Islam, gender and urbanisation among the Mafa of north Cameroon: the differing commitment to ‘home’ among Muslims and non-Muslims

Abstract

The history of the town of Mokolo, in the heart of the land of the Mafa (in northern Cameroon), exhibits a specific pattern of urbanisation that seems characteristic of Islamic frontier zones generally in Africa. The town was founded as a settlement for converted slaves towards the end of the nineteenth century by Fulbe chiefs who regularly raided the area. Since that time urbanisation has largely gone hand in hand with Islamisation. It has involved, therefore, a marked change of identity for Mafa converts in the town, with drastic consequences for their relationship with their areas of origin in the mountains. The article emphasises, moreover, that the implications of Islamisation/urbanisation differ along gender lines. Although for both men and women the Muslim community in town provided specific forms of social security, the motives for migration, and the ways men and women were included in the urban community, differed sharply. In the 1980s, owing to political changes at the national level, the pressure to convert to Islam decreased throughout northern Cameroon. Since then the number of migrants to town who do not convert has increased rapidly. Mokolo used to be a Muslim town. In the 1990s, however, it has become more and more a Mafa town, and thus symbolises the revival of Mafa ethnicity as a truly region-wide force.

Family Ties and Urban–Rural Linkages among Older Migrants in Nairobi Informal Settlements

“…In terms of the role of social identity variables, our likelihood ratio test summarised in Table showed that the cluster of ethnic and religious affiliation variables independently explained 35% of the explained visits to rural places of origin. The significant independent effect of Islamic religion in maintaining the least levels of contacts observed in our result finds support in other studies in the region, which identify Islamic religious affiliation as a significant predictor not only of rural–urban migration but reconnection to places of origin after migration (van Santen, ). The Muslim Mafa of northern Cameroon was found to rarely maintain link with their rural origins, and although the reasons include profound reconfiguration of identities and affinities, one of the significant explanations likely to be important for our finding in the slums of Nairobi was the fact that the maintenance of regional networks and often burial in the hometown were important motives for circular migration throughout Cameroon.…”

Who moves and who stays? Rural out-migration in Nigeria

“…Hogan and Biratu (2004) in a study of Southern Ethiopia characterized by religious diversity, found that Muslims more often live in communities in which they are the majority group and less often experience contact with persons of other religious identities. A study of the Maja of northern Cameroon also revealed a tendency to remain in Islamic enclaves rather than migrate to nonIslamic areas of the country (Santen 1998). Nigeria is predominantly Christian in most of the southern regions and predominantly Muslim in the core northern regions.…”

The International Handbook of the Demography of Race and Ethnicity

“…The bivariate analysis indicated that Muslims predominate among rural non-migrants and rural-rural migrants. This tendency with signifi cant negative implications for migration is supported by fi ndings among Muslims in other African countries (Santen 1998 ;Hogan and Biratu 2004 ). In the multivariate analysis, religion stood out as a signifi cant predictor of migration propensities.…”