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Efé People
The Efé are a group of part-time hunter-gatherer people living in the Ituri Rainforest of the Democratic Republic of Congo. In the depths of the forest they do not wear much clothing, using only hut (dwelling), leaf huts as shelter for their bodies in the intense heat. The Efé are Pygmies, and one of the shortest peoples in the world. The men grow to an average height of 142 cm (4 ft. 8 in.), and women tend to be about 5 cm (2 in.) shorter. Jean-Pierre Hallet, Dr. Jean-Pierre Hallet was very involved with the Efé, from raising awareness to the plight of the tribe, to the introduction of new foods and methods previously unknown (such as a legume called the "winged bean" of New Guinea). He also introduced new methods of farming to the Efé, who likely had been a hunter-gatherer society for many thousands of years. Origins The Efé (and other Western pygmy groups) show genetic evidence of an early genetic divergence from neighboring groups. The Semliki harpoon, 90, ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Hunter-gatherer
A traditional hunter-gatherer or forager is a human living an ancestrally derived lifestyle in which most or all food is obtained by foraging, that is, by gathering food from local sources, especially edible wild plants but also insects, fungi, honey, or anything safe to eat, and/or by hunting game (pursuing and/or trapping and killing wild animals, including catching fish), roughly as most animal omnivores do. Hunter-gatherer societies stand in contrast to the more sedentary agricultural societies, which rely mainly on cultivating crops and raising domesticated animals for food production, although the boundaries between the two ways of living are not completely distinct. Hunting and gathering was humanity's original and most enduring successful competitive adaptation in the natural world, occupying at least 90 percent of human history. Following the invention of agriculture, hunter-gatherers who did not change were displaced or conquered by farming or pastoralist groups in ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Lese Language
Lese is a Central Sudanic language of northeastern Democratic Republic of the Congo, as well as a name for the people who speak this language. The Lese people, live in association with the Efé Pygmies and share their language, which is occasionally known as Lissi or Efe. Although Efe is given a separate ISO code, Bahuchet (2006) notes that it is not even a distinct dialect, though there is dialectical variation in the language of the Lese (Dese, Karo). Lese is spoken in Mambasa Territory, Watsa Territory, and Irumu Territory Irumu is a territory of Ituri province, Democratic Republic of the Congo. It is located in the northeastern part of the country, 1,700 km east of the capital Kinshasa. Its administrative center is the town of Irumu. The territory nearly ....Bokula, Moiso & Agozia-Kario Irumu. 1994. Bibliographie et matériaux lexicaux des langues Moru-Mangbetu (Soudan-Central, Zaïre). ''Annales Aequatoria'' 10: 203‒245. Phonology Consonants * Lese can ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Mobutu
Mobutu Sese Seko Kuku Ngbendu Wa Za Banga (; born Joseph-Désiré Mobutu; 14 October 1930 – 7 September 1997) was a Congolese politician and military officer who was the president of Zaire from 1965 to 1997 (known as the Democratic Republic of the Congo from 1965 to 1971). He also served as Chairman of the Organisation of African Unity from 1967 to 1968. During the Congo Crisis, Mobutu, serving as Chief of Staff of the Army and supported by Belgium and the United States, deposed the democratically elected government of left-wing nationalist Patrice Lumumba in 1960. Mobutu installed a government that arranged for Lumumba's execution in 1961, and continued to lead the country's armed forces until he took power directly in a second coup in 1965. To consolidate his power, he established the Popular Movement of the Revolution as the sole legal political party in 1967, changed the Congo's name to ''Zaire'' in 1971, and his own name to Mobutu Sese Seko in 1972. Mobutu claimed that h ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Chiefdom
A chiefdom is a form of hierarchical political organization in non-industrial societies usually based on kinship, and in which formal leadership is monopolized by the legitimate senior members of select families or 'houses'. These elites form a political-ideological aristocracy relative to the general group. Concept In anthropological theory, one model of human social development rooted in ideas of cultural evolution describes a chiefdom as a form of social organization more complex than a tribe or a band society, and less complex than a state or a civilization. Within general theories of cultural evolution, chiefdoms are characterized by permanent and institutionalized forms of political leadership (the chief), centralized decision-making, economic interdependence, and social hierarchy. Chiefdoms are described as intermediate between tribes and states in the progressive scheme of sociopolitical development formulated by Elman Service: ''band - tribe - chiefdom - state''. A ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Belgian Congo
The Belgian Congo (french: Congo belge, ; nl, Belgisch-Congo) was a Belgian colony in Central Africa from 1908 until independence in 1960. The former colony adopted its present name, the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC), in 1964. Colonial rule in the Congo began in the late 19th century. King Leopold II of the Belgians attempted to persuade the Belgian government to support colonial expansion around the then-largely unexploited Congo Basin. Their ambivalence resulted in Leopold's establishing a colony himself. With support from a number of Western countries, Leopold achieved international recognition of the Congo Free State in 1885. By the turn of the century, the violence used by Free State officials against indigenous Congolese and a ruthless system of economic exploitation led to intense diplomatic pressure on Belgium to take official control of the country, which it did by creating the Belgian Congo in 1908. Belgian rule in the Congo was based on the "colonial tr ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Swahili Language
