In
British English
British English (BrE, en-GB, or BE) is, according to Lexico, Oxford Dictionaries, "English language, English as used in Great Britain, as distinct from that used elsewhere". More narrowly, it can refer specifically to the English language in ...
, Bongo Bongo Land (or Bongo-bongo Land) is a
pejorative
A pejorative or slur is a word or grammatical form expressing a negative or a disrespectful connotation, a low opinion, or a lack of respect toward someone or something. It is also used to express criticism, hostility, or disregard. Sometimes, a ...
term used to refer to
Third World
The term "Third World" arose during the Cold War to define countries that remained non-aligned with either NATO or the Warsaw Pact. The United States, Canada, Japan, South Korea, Western European nations and their allies represented the " First ...
countries, particularly in
Africa
Africa is the world's second-largest and second-most populous continent, after Asia in both cases. At about 30.3 million km2 (11.7 million square miles) including adjacent islands, it covers 6% of Earth's total surface area ...
, or to a fictional such country.
Possible origins
The origin of the term is unclear but it may come from one or both of the following:
*
Bongo drums believed to be played by African natives
* A parody of African place-names or languages, particularly those in
Bantu languages. Bantu languages avoid
consonant clusters
In linguistics, a consonant cluster, consonant sequence or consonant compound, is a group of consonants which have no intervening vowel. In English, for example, the groups and are consonant clusters in the word ''splits''. In the education fie ...
and almost all words end in vowels, and
reduplication is commonly used to mark intensity or frequency.
There is a reference to "Bongoland" in the English translation by Ellen Elizabeth Frewer of a book originally in German by
Georg August Schweinfurth
Georg August Schweinfurth (29 December 1836 – 19 September 1925) was a Baltic German botanist and ethnologist who explored East Central Africa.
Life and explorations
He was born at Riga, Latvia, then part of the Russian Empire. He was edu ...
, published in 1874 in English as ''The Heart of Africa''. Schweinfurth locates it as lying between 6-8 degrees North and in the south-western region of the Bahr-el-Ghazal (South Sudan). The Belgian explorer Adolphe de Calonne-Beaufaict also refers to the 'Bongo of the Bahr-el-Ghazal' in his 1921 study of the Azande. The English anthropologist Evans-Pritchard published a useful description of the Bongo in 1929, in which he pointed out how their way of life was systematically destroyed by the Arab slave and ivory traders from the North.
The 1947 song "
Civilization
A civilization (or civilisation) is any complex society characterized by the development of a state, social stratification, urbanization, and symbolic systems of communication beyond natural spoken language (namely, a writing system).
...
" by
Bob Hilliard
Bob Hilliard (born Hilliard Goldsmith; January 28, 1918 – February 1, 1971) was an American lyricist. He wrote the words for the songs: "Alice in Wonderland", "In the Wee Small Hours of the Morning", " Any Day Now", " Dear Hearts and Gentle ...
and
Carl Sigman, recorded by various artists, contained the line "Bongo, Bongo, Bongo, I Don't Want to Leave the Congo". A variation of this was adopted for a poster produced by the
fascist Union Movement
The Union Movement (UM) was a far-right political party founded in the United Kingdom by Oswald Mosley. Before the Second World War, Mosley's British Union of Fascists (BUF) had wanted to concentrate trade within the British Empire, but the Uni ...
bearing the chant "Bongo, bongo,
whites
White is a racialized classification of people and a skin color specifier, generally used for people of European origin, although the definition can vary depending on context, nationality, and point of view.
Description of populations as ...
aren't going to leave
the Congo".
In the 1970s, the cinema advertisement for
Silk Cut
Silk Cut is a British brand of cigarettes, currently owned and manufactured by Gallaher Group, a division of Japan Tobacco. The packaging is characterised by a distinctive stark white packet with the brand name in a purple, blue, red, silver, wh ...
cigarettes parodying the 1964 film ''
Zulu'' was supposedly set in "Mbongoland".
The word "bongo" is also the slang nickname of the
Tanzanian
Tanzania (; ), officially the United Republic of Tanzania ( sw, Jamhuri ya Muungano wa Tanzania), is a country in East Africa within the African Great Lakes region. It borders Uganda to the north; Kenya to the northeast; Comoro Islands and ...
city of
Dar es Salaam, and the kind of music which originated from Dar es Salaam is called "
Bongo Flava
Bongo Flava (or Bongoflava) is a nickname for Tanzanian music. The genre developed in the 1990s, mainly as a derivative of American hip hop and traditional Tanzanian styles such as taarab and dansi, with additional influences from reggae, ...
", a slang version of the phrase "bongo flavour". Also, some
Tanzanian films are known as "bongo films".
Controversies
The term has featured in political controversies. In 1985,
Alan Clark
Alan Kenneth Mackenzie Clark (13 April 1928 – 5 September 1999) was a British Conservative Member of Parliament (MP), author and diarist. He served as a junior minister in Margaret Thatcher's governments at the Departments of Employment, Tr ...
, while
Conservative
Conservatism is a cultural, social, and political philosophy that seeks to promote and to preserve traditional institutions, practices, and values. The central tenets of conservatism may vary in relation to the culture and civilization in ...
