Sociolinguistic ISSN: 1750-8649 (print)

Studies ISSN: 1750-8657 (online)

Guest Editorial

African anthroponyms:
Sociolinguistic currents and anthropological
reflections
Eyo Mensah and Kirsty Rowan

1 Introduction

Names and naming traditions are ubiquitous cultural practices that herald the
beginning of bearers as social beings. In the African socio-historical context,
anthroponymic systems provide prominent sites for the interaction between
language, culture and society. African names have age-long ideological
rootedness in culture and institutions; they are contextualized as social action and
practices only within the culture in which they are embedded (Mensah, 2017).
This position corroborates the claim by Haviland, Prins and McBride (2013), who
state that personal names mark the social transition of a child from a state of
nature to a state of culture. Gertz (1973:363) captures it more aptly when he
argues that naming is an act of converting ‘anybodies into somebodies’. This
position reveals that naming is one of the important symbolic resources in which
an African society can express its culture, and it is through name bestowal that
history can begin to gather around the name-bearer (Bodenhorn and vom Bruck,
2006). Names in this context confer ideologies of individualism, enact social
personality and negotiate cultural identity. African names are, therefore, crucial
cultural capital that reveal essential information which transmits relevant African

Affiliation
University of Calabar, Nigeria
email: eyomensah2004@yahoo.com

University of London, United Kingdom

email: kr2@soas.ac.uk

SOLS VOL 13.2-4 2019 157–170 https://doi.org/10.1558/sols.37819

© 2020, EQUINOX PUBLISHING
158 SOCIOLINGUISTIC STUDIES

ontological and epistemological values. Personal names can be described as a

‘cultural universal’ (Alford, 1988:2) which project beliefs, norms, attitudes,
emotions and mores that can facilitate a broader understanding of Africa and its
people. With names, personal identity and collective belonging are discursively
constructed from varied ideological bents. These names and naming practices
interface with every facet of African life – environment, occupation, geography,
spirituality, economy, politics, family and conflict – in the quest for identity and
authenticity and in the preservation of linguistic and social heritage.
In the Western tradition, proper nouns or personal names are believed to not
have sense or meaning (Searle, 1958; Dixon, 1964; Lyons, 1977; Ryan, 1981;
Suzman, 1994) given that what they represent is unique and individuating.
Personal names usually only identify or recognize the name-bearer; thus, they
refer to one and only one object. In other words, Western names are existential
elements with no definite description and signification. However, in the African
cultural context, personal names do not fit into this stereotyped semantic categori-
zation because they have both sense and referents. Carlson (2004) maintains that
such names are expressive and refer directly to their referents, and there is no
mediating sense or meaning which is employed to necessarily determine reference.
The interpretation of African names is not extremely literal or semantic in content
but embodies a wide range of peculiarities that need to be broadly contextualized
and understood from social, religious, cultural and pragmatic perspectives
(Mensah, 2015). In this way, the import of African names is that they reflect and
capture cultural variables such as kinship, gender relations, class, cosmology,
personal tastes and preferences, along with indexing relationships that define
socio-cultural functions and meaning. African personal names, therefore, are
cultural symbols that represent experiences, conflicts or situations with deep
historical resonances. These names are a body of knowledge that reflect the depth
and breadth of African culture; language, history, philosophy, spirituality and
worldview. African names also mirror the patterns of a society’s cultural and
social organization and are pointers to a range of people and circumstances that
are relevant at the time of the child’s birth (Suzman, 1994). In Africa, personal
names are communicative devices that tell stories about historic events, familial
conflicts and the struggle with supernatural powers which are central to the
notions of personhood and self-definition. African names are symbolic resources
for communicating name-givers’ experiences, expectations and perceptions. They
have expressive communicative content which can also be a reflection of social
tension and struggle. Their use in social interaction represents cultural customs
and family traditions.
 AFRICAN ANTHROPONYMS: AN EDITORIAL 159

