Talk:Bamileke people

Images in Article

I felt that some of the images included in the article were not expanded upon in accordance to what is written and didn't make sense in context. I removed the image of a hut and the image of a tree with a basket around it, titled 'Sacred place'. I inserted an image of a Fon's stool and rearranged/made larger some images that I personally felt would fit in other places better. Hauen1jk (talk) 04:51, 22 November 2019 (UTC)

Bandjoun, Bafoussam and Bamendjou follow exactly the name in the French language in which they have a well established spelling. They are not transcriptions of the local language in which Bandjoun and Bafoussam people are "Jo" (or "Pe jo", where "Pe" means "people") and "Fusap". I don't see any reason for transcribing French. I may be wrong but I think that cameroonian anglophones rather use the first spelling (at least for Bandjoun and for Bafoussam) I see that Wikipedia itself use the "original" French spelling for the village of Bandjoun ("La' Jo" in ghomala').

By the way, the article made confusion between "bandjoun" and ghomala' speaking people. Baham for example share the same language, but don't tell them they are bandjoun! I corrected for this part but the mistake is still there for bafang, bangangte, dschang which are just the main sub-group or fe'fe'-, medumba- and yemba-speaking people but not the whole group. I'm not english native, so I let you correct. Togui 15:56, 12 April 2006 (UTC)

I appreciate the clarification, and please correct the others if you have the time. The general rule of thumb used with ethnic groups and villages in Cameroon is to prefer Anglopone spellings for peoples (such as Duala peoples) and French spellings for villages and towns in French-speaking areas (so, Douala). This is the method used in all of my English-language sources. That gives us the Banjun people but the village Bandjoun. — BrianSmithson 21:49, 12 April 2006 (UTC)

OK, but "Duala" is not the anglophone spelling, but simply the standard spelling in Duala language and a good transciption of the local name, just like bulu or ewondo. Bandjoun people in ghomala' (the local language) are called "jo" (standard spelling, not sure if there are diacritics).

If you look at this cameroonian official website http://www.museumcam.org/en/bandjoun/pays.php, you'll see that they use "Bandjoun" spelling in English.

Togui 09:49, 13 April 2006 (UTC)

No, I didn't mean the spelling used by Anglophone Cameroonians; I meant the spelling used by Anglophone writers in general. The phoneme /OU/ to make the long /U/ sound does not exist in English, nor does the /DJ/, which is represented simply by English /J/. However, I only have two sources that refers to them as Banjun: Cameroon History for Secondary Schools and Colleages Vol 1 by V. G. Fanso and the various pages on Cameroonian languages (all of which originate from data at Ethnologue. The fact that the Bandjoun Museum uses the French spelling doesn't surprise me; the page is mostly concerned with the place Bandjoun (which should use French phonetics), and it was probably written by a Francophone. — BrianSmithson 11:51, 13 April 2006 (UTC)

"Flag of the Bamileke people"

Flag of Bamileke people

I'd like a non-WWW source for the Bamileke flag that was added to the article today. Who uses this flag? What is its purpose? Is it nationalistic? Pending further verification, I've removed it for now. — BrianSmithson 18:51, 11 May 2006 (UTC) ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥§₮₩¥₳฿₵₡₦₥₤₭₴ ←

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that is chinese↑

Well brainsnotson, it is not a real flag and its purpose is to get you in jail! :0 :)§§§§§§§§§§§§°≈≥±−

In regards to the the 'German administration' section, there are no sources to back up info stated and the details are slim to none. Why is this section necessary? Is there more information/influence on the impact of this administration we can add? When did they leave/cease administrative power? Hauen1jk (talk) 16:44, 28 October 2019 (UTC)

Removed "history revisited"

I removed this:

