KRAHN (GUERE) PEOPLE: THE POWERFUL AGRO-FISHERY KRU ETHNIC SUB-GROUP LIVING IN LIBERIA AND IVORY COAST Krahn people are related Krahn-speaking ethnic group that forms a subset of the larger Kru ethnolinguistic group living in Liberia and Cote dIvoire. The Krahn people are sometimes referred to as the Wee, Guéré, Sapo, or Wobe. It is believed that Western contact with the Kru language is the primary reason for the development of these different names. The name Krahn is usually referred to the Krahn people living in Liberia whilst the name Guere is referred to Krahn people living in Ivory Coast. There are over 360,000 Krahn people scattered in Ivory Coast and Liberia with over 290,000 living in Ivory Coast alone. In Ivory Coast, the Krahn or Guere people lives in the coastal area sharing four major Rivers: the Cestos, Sanquine, Sino and Cavalla. The Krahn in Liberia were originally hunters, farmers, and fishermen, traditionally focusing on rice and cassava production. The land in this region has faced developmental setbacks and as a result, many of the younger Krahn generations have migrated to areas such as Monrovia. The Wee in Côte dIvoire, also traditionally became hunters, farmers, and fishermen, but they tended to focus more heavily on crops such as “rice, yams, taro, manioc, maize, and bananas.” Like the Krahn in Liberia, the Wee traditions of hunting and farming have faced some difficulties, and in more recent years many have instead begun laboring in diamond camps and on rubber plantations. Language Krahn people speak Krahn or Guere; one of the Kru languages which belongs to the Niger–Congo language family. Although many Kru-speaking tribes have adopted English as their second language, recent studies have shown that Kru is still spoken by many Liberians. Within the Kru language there are several subcategories, with Eastern and Western Kru offering the first significant division of tribal language breakdowns. This Kru language chart clearly shows that Krahn falls under the Western Kru, Wee subgroup. Some scholars further denote a difference between Eastern and Western Krahn, with Eastern variations typically spoken in northeast Liberia and Western Krahn spoken throughout Grand Gedeh County and Côte dIvoire. As of 1993, there were approximately 47,000 Eastern Krahn speakers within Liberia, with an additional 47,800 Western Krahn speakers in Liberia and 12,200 in Côte dIvoire source:kwekudee-tripdownmemorylane.blogspot.no/2014/01/krahn-guere-people-powerful-agro.html #HistoryOfAfrica
Posted on: Fri, 02 May 2014 23:59:58 +0000
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