Importantly, African personal names have been identified as prominent sites to

reflect on and interpret emotions, where a name can stand for its bearer and
synecdochally epitomizes the essence of his or her being. African names appear to
inform how their bearers act, think and feel, and how others react and respond
towards them. In this way, African personal names are also significant entry
points into African cosmology and cosmogony. African names can also function
as a medium of spiritual communication, particularly with ancestors and
underworld forces (Obeng, 1998; Doyle, 2008; Mensah, 2015; Sagna and
Bassène, 2016). This is captured by Handler and Jacoby’s (1996:686) claim that
‘ritually significant information’ is coded in personal names. In this way, names
provide a renewed sense of security to its bearers and sustain transition and
mobility that connects the living with the dead, who are the source of tribal
tradition and stability.
Research into African anthroponyms over the years has offered intriguing
insights into contemporary issues in names’ scholarship from broad interdisci-
plinary perspectives, and investigated the relevant themes and resonances in
naming ‘to see how differently societies conceptualize personal identity’ (Alford,
1988:51). However, sociolinguistic and anthropological investigations of African
names are sparse in the onomastic literature. This Special Issue aims to fill this
conceptual gap and extend the frontiers of knowledge by renewing sociolinguistic
and anthropological interest in African names’ research, particularly within the
increasing contemporary globalized culture where there is an apparent decline in
cultural identity among Africans. The papers included in this Special Issue
examine African names from sociolinguistic and anthropological trajectories,
linking the discussions on convergent paths from different methodological,
conceptual and theoretical backgrounds. We are pleased to present this Special
Issue which engages exciting new dimensions of African names’ research with
innovative insights and approaches.

2 African names and naming practices: A transhistoric trajectory

Certain events and activities in the course of history have tended to erase or
subjugate African names and identities. Of particular interest is the effect of the
slave trade, colonization and the advent of new religions in the African naming
enterprise. Asante (1995:71) records that there was a forceful attempt to eradicate
any trace of African culture during the transatlantic slave trade era, and among the
initial forms of this eradication programme were African names. African naming
procedures were torn from the social and ritual context that existed in Africa
(Handler and Jacoby, 1996:689). The immediacy of this eradication can be seen
160 SOCIOLINGUISTIC STUDIES

in that African (slaves) names were changed before they disembarked from the
slave ships, and they were punished severely if caught speaking their own
languages. Assigning new names to African slaves, or even leaving them
nameless, was an attempt by the colonisers to obliterate African collective
memories and identities; one of many ways in which Africans were subjugated
and forced into perpetual servitude (Fitzpatrick, 2012). In this way, renaming and
name defilement became tools for oppression and suppression. Mphande (2006)
illustrates how African-Americans have retained and modified their names and
even adapted them to their slavery experience. He maintains that they invoke a
culture of resistance which involves a process of renaming themselves, constantly
reverting back to their African roots, cultural forms and spirituality, thus
reasserting and reaffirming their humanity in a hostile world. This naming pattern
is propelled by the pain of the slavery experience. In the same vein, Ngubane and
Thabethe (2013) show how Africans attempt to reclaim their names in the post-
apartheid dispensation in South Africa, as a way of redefining and affirming their
identity and to promote their African heritage and history. The dominant
hegemonic political structure in South Africa under apartheid regimes had
compelled many Africans to change their names so as to be relevant or acceptable
in the prevailing socio-political system. With the abolition of apartheid, Africans
found a compelling need to reassert their African cultural roots. This
demonstrates the power of naming as subject to alteration and adaptation in
response to political power, control and annihilation which has now conferred
contested identities on Africans.
The experience of colonialism has had its concomitant negative impact on the
African naming enterprise. Johnson (1921) aptly documents how the colonial
British government in Sierra Leone abolished native names wholesale,
considering them heathenish, and substituted European names. This was one of
the outputs of the forced assimilation policy of the British Colonial Government
(Bailey and Lie, 2013). Similarly, Mensah (2009) reveals how the British
administrators in Old Calabar, Nigeria refused to accept and recognize indigenous
Efik names in official government circles. Rather, they resorted to anglicizing and
imposing English versions on the bearers of the indigenous names. For instance,
names like Okon, Orok and Abasi were changed to Hogan, Duke and Bassey
respectively. These names were, however, reclaimed in the course of time. The
adoption of Christianity and Islam in Africa has also contributed to the
suppression of African names and identities. Most African names have been
condemned as fetishist, heathen or diabolical (Betiang, this volume), hence the
need for name change as a condition of accepting a new faith becomes compelling
in order to define a new spiritual path that fits the essential self (Mensah,
 AFRICAN ANTHROPONYMS: AN EDITORIAL 161

forthcoming). According to Rahman (2015:36), ‘conversion to a religion

generally entails a change of name’, and therefore this widespread practice is
accountable for the loss of African indigenous names in most parts of the
continent that have undergone early evangelization. Commonly, religious
authorities compel their adherents or converts to change their names as a
contemporary response to new religious references, in addition to being used as a
tool for reclaiming faith. Names are used to index social and spiritual
transformations of the individual. This state of affairs reflects the socio-religious
influence in the naming system of a people, and a transformation of custom which
endangers traditional anthroponymic praxis.