There was a Bamileke kingdom before colonial era. The reunification of Bamileke was achieved in the nineteenth century by conquest after a war of coalition. During this war Bamileke generals innovated the technique of Trench Wars. King Nkalakeu Hapi II aka "Panther of Lakeu (leke)" was also the top general during this war. Bamileke maintained a cordial relation with Germans but king hapi II was arrested and exiled in Duala by the French. He remained at New Bell for nine month. during his absence Princess Mabu served as interim Queen while Hapi Henry, a nine year old prince sat on the thrown. This was organized by the Kamvu secret society in order to thwart foreign influences. Eventually king Hapi II returned home and in 1925 his son Hapi III aka Ptah'Fu of Bana became the new king. In 1954 he met French governor Socadeaux at the summit of Dschang. The war for independence continued. The Bamileke genocide engineered by French colonial authorities took the life of perhaps one million people. A French Pilot and witness recalled that 400,000 people died in only two years. He compared the genocide to Attila. The Bamileke genocide was an holocaust. People were burned to death with napalm. It lasted over ten years. During this period colonial administration divided the kingdom. Dukedoms and counties disappeared. They were replaced by chiefdoms.

No sources were cited. — Dulcem (talk) 23:30, 27 February 2008 (UTC)

Egyptian origins? Dieudonne Toukam as an authoritative source?

The article now reads,

For instance, contrary to common belief, the Bamileke are not Bantus that migrated from northeast to southwest some 10,000 to 30,000 years ago....The Benue-Congo language (from the proto Niger-Congo language did not give rise to Bamileke languages...many Egyptians fleed the Roman and Arab dominations and settled in the desert (Sahara) in the early centuries CE (AD 120-600)....Dieudonné "Toukam (2010) discovered that a last group of Baladi Egyptians (Fellaheen) migrated from the Nile Region in the 9th century. This group was special in that it bore the essence of Baladi culture. This group carried away a Baladi treasury. The researcher has good reasons for believing that those Baladi Egyptians migrated and became the Bamiléké. Indeed, when making a comparative study of the Baladis and Bamileke (to ascertain some oral-tradition facts), D. Toukam (2010) found that the Baladi heritage is still abundant in the Bamileke civilization so far. Besides, the so-called Baladi treasury (which is at the basis of the peculiarity of Bamiléké, coupled with genetic specificities, is more eloquent proof of the Baladi Egyptian origin of the Bamiléké people.:

I would strongly question this view of Bamileke origins, as it contradicts virtually everything not only that is "commonly believed," but that has been written by scholars on the subject, as far as I can tell. What are the qualifications of Dieudonne Toukam? According to his LinkedIn profile, his only higher education is as a translator. He has no college or university level studies in history, anthropology, or any such field. The fact that he has published books on the subject of Bamileke history does not make him an authoritative source. Also, I would really like to see evidence of the supposed "genetic specificities" that the author claims link the Bamileke to the Egyptians. I have seen nothing of this in my studies of African genetics.

I would propose that this section needs some major editing. Iris-J2 (talk) 19:03, 9 March 2012 (UTC)

Population

The "Total Population" is listed as 85,000 but the text says "They are the largest ethnic group in Cameroon". A population of only 85,000 cannot be the largest ethnic group in this country of over 25 million. Britanica says "about 2,120,000" (https://www.britannica.com/topic/Bamileke). Even that seems low to be the largest. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Blampied (talk • contribs) 16:14, 18 December 2020 (UTC)

The claim of Egyptian origin

Hello, @GuinanTheListener: Regarding your recent additions claiming that the Bamileme originate in Egypt: This edit [[1]] is sourced to a one-page pdf that does not contain any citations of studies of scholarly work making the case that Bamileke descends from Egyptian. It is an extraordinary claim (again see WP:REDFLAG) that radically contradicts the mainstream consensus of linguistics that Bamileke is a Niger-Congo language (probably related to the branch of Niger-Congo that Bantu beings to). The claim that it somehow descends from Egyptian, an Afro-Asiatic language from a different region of Africa, is an extraordinary claim. Like many WP:FRINGE claims it does not seem to be addressed by modern ethno-linguistics. If it is an idea argued by mainstream modern ethno-linguistics, there should be studies and published scholarly work by relevant experts in mainstream outlets making that case, but there do not seem to be.

