TheLingeer’s Jihad: Challenging a Male-Normative Reading of African History

Abstract

AbstractThis article is a retelling of the Sharr Bubba Jihad as it unfolded in Kajoor (present-day Senegal) in which I attempt to set aright an instance of ontological violence in the existing secondary literature. I attempt to correct this first through an exposition of how the prevailing academic history is complicit in the continual colonization of African history. Secondly, I explain how Eurocentric discourses relegate African women to ancillary bearers of children, hewers of wood, and drawers of water. I further explain that the relationships between gender and authority in African histories do not align with the European “template” explaining the position and role oflingeer. Thirdly, I give the details of the Sharr Bubba Jihad in Kajoor through a rereading of the sources, making sure to nameLingeerYacine Bubu, and contextualizing the role of thelingeerin Kajoor and the other Senegambian kingdoms.