3 African anthroponyms in contemporary sociolinguistic and

anthropological literature

Investigations and documentation of African anthroponymic practices have

provided excellent and multiple insights into a broader understanding of the
African people. Lynch (2016) avers that names and naming provide the structures
and nuances of the way we imagine and understand the world, and are essential
practical rituals of everyday life (Althusser, 1971). Contemporary sociolinguistic
and anthropological research on African names has provided acuity into and
defined how anthroponyms are an interface between the social and cultural
aspects of African life. The relevance of personal names in language planning,
language shift, language ideology, language change and the development of new
Englishes has been highlighted in the literature (Yanga, 1978; Makoni, Makoni
and Mashiri, 2007). Names are conventional signs, hence; they help to preserve
cultural identity and indigenous linguistic heritage. African names are highly
important for preserving and maintaining indigenous languages whereby the
discontinuity of these names could forewarn the imminence of their languages’
endangerment or ultimate extinction. Continued cultural transmission of names
from one generation to another could be a key intervention strategy towards
revitalization and conservation of threatened languages, given that languages die
alongside the sociological and cultural information that is also embedded in the
naming practices of their speakers. Names also have deep historical significance.
The naming pattern of any society, according to Ansa and Okon (2014), generally
reflects the linguistic behaviour of people, and names are not just arbitrary labels
of identification; they are imbued with the socio-cultural and geo-political
histories of the bearers or the bearing community. They therefore act as historical
records or landmarks which are passed on from one generation to another. Among
the Efut people of Southern Cross River State, South-eastern Nigeria, whose
162 SOCIOLINGUISTIC STUDIES

language and culture has been consumed by the dominate neighbouring language,
Efik, personal names and street names are the only resources left to which the
community can reclaim or associate with their community’s identity.
African names also have communicative attributes (Ansu-Kyeremeh, 2000;
Mensah and Mekamgoum, 2017) which aid in the composition of dirge, drum
language, and praise poetry, and tell stories about past events, experiences and
circumstances of birth. Pilcher (2016) argues that names serve to mark unique
individuality as well as family rootedness. Beyond these, they offer information
on significant historical events which are indicative of family or communal
festivals, tensions, struggles or crises. In this way, names function as essential
memory cues to perpetuate the continuity of such activities. Naming is also used
to facilitate intercultural communication. For example, there is greater cross-
cultural affinity with speakers of Yoruba in Nigeria, Benin Republic and Togo
who also bear similar Yoruba names. In other cases, people may choose
alternative or surrogate names based on the naming practice of a prevailing
culture (Oyetade, 1995). This can help to promote intercultural communication,
friendship and intimacy. In this way, names become resources for
bi/multilingualism and biculturalism (Li, 1997).
The role of names in attributing gender identity (Pilcher, 2017) is a unique
feature of African anthroponyms as found in Akan, Igbo, Ibibio and Efik cultures
among others. Certain categories of names, such as birthday names, order of birth
names and market day names are usually grammaticalized in terms of gender
(Essien, 2000). These names are bestowed automatically depending on how the
bearer fits into the existing stereotyped norm. Aygekum (2006:213) maintains that
among the Akan, it is believed that the particular day a child is born may affect
his or her behaviour, fate and future. Essien (2001:124) similarly argues that such
names can influence the future, well-being, personality and character of the bearer,
thus naming generally can be quite an exacting mental or emotional exercise. This
category of names also assists in the socialization process of children. Male and
female children become aware of their stereotype roles in the family and society
by virtue of their gender. This usually results in the fusion of names, bodies and
identities, or what Pilcher (2016:764) calls ‘embodied named identity’. Another
common feature of African naming patterns is degenderization, that is, where
male and female members of the society share the same first names. Such names
cannot be distinguished on the basis of gender. In certain cultures, however,
affixation processes are used to signal the gender category of name-bearers.
It is common knowledge that traditional name-giving practices in Africa have
decreased (Suzman, 1994) and continue to do so. The transformation of naming
practices is directly caused by the impact of religion, politics, modernization and
 AFRICAN ANTHROPONYMS: AN EDITORIAL 163

globalization. The challenge, therefore, becomes compelling for name scholars,

parents, custodians of culture and community members to strive to reclaim their
cultural citizenship and navigate their sense of belonging through using
established naming practices. This collection, therefore, explores some of the vast
cultural knowledge which is embedded in African names and offers a range of
sociolinguistic and anthropological understandings of African anthroponyms that
will be a useful resource for future research.

