Professor Mansuur’s viral BBC interview Clip

Sarmaan Ramses
Saturday, November 13, 2010

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As despondent as we have been lately about the state of affairs in Somalia, Professor Abdalla Mansuur’s erudite BBC interview on the Somali issue was quite a departure from the normal downturn. The interview clip became so viral and triggered a renewal of serious discussions among the Somalis.

It was indeed laudable that Prof. Mansuur as an academic avoided as well the polemics of the day and artfully at that. Matter of fact, most of the available literature in English and Italian has been consistently telling a different narrative of the Somali origin and the makeup of its languages unlike the usual Somali narrative that is based on legends and myths that became the real history for most Somalis and eventually contributed to the current vicious civil war in the country.

In reality, it’s not even surprising as a society that wrote down its language almost two decades ago and was previously strongly dependent on oral tradition to propagate certain myths and tales as mere solid facts of history. But what has been more surprising in the Somali academic milieu is the fact that even many scholarly studies were inherently biased or tilted to certain personal affinities rather than scholarly research– I think you can call that epistemological view gone awry.

Actually, there are many studies done in the past 20 years on the issue of the Somali origin as people and the variations of dialects/languages among the different tribes located in the horn of Africa. Yet, few of those studies ever became validated enough to dispel or even repudiate the tradionalist view—maybe there’s a silver lining here with Mansuur’s masterful take on the issue. Hopefully this latest interview on these issues could herald a new discussion that perhaps could contribute in curbing the long ongoing civil strife in the country.

Furthermore, Professor Mansuur’s academic bias rather than personal in discussing the issues in a very civil way set a new tone. And we wish to hear more of him on the subject as that may help in many ways than imaginable to reverse the current madness afflicted with the Somalis. Also, hopefully the discussion on the issue could be expanded more than the Somali geography because the subjects of language and physical features are shared by many peoples in the Horn region if not beyond.

For instance, there are many similarities between the Oromo, Afar, Saho, and Somali peoples and languages that the existing literature refers to as having common origin. Ironically though, most of these studies are well researched and academically well accepted but still these studies didn’t become a mainstay reference for most of the Somalis—particularly for the educated class let alone the common folks. I believe, knowing history in its true form – if there’s such a thing at all—contributes to common understanding and higher regard for our fellow Somalis. And surprisingly that has been the missing link!

Lastly, the BBC and VOA Somali services and other news outlets could better serve their audiences in providing valuable programs such as the Mansuur interview segment, instead of less value added programming prescribed from their Western perspectives. One such program on the BBC was Business Today – not sure if it’s still running today. But to think of it, there is no great demand from the audience for such programs and as a light hearted joke, I remember regularly seeing my mother an avid listener shut off her Internet stream once such business programs started broadcasting, nevertheless, the good intentions behind business programming are not lost on us in the Diaspora.

Sarmaan Ramses
Washington DC
[email protected]

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