refugees, including people displaced within their own countries, as well as people who have fled across borders in search of safety.

C

Languages

More than 2,000 languages are spoken in Africa. Although more than 50 languages have at least 500,000 speakers each, the majority of African languages are spoken by relatively few people. Apart from Arabic, the most widely spoken are Swahili (in eastern and southern Africa, primarily) and Hausa (West Africa). African languages are divided into four linguistic families or groups: Niger-Congo and Afro-Asiatic (formerly known as Hamito-Semitic), the largest groups, consisting of over 1,400 and 400 languages respectively; Nilo-Saharan, spoken in north-central and East Africa, and Khoisan, spoken among the San and Khoikhoi of southern Africa. Many Africans, particularly those of sub-Saharan Africa, are multilingual, speaking their own languages as well as those of previous European colonizers. See African Languages.

D

Religion

Christianity is today probably the most widespread religion in Africa. It was introduced into northern Africa in the 1st century and spread to the Sudan and Ethiopian regions in the 4th century. Christianity survived in Ethiopia and Egypt through the Coptic Church, but in the other areas, was swept away by Islam after the 7th century. It was reintroduced by missionaries and spread through tropical Africa with the 18th-century rise of European overseas expansion. Today Protestant and Catholic groups are about equally represented throughout the continent.

Islam, the fastest-growing religion in Africa, was introduced throughout northern Africa in the 7th century and in following centuries was spread down the River Nile, along the east African coast, and through the grasslands of west Africa. In the 20th century, Islam penetrated into the rest of the continent. The earliest of the Muslim schools of law, the Maliki, prevails over most of Muslim Africa except in Egypt, the Horn, and the east African coast.

About 15 per cent of Africa's people practise only indigenous, or local, religions. Many more, however, retain elements of traditional beliefs in their lives, and Christianity and Islam in Africa have also incorporated indigenous practices. Although indigenous religions are of great diversity, they tend to have a single god or creator figure and a number of subordinate spirits—nature spirits who inhabit trees, water, animals, and other natural phenomena—and ancestral spirits, such as founders of the family, lineage, or clan—who affect everyday life. See Religion.

Certain modern indigenous religious movements have developed, fusing mainly orthodox Christian rites and beliefs with indigenous religious elements. Led by individual prophets, these separatist groups have spread throughout Africa, although they appear most widespread and powerful in southern and central Africa.

Small numbers of Jews are located in northern and southern Africa; until the 1980s there was also a sizeable Jewish community in Ethiopia, the Falashas; Hindu, Buddhist, and Daoist peoples are scattered throughout eastern and southern Africa.