4 A synopsis of this volume

Focusing on East Africa, Luke Fleming, Alice Mitchell and Isabelle Ribot (‘In the
name of the father-in-law: Pastoralism, patriarchy and the sociolinguistic
prehistory of eastern and southern Africa’) reveal the name-avoidance strategies
of the daughter-in-law register of Datooga, a Southern Nilotic, Nilo-Saharan
language community of Tanzania. The discussion of the sociocultural significance
of patrilineal descent of the Datooga allows us to understand the motivation
behind this specific name-avoidance register. This discussion demonstrates that
this register involves avoidance of not only the names of in-laws, but also the
lexical roots and near-homophones of these names. Contextualizing this practice
within the broader discussion of in-law avoidance in Africa, the authors show us
how these are commonly gendered and generationally stratified. In considering
the genesis of these specific avoidance registers in eastern and southern African
languages, the authors investigate the registers’ historical roots and trace their
origin to East Africa. With further considerations of archaeological, ethnological,
sociolinguistic and genetic lines of evidence, the authors suggest that the spread
of pastoralism can be correlated with the diffusion of these specific
anthroponymic registers, leading to the explanation for their manifestation in
these particular regions of Africa. A socio-pragmatic approach to naming
practices amongst the Kabye of Northern Togo, West Africa is the focus of
Atoma Batoma’s paper (‘Onomastic strategies: A pragmatic approach to the use
of personal names among the Kabye of Northern Togo’). As in many other
African languages, Kabye names have meaning beyond their referential function,
and the social context which motivates the bestowal and use of names in a
community may be obscured to strangers in their speech community. This paper
approaches Kabye naming practices from a behaviour-motivated perspective,
whereby Batoma proposes that there are three strategies by which interpellators
(name-givers or name-users) attempt to influence the behaviour of a name-bearer:
the choice of anthroponomy; the amplification of the meaning of the
anthroponym; and the intonation of the anthroponym which is used as a signal of
164 SOCIOLINGUISTIC STUDIES

the interpellator’s state of mind. This paper shows us how these strategies assist
with reinforcing the efficacy of the communicative use and function of Kabye
anthroponyms, and how it is important to understand names as communicative
verbal acts in themselves.
Taking an ethnopragmatic approach to naming practices amongst the Tiv in
Nigeria, the study by Eyo Mensah, Kirsty Rowan, Akase Tiav and Jighjigh Ishima
(‘Aspects of traditional Tiv naming practices: A sociocultural account’) provides
a culture-internal perspective on the interpretation of Tiv anthroponyms. Tiv
naming practices are ‘cultural scripts’ through which an insight can be acquired
into the importance of certain cultural traditions, socio-cultural concerns and
worldview of this community of speakers. For instance, the authors show how Tiv
name-givers’ experiences are encoded in their choices and bestowal of names as a
form of guarantee against continuity of suffering in the name-bearer, whether
physical, material or spiritual, or as a form of supplication. The authors assert that
Tiv names are also a form of ‘indigenous oral education’, whereby naming
practices are an important device for the transmission of cultural and historical
knowledge. Considering anthroponyms from the culture-internal angle allows the
authors to reveal to us not only the socio-cultural environment of the Tiv
community but also their lived experiences. Staying with an ethnopragmatic
approach, Eniola Boluwaduro examines identity construction in Ibibio (southern
Nigeria) personal names and their underlying ideologies (‘Ideology and identity
construction in Ibibio personal names’). The paper foregrounds the perception of
personal names from the name-bearers’ perspective. Name-bearers negotiate their
individual identity through activating their subjective beliefs about their names,
while also transferring these beliefs to their lived experiences. The study also
uncovers that in certain cases, name-bearers are disconnected from the symbolic
meaning of their names through limited knowledge or experience of the cultural
background or that their names lack guidance for their lived experience as they
capture the name-givers lived experience instead. For these Ibibio name-bearers,
their names are subjectively redundant for symbolic significance or guidance. The
author considers the fundamental notion that name-bearers are essentially under an
imposed identity construction from name-givers which they have to ‘live-up’ to.
A typology of traditional Yoruba (Nigeria) naming practices is presented in
Gbenga Fakuade, Joseph Friday-Otun and Hezekiah Adeosun’s study (‘Yoruba
personal naming system: Traditions, patterns and practices’). The authors’ study
is motivated by their observation that many of these naming practices are
endangered due to various factors within the community. Eliciting information
from respondents on name-givers’ choices, the authors allow us to understand the
impact of changes that traditional birthing circumstances have had on the
 AFRICAN ANTHROPONYMS: AN EDITORIAL 165

