Tribe
Like many of their neighbors in the area, the Jabo have very pronounced ethnocentric attitudes,ETH and are frequently referred to both by themselves and by others as a '' tribe'', a term that in Liberia has a meaning imprecise at best. Confusion may arise due to the circumstance that in Liberia the English word "tribe" is also sometimes applied to the second-order administrative "Location
The area inhabited by the Jabo is now mostly in the Lower Kru Coast district of the new (1984) Grand Kru County, with a few outliers across the river in Maryland County. Their area coincides more or less with the southern half of Lower Kru Coast District in Grand Kru County. This southern portion of the district is defined in terms of Liberian administrative units as the Garawe/Nemia "clan" (code 180810). Jabo territory extends along the coast of southeastern Liberia from Garraway in the northwest proceeding in a southeasterly direction to the Deeah River, and from there inland almost as far as Bewehn. The northern half of the district is inhabited by the Trembo ethnic group and which has its center at the district capital in Bewehn.Population centers
Names of towns
At the level below the administrative clan, the Jabo are organized into administrative townships (each with a "town chief"), usually consisting of multiple clusters of villages or hamlets. Hasselbring & Johnson list seven Jabo town complexes: :*Garaway Beach (Polou) :*Genoyah :*Nemiah (includes: Glopluken, Jlatiken, Mensiengloh, Nyanoken, Penoken, Yaytueken) :*Nyambo :*Piaty :*Poloya (includes: Poloylowen, Pungbaloken, Tuwaken, Weteken) :*Weteken Since the recent civil war in Liberia, many towns have been emptied, renamed, reclaimed, or swollen by displaced populations. :*Garraway is now called Garraway Beach. :*Half Garraway is now called Yedweke. :*(Upper) Nimiah is now called Wilsonville.Nimiah
The Jabo population center most reported in the literature is the town complex of Half Garraway (variants: Half Garroway, Half Gadowe, Half Grawe, New Garraway), known in Jabo as Nimiah, which is situated between Garraway and the Seaside Grebo town of Fishtown (Waa). Nimiah consists of two main centers: one village cluster on the coastal lagoon, and another, larger cluster located approximately 10 km inland. The town on the lagoon (Lower Nimiah, Nimiah Beach) consists of several centers, of which the principal one is now called Yedweke, at latitude 4°28'48" N (4.48), longitude 7°52'39" W (−7.8775), altitude 83 m (275 ft); population 1724. Upper Nimiah (Nemiah, Nemia, Nimia) is located at Latitude 4°32'40" N (4.5444), Longitude 7°53'37 W (−7.8936), altitude 101 m (334 feet); population 3688. It is now called Wilsonville.Language
The Jabo are known for their drum-signalling system, which mirrors to some degree the suprasegmental system of their highly tonal language. The collection of their proverbs and sayings assembled by Herzog and BlooahH&B is often cited in the folkloristic literature. The Jabo language is complex and has been studied by well-known scientific linguists.Etymology
The term ''Jabo'' in a narrow sense means "Ja people", the ''-bo'' being an animate plural suffix (compare with ''ba'' in ba-ntu). A single member of the group is a ''Jawe'' "Ja + person" and the language *''Jame'' "Ja + tongue"(Glebo form . The significative element ''Ja'' is explained as being the proper name of the eponymous ancestor of the group. Compare: : "Glebo man of Fishtown (Waa) clan" : "Glebo people of Fishtown (Waa) clan"Gweabo
The Jabo are also referred to in the literature as the Gweabo. The Jabo form of the name is . This name is also used for them by at least some Glebo speakers as . The term is not a mere variant of the word ''Jabo'', as might be assumed. It is, rather, defined as the name of "a group of five tribes" or "a language". It properly designates a certain patrilineal descent group (in this case a "sub-tribe"), within the larger group ("Jabo tribe"). It may be conjectured to have as an eponym the common personal name ''(g)wea''. ''Gweabo'' was originally incorrectly generalized to apply to the larger group (the Jabo confederation) because Sapir's Jabo informant was a member of that sub-tribe. Among the subdivisions of the Gweabo sub-tribe mentioned in ''Jabo Proverbs from Liberia'' are: :* :* :*Nimiah
Blooah sometimes also claimed to be a member of the "Nimiah tribe;" sometimes Nimiah was called a township. As mentioned above, it corresponds to a Liberian administrative clan. The pronunciation in Jabo which was recorded was .Classification
Dealing with a people with little recorded history and for which little detailed ethnographic information is available, the most reliable framework for placing them with respect to related peoples is the classification of their language. Jabo clearly belongs within the Kru family of Niger–Congo languages. For further discussion, see the articleJabo and Grebo
A certain amount of confusion is created by the fact that many sources treat "Jabo" as being either identical with, or as a subgroup of Grebo. For a discussion of this see the articleGeographical factors
Although the Jabo area is adjacent to the Seaside Grebo area to the east-southeast, the two are separated by the Deeah (Die or Decoris) River, which is often treacherous and difficult to cross, especially during the rainy season or when a strong tide is running in the estuary. Because of the lack of usable roads connecting them, the Jabo tend to go northwest to market, into a Kru-oriented area at the county seat of ( Barclayville) and Garraway, north to Bewehn, or sometimes northeast to Plibo, rarely to the commercial and government center inExogamy
A cultural trait present among the Jabo, and apparently widespread across the Kru group is the practice of virilocal exogamy. This is enforced as a taboo at the clan level, but in practice, many also marry outside their tribe. The extent of this practice is obviously limited by the difficult transportation situation. Nonetheless, the exogamy factor has a certain effect of heightening intergroup awareness and communication. It remains to be seen how this will be affected by the refugee situation and urbanization.Allegations of ritual murder and cannibalism
In researching the literature pertaining to the Jabo, one may occasionally come upon references to them practisingReferences
Bibliography
DSHerzog, George. "Drum Signaling in a West African Tribe," ''Word'' 1:217-38, 1945. Reprinted in: ''Language in Culture and Society'', pp. 312–23. Ed. Dell Hymes. New York, 1964. &BHerzog, George, and Charles G. Blooah. ''Jabo Proverbs from Liberia: Maxims in the Life of a Native Tribe''. London, Pub. for the International Institute of African Languages & Cultures by Oxford University Press, H. Milford, 1936. THGordon, Raymond G., Jr., editor. ''Ethnologue: Languages of the World, Fifteenth edition''. Dallas, Tex.: SIL International, 2005. Online versionExternal links
*''Maryland in Liberia'', U.S. Navy map from 1853 in the Library of Congress,