Swahili, also known by its local name , is the native language of the Swahili people, who are found primarily in Tanzania, Kenya and Mozambique (along the East African coast and adjacent litoral islands). It is a Bantu language, though Swahili has borrowed a number of words from foreign languages, particularly Arabic, but also words from Portuguese, English and German. Around forty percent of Swahili vocabulary consists of Arabic loanwords, including the name of the language ( , a plural adjectival form of an Arabic word meaning 'of the coast'). The loanwords date from the era of contact between Arab slave traders and the Bantu inhabitants of the east coast of Africa, which was also the time period when Swahili emerged as a lingua franca in the region. The number of Swahili speakers, be they native or second-language speakers, is estimated to be approximately 200 million. Due to concerted efforts by the government of Tanzania, Swahili is one of three official languages (th ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Kingwana Language
Swahili, also known by its local name , is the native language of the Swahili people, who are found primarily in Tanzania, Kenya and Mozambique (along the East African coast and adjacent litoral islands). It is a Bantu language, though Swahili has borrowed a number of words from foreign languages, particularly Arabic, but also words from Portuguese, English and German. Around forty percent of Swahili vocabulary consists of Arabic loanwords, including the name of the language ( , a plural adjectival form of an Arabic word meaning 'of the coast'). The loanwords date from the era of contact between Arab slave traders and the Bantu inhabitants of the east coast of Africa, which was also the time period when Swahili emerged as a lingua franca in the region. The number of Swahili speakers, be they native or second-language speakers, is estimated to be approximately 200 million. Due to concerted efforts by the government of Tanzania, Swahili is one of three official languages (the ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Arab Slave Trade
History of slavery in the Muslim world refers to various periods in which a slave trade has been carried out under the auspices of Arab peoples or Arab countries. Examples include: * Trans-Saharan slave trade * Indian Ocean slave trade * Barbary slave trade * Slavery in Tunisia * Slavery in Libya * Slavery in Sudan * Slavery in Mauritania * Slavery in Yemen See also * History of slavery in the Muslim world * Qiyān * Saqaliba *Slavery in the Ottoman Empire Slavery in the Ottoman Empire was a lawful institution and a significant part of the Ottoman Empire's economy and traditional society. The main sources of slaves were wars and politically organized enslavement expeditions in the Caucasus, Easte ... {{SIA Slave trade Slavery in Africa Slavery in Asia African slave trade ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Thermoregulation
Thermoregulation is the ability of an organism to keep its body temperature within certain boundaries, even when the surrounding temperature is very different. A thermoconforming organism, by contrast, simply adopts the surrounding temperature as its own body temperature, thus avoiding the need for internal thermoregulation. The internal thermoregulation process is one aspect of homeostasis: a state of dynamic stability in an organism's internal conditions, maintained far from thermal equilibrium with its environment (the study of such processes in zoology has been called physiological ecology). If the body is unable to maintain a normal temperature and it increases significantly above normal, a condition known as hyperthermia occurs. Humans may also experience lethal hyperthermia when the wet bulb temperature is sustained above for six hours. The opposite condition, when body temperature decreases below normal levels, is known as hypothermia. It results when the homeostatic c ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Adaptation
In biology, adaptation has three related meanings. Firstly, it is the dynamic evolutionary process of natural selection that fits organisms to their environment, enhancing their evolutionary fitness. Secondly, it is a state reached by the population during that process. Thirdly, it is a phenotypic trait or adaptive trait, with a functional role in each individual organism, that is maintained and has evolved through natural selection. Historically, adaptation has been described from the time of the ancient Greek philosophers such as Empedocles and Aristotle. In 18th and 19th century natural theology, adaptation was taken as evidence for the existence of a deity. Charles Darwin proposed instead that it was explained by natural selection. Adaptation is related to biological fitness, which governs the rate of evolution as measured by change in allele frequencies. Often, two or more species co-adapt and co-evolve as they develop adaptations that interlock with those of the oth ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Hunter Gatherer
A traditional hunter-gatherer or forager is a human living an ancestrally derived lifestyle in which most or all food is obtained by foraging, that is, by gathering food from local sources, especially edible wild plants but also insects, fungi, honey, or anything safe to eat, and/or by hunting game (pursuing and/or trapping and killing wild animals, including catching fish), roughly as most animal omnivores do. Hunter-gatherer societies stand in contrast to the more sedentary agricultural societies, which rely mainly on cultivating crops and raising domesticated animals for food production, although the boundaries between the two ways of living are not completely distinct. Hunting and gathering was humanity's original and most enduring successful competitive adaptation in the natural world, occupying at least 90 percent of human history. Following the invention of agriculture, hunter-gatherers who did not change were displaced or conquered by farming or pastoralist groups in ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Rainforest
Rainforests are characterized by a closed and continuous tree canopy, moisture-dependent vegetation, the presence of epiphytes and lianas and the absence of wildfire. Rainforest can be classified as tropical rainforest or temperate rainforest, but other types have been described. Estimates vary from 40% to 75% of all biotic species being indigenous to the rainforests. There may be many millions of species of plants, insects and microorganisms still undiscovered in tropical rainforests. Tropical rainforests have been called the "jewels of the Earth" and the " world's largest pharmacy", because over one quarter of natural medicines have been discovered there. Rainforests as well as endemic rainforest species are rapidly disappearing due to deforestation, the resulting habitat loss and pollution of the atmosphere. Definition Rainforest are characterized by a closed and continuous tree canopy, high humidity, the presence of moisture-dependent vegetation, a moist layer of lea ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