Member of Parliament
A member of parliament (MP) is the representative in parliament of the people who live in their electoral district. In many countries with bicameral parliaments, this term refers only to members of the lower house since upper house members o ...
for
Plymouth Sutton
Plymouth, Sutton was, from 1918 until 2010, a borough constituency represented in the House of Commons of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. It elected one Member of Parliament (MP) by the first past the post system of election.
History
Pl ...
, once, in a departmental meeting, allegedly referred to Africa as "Bongo Bongo Land". When called to account, however, Clark denied the comment had any racist overtones, saying it had simply been a reference to the President of
Gabon
Gabon (; ; snq, Ngabu), officially the Gabonese Republic (french: République gabonaise), is a country on the west coast of Central Africa. Located on the equator, it is bordered by Equatorial Guinea to the northwest, Cameroon to the nort ...
,
Omar Bongo
El Hadj Omar Bongo Ondimba (born Albert-Bernard Bongo; 30 December 1935 – 8 June 2009) was a Gabonese politician who was the second President of Gabon for 42 years, from 1967 until his death in 2009. Omar Bongo was promoted to key positions as ...
.
In 2004,
Taki Theodoracopulos
Panagiotis "Taki" Theodoracopulos (; el, text=Παναγιώτης "Τάκης" Θεοδωρακόπουλος ; born 11 August 1936) is a Greek journalist and writer. He has lived in New York City, London, and Gstaad.
Early life and education ...
called
Kenya
)
, national_anthem = " Ee Mungu Nguvu Yetu"()
, image_map =
, map_caption =
, image_map2 =
, capital = Nairobi
, coordinates =
, largest_city = Nairobi
...
"bongo-bongo land" in his ''
Spectator'' column. ''
The Guardian
''The Guardian'' is a British daily newspaper. It was founded in 1821 as ''The Manchester Guardian'', and changed its name in 1959. Along with its sister papers ''The Observer'' and ''The Guardian Weekly'', ''The Guardian'' is part of the Gu ...
'' later criticized his use of "offensive and outdated stereotypes".
In July 2013,
Godfrey Bloom
Godfrey William Bloom TD (born 22 November 1949) is a British politician who served as a Member of the European Parliament (MEP) for Yorkshire and the Humber from 2004 to 2014. He was elected for the UK Independence Party in the European elec ...
,
Member of the European Parliament
A Member of the European Parliament (MEP) is a person who has been elected to serve as a popular representative in the European Parliament.
When the European Parliament (then known as the Common Assembly of the ECSC) first met in 1952, its ...
for
Yorkshire and the Humber
Yorkshire and the Humber is one of nine official regions of England at the first level of ITL for statistical purposes. The population in 2011 was 5,284,000 with its largest settlements being Leeds, Sheffield, Bradford, Hull, and York.
It is ...
for the
UK Independence Party
The UK Independence Party (UKIP; ) is a Eurosceptic, right-wing populist political party in the United Kingdom. The party reached its greatest level of success in the mid-2010s, when it gained two members of Parliament and was the largest par ...
(UKIP), was filmed referring to countries which receive overseas aid from the United Kingdom as "Bongo Bongo Land".
UKIP later banned use of the term, A spokesperson from
Show Racism the Red Card
Show Racism the Red Card (SRTRC) is an anti-racism education charity, established in England in January 1996 to harness the high-profile nature of footballers as anti-racist role models to educate against racism throughout society in the United K ...
stated that Bloom's remarks were "crude stereotypes that see Britain as a civilised place and overseas as tribal".
Matthew d'Ancona
Matthew Robert Ralph d'Ancona (born 27 January 1968) is an English journalist. A former deputy editor of ''The Sunday Telegraph'', he was appointed editor of ''The Spectator'' in February 2006, a post he retained until August 2009.
Early life ...
wrote in ''
The Daily Telegraph
''The Daily Telegraph'', known online and elsewhere as ''The Telegraph'', is a national British daily broadsheet newspaper published in London by Telegraph Media Group and distributed across the United Kingdom and internationally.
It was f ...
'': "There may indeed be some who inwardly cheered Bloom’s choice of words. But there will be many – including, crucially, some who agree with his position on aid – who felt queasy at the use of such antediluvian language."
In 2019, the MP
Tanmanjeet Singh Dhesi asked the Prime Minister,
Boris Johnson
Alexander Boris de Pfeffel Johnson (; born 19 June 1964) is a British politician, writer and journalist who served as Prime Minister of the United Kingdom and Leader of the Conservative Party from 2019 to 2022. He previously served as F ...
, to apologise for his use of derogatory terms to describe immigrants, citing "towel-head, or Taliban, or coming from bongo-bongo land" as examples of such insults which
minority communities receive; though not necessarily ascribing these terms to Johnson, the speech was made in relation to other comments made by him.
See also
* ''Bongoland,'' a 2003 American/Tanzanian film directed by
Josiah Kibira.
*
Bunga bunga
*
Um Bongo, a tropical fruit drink with African-themed branding
*
Bongo bongo in linguistics
* ''
King Leonardo and His Short Subjects
''King Leonardo and His Short Subjects'' (also known as ''The King and Odie Show'') is a 1960–1963 American Saturday-morning animated television series that aired on NBC, sponsored by General Mills. It was created by Total Television (which wou ...
'', a 1960 animation series about the fictional African country of Bongo Congo
References
{{Reflist
Anti-black racism in the United Kingdom
Fictional African countries
British political phrases
Stereotypes of black people