continuity of Yoruba traditional naming practices. As many names relate to the

family, home or birth of the name-bearer, disruptions to traditions in these
contexts consequently affects naming practices. We are presented with evidence
showing this disruption to Yoruba naming practices which are both unary and
sentential in their structure.
Motivated to disprove the general notion that names are not translatable
because they have no meaning beyond their referential function, the translatability
of African anthroponyms is the focus of Samson Nzuanke and Zana Akpagu’s
study (‘Onomastics and translation: The case of Bette-English translation of
death-related names’). Presenting data from Bette (Niger-Congo, Nigeria) death-
related names, the authors show that translatability can be achieved through
utilizing linguistic, interpretative and semiotic approaches. Throughout the
analysis and translation proposals presented in the paper, we are informed of the
rich sociocultural meanings behind Bette death-related names, in particular the
psycho-spiritual meaning and functions of these particular anthroponyms. Bette
death-related names address the spiritual realm as implorations for an opportunity
to life; they can take the form of epigrams, statements, declarations or apostrophes
which, through the authors’ analyses, can convey their meaning to speakers
outside of this community through their translation into other languages such as
English.
The theme of death-related names is also discussed in the paper by Jonas
Akung and Oshega Abang (‘I cannot baptize Satan: The communicative import of
Mbube death-prevention names’).1 Herein we find a sociopragmatic investigation
of death-prevention names of the Mbube, Nigeria. The Mbube’s belief in
reincarnation is discussed as a primary factor in motivating the selection and
bestowal of names. Death-prevention names are also examined as being appeals
to the spirit world for the protection of the name-bearer. Through the discussion
and presentation of data in this study, we are informed of the rich spiritual beliefs
of the Mbube people, including how derogative names are bestowed as a
mechanism to protect the name-bearer from ethereal forces by not attracting
attention. Death-prevention names are not only significant communicative devices
for and between the community’s members, but are also a form of communication
between the physical and spiritual worlds of the Mbube.
Male praise names of the Awgba Igbo of Nigeria are presented and discussed
in Patience Solomon-Etefia and Amaka Ideh’s paper (‘Naming and social
identity: A case study of male praise names in Awgbu Igbo’). Praise names form
one category of names amongst many that are bestowed upon a name-bearer
within this community. The authors show us how these names can be explained as
being of dual function: creating or maintaining social identity whilst also being
166 SOCIOLINGUISTIC STUDIES

