The Hemeila Riddle: Genealogical Reconfigurations of Pre-colonial Encounters in Southwestern Mauritania

Abstract

This article will focus on a seldom-considered aspect of Saharan social contexts: the incorporation of European / Christian characters into tribal sociopolitical frameworks. Supported by data from my fieldwork, I will discuss the contemporary arguments portraying a mid-seventeenth-century woman, Hemeila, whose mother is locally recognized as a European, most probably of Iberian origin. These two women are presently incorporated in different genealogical narratives from southwestern Mauritania. The research dealt with in this article also relates to discussions of social hierarchy discussions familiar to Mauritania's Arabophone populations, with a particular focus on groups holding a "religious" (zwaya) status. Additionally, this article also discusses the role of the anthropologist as a producer of social facts, which, in this context, has led to a direct intervention in the reassessment of Saharan historical traditions.

Unsettling gender and feminism: Views from Mauritania

“…Later, even the tentative attempts by male researchers to 'rescue' Mauritanian women from their silence were often voiced from the point of view of a men's political interest, taking place in masculinized settings, using male interlocutors, where women's voices were barely heard. While emphasizing the exceptional role that some women played in the genealogical architecture of tribes (Bonte 1987;Freire 2013Freire , 2017, they end up maintaining them under the gatekeeping concept (Appadurai 1988) of the cultural areas where they should be academically placed: that of the tribe.…”

State, Society and Islam in the Western Regions of the Sahara

“…Later, even the tentative attempts by male researchers to 'rescue' Mauritanian women from their silence were often voiced from the point of view of a men's political interest, taking place in masculinized settings, using male interlocutors, where women's voices were barely heard. While emphasizing the exceptional role that some women played in the genealogical architecture of tribes (Bonte 1987;Freire , 2017, they end up maintaining them under the gatekeeping concept (Appadurai 1988) of the cultural areas where they should be academically placed: that of the tribe.…”

Poder e cultura nos iniciais encontros luso-saarianos: apontamentos etnográficos do sudoeste da Mauritânia (Trarza) / Power and Culture in Early Luso-Saharan Encounters: Ethnographic Notes from Southwestern Mauritania (Trarza)

“…Face ao espírito de cruzada dos portugueses, mostrou-se, desde sempre, um opositor local que paralelamente responde à gesta "guerreira" europeia no litoral Saariano. Reconhecem-se até hoje diversas tradições que tratam o encontro luso-saariano, e nas quais, por diversas vezes, se declara a vitória de populações saarianas face ao invasor europeu (Freire, 2011;2013). Assim, o exercício que enceto refletirá não só sobre a primeira descrição europeia da costa saariana, mas também sobre as vozes que localmente reproduzem esse encontro.…”