Kalenjin: the emergence of a corporate name for the 'Nandi-speaking tribes' of East Africa

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Periodical article

Title:	Kalenjin: the emergence of a corporate name for the 'Nandi-speaking tribes' of East Africa
Author:	Omosule, Monone
Year:	1989
Periodical:	Genève-Afrique: acta africana
Volume:	27
Issue:	1
Pages:	73-88
Language:	English
Geographic term:	Kenya
Subjects:	Kalenjin ethnological names Suk
Abstract:	Until the early 1950s the people now known as the Kalenjin did not have a common name. Scholars and administration officials usually referred to them as the 'Nandi-speaking peoples'. Between the mid-1940s and the early 1950s, several Nandi-speaking entities - Kipsigis, Nandi, Keiyo, Marakwet, Pokot, Tugen, Terik, Sabaot - came together and assumed the new corporate name of Kalenjin. With the emergence of Kalenjin the Nandi-speaking peoples were transformed into a major ethnic group in Kenya. This article analyses some of the processes involved in this metamorphosis. These include the successful struggle to gather the major Nandi-speaking groups into the same province - the Rift Valley province; the standardization of the different dialects of the Nandi-speaking peoples; and the adoption of Kalenjin as the symbol of the collective identity of the new aggregation. The significance of these developments for the Kalenjin as a group as well as for Kenya as a whole are also examined. Notes, ref., sum. also in French and German.