instructional. We are informed of how it is the praise name which is the most
preferred name for reference and address for an Awgba Igbo member. In this
community, it is the praise names which have specific social importance, as any
social interaction requires the use of the praise name foremost. The authors’ focus
on male praise names permits us an insight into the gendered meaning of these
names, which are typically associated with strength and power, wealth and king-
ship. The authors show us that these specific categories of names are an interac-
tional strategy for the discursive and ideological construction of social identity.
Itani Peter Mandende, Mzwamadoda Phillip Cekiso, and Christopher Rwodzi
(‘Personal names as communicative tools in Tshivenḓa: Cultural-historical
perspectives’) explore how the Tshivenḓa naming system is used as a
communicative tool reflecting the lived experience, cultural values and beliefs of
the Vhavenḓa of South Africa. The Vhavenḓa naming practice is considered, by
the authors, as a form of information transmission by the name-givers to society
at large, whether living or deceased, as in the case of appeals to forebears. We
find that Tshivenḓa names are a form of verbal documentation which transmit
information of historical events within this community, and therefore act as oral
record-keeping. Personal names are living archives which assist with the
continuity of Vhavenḓa socio-cultural and historical knowledge.
Liwhu Betiang (‘Naming and the reconstruction of female identity in Bette-
Obudu’) approaches naming practices bestowed upon female Bette (Nigeria)
children from a critical ethnographic perspective. The author seeks to investigate
the appropriateness, or not, of naming-bestowal traditions in the 21st century on
the Bette girl-woman. Presenting the theoretical argument that there is a
connection between the function of a Bette name and how this bestows a pre-
ordained or self-fulfilling prophecy on the Bette girl-woman, Betiang finds that
there are discordances in the lived experience of name-bearers. The Bette girl-
woman is in a position whereby she either deviates from the identity constructed
by her name or conforms to the identity. For the author, this is a restrictive
practice which hinders the formation of multiple identities needed in the
postmodern 21st century by the Bette girl-woman.
The referential transformation of English titles, kinship terms and occupations
(or non-names) into Akan (Ghana) is the focus of Yaw Sekyi-Baidoo’s study
(‘English “non-name” address forms in the non-native sociolinguistic context:
The case study of the Akan of Ghana’). While Akan has traditional names, their
replacement by the use of English titles and other non-names is primarily a
reflection of the colonial history of Ghana and the subjective valorization of
English terms. However, within the Akan sociolinguistic context, these English
non-names become subject to new meanings in their transformation as address
 AFRICAN ANTHROPONYMS: AN EDITORIAL 167

terms. The author’s study reveals to us the complex nature of Akan use of these
borrowed forms, and he also details how the intricate interplay of social status,
age, deference and politeness in Akan are involved in the correct usage of these
loaned forms as dynamic address terms.
The various studies on African anthroponyms presented herein also form an
important and specific collection of language documentation in Africa. At a time
when many of the world’s languages are undergoing shift, particularly in Africa,
these papers highlight that even within those languages which may appear ‘safe’,
there exists endangerment such as in their traditional naming practices. These
papers also contribute to identifying the causes of this lexical shift, which are
perhaps specific to certain communities of speakers, while at the same time
documenting these traditional naming practices. The importance of anthroponyms
has been demonstrated by all our contributors who have shown, through multiple
approaches, that African anthroponyms reveal so much to us about distinct
communities of speakers’ knowledge, perception and worldview. Assuredly,
anthroponyms, within an African context, can also be considered as crucial
carriers of a community’s living heritage.

Notes
1. We regret the passing of Dr. Oshega Abang who sadly departed this life
during the course of co-preparing his manuscript for this Special Issue.

Acknowledgments

We would like to thank the Editor-in-Chief of Sociolinguistic Studies, Prof. Xoán

Paulo Rodríguez-Yáñez, for inviting us to edit this Special Issue. We are very
grateful to all our reviewers who contributed greatly to advising and supporting
our contributors in the presentation and discussion of their studies. We also thank
our contributors for their patience and understanding, and for working with us
closely on this Special Issue.

About the Guest Editors

Dr. Eyo Mensah is an Associate Professor of Structural and Anthropological

Linguistics at the University of Calabar, Nigeria. He is a CAS Leventis
Postdoctoral Research Associate (SOAS, University of London, UK), AHP/ACLS
Postdoctoral Fellow and Firebird Anthropological Research Fellow. He is the
pioneer President of the Nigerian Name Society (NNS). Some of his latest
publications have appeared in Sexuality and Culture (2019), Linguistics Vanguard
168 SOCIOLINGUISTIC STUDIES

(2019), Journal of Cognitive Science (2019), Journal of Asian and African Studies
(2019), Journal of Black Studies (2019), and Names (2020). He is a member of
the Linguistic Association of Nigeria (LAN) and the West African Linguistic
Society (WALS). He sits on the Editorial Boards of Sociolinguistic Studies and
English Language Teaching. He is also a member of the Governing Council of
the University of Calabar, Nigeria.
Dr. Kirsty Rowan is a Senior Teaching Fellow in the School of Languages,
Cultures and Linguistics at the School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS),
University of London, United Kingdom. She is a member of the Anthropology
and Language Committee of the Royal Anthropological Institute (RAI) and a
Fellow of the RAI and the Royal Geographical Society (RGS with IBG). She
conducts endangered language documentation on Nile Nubian languages,
toponymy and culture and works with African heritage and diaspora communities
towards the maintenance of indigenous languages.

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(Received 17th December 2018; final revision received 19th March 2019)