Your other addition here [[2]] makes the claim in passing in a paper whose main subject is something else. The author, Beaudelaire Noel Kaze, also does not seem to be an expert in African history, linguistics, archaeology or any other discipline relevant to the ancient origin of the Bamileke. I can only find one publication by him, and it is uncertain what his credentials are. Also, even aside from that, for the statements to not be WP:UNDUE it seems that they should be sourced to contemporary research by relevant experts (linguists, historians, anthropologists, etc.) that argue that the Bamileke originate in Egypt. A single source making the claim (especially in passing with no explanation) should not be the basis of a definitive statement in the article (as it is now in the history section) as though it were mainstream consensus, when it is not. That seems to be misleading. Skllagyook (talk) 10:39, 28 September 2022 (UTC)

The language quotation is an exact quote that the University of Indiana's National African Language Resource Center sourced from an article written by France's Official Department of Culture, which is a government agency of anthologists and linguists. This source is scholarly, reputable and was written by experts in the field.

The EPH - International Journal of Humanities and Social Science, which published Kaze's article is a reputable, scholarly, peer-reviewed journal. As this article was written in 2020, it is based on the most current research on the Bamileke people. GuinanTheListener (talk) 19:15, 28 September 2022 (UTC)

• anthropologists GuinanTheListener (talk) 19:16, 28 September 2022 (UTC)

@GuinanTheListener: I'm afraid you don't seem to be addressing the issues I raised above. There are no studies/work named anywhere in the one page pdf you cited that establish that Bamileke descends from Egyptian. It takes more than a brief line in a source that is not a study to establish an extraordinary claim as not WP:UNDUE. Again, see WP:REDFLAG. Every mainstream linguist I am aware of agrees that Bamileke is a Niger-Congo language and that the Bamileke are ethno-linguistically Niger-Congo and have deep roots in the region. Egyptian is not Niger-Congo. Therefore the claim that one descends from the other is extraordinary and requires at the very least some high-quality sources that actually make the case for that being true, rather than merely claiming it.

As I also explained, Kaze does not seem to be an expert in a relevant field, nor to have published in a relevant field. I can find no evidence that he has relevant qualifications or has published other research on the topic. This means he is a non-expert and not qualified to have his statements about linguistics or the ancient ethic origins of a people featured as though there were the definitive mainstream academic opinion, and that is how you have framed this opinion in the article. In addition, the ancient origin of the Bamileke is not the main subject of his article (which is not about ancient history or origins) and is only mentioned in passing in the beginning. That is why your edits are misleading and WP:UNDUE. If you can find actual reliably published studies by specific linguists, anthropologists (that are from the modern era) arguing for the statements you want to add, that would be different, but what you have added does not present any evidence to that effect that would challenge the WP:MAINSTREAM understanding that the Bamileke are ethno linguistically Niger-Congo and not related to Ancient Egyptians. Skllagyook (talk) 20:00, 28 September 2022 (UTC)

The article by France's Official Department of Culture actually compares the languages, as does the work of Harry Johnston (despite the racist overtones in his writing). The Bamileke language shares syntax and suffixes with languages in ancient Egypt. The Official Department of Culture also cited the works of Dr. Dieudonné Toukam, a renowned linguist and translator, who is considered an expert in the field. He asserts the same findings in his essay “Histoire et anthropologie du peuple bamiléké,” which is a 2010 study of the Bamileke people, culture and language. And article written in 2003 by Moustafa Gadalla, an esteemed Egyptologists, also affirms the blatant similarities in language and alphabet of the Bamileke, Tikar and Bamoum with Ancient Egyptian peoples. He asserts that "The early history of these peoples is completely ignored by academicians, who dismiss oral and other traditions and evidence, if it contradicts their self-made linguistic classification." GuinanTheListener (talk) 21:54, 28 September 2022 (UTC)

Please excuse the typos. GuinanTheListener (talk) 21:56, 28 September 2022 (UTC)

@GuinanTheListener: The one page pdf does not seem to compare the languages. If you have a link to a source that does, feel free to post it here. Dieudonné Toukam is a translator but does not seem to be a linguist. There is a topic about him here on this Talk page. The quote you gave from Gadalla if anything seems to confirm that the view that Bamileke descends from Egyptian is not mainstream and is not given credence by the majority of academics in the field (which I have been trying to explain). And it should be noted that fringe theorists often portray themselves as persecuted by the mainstream (this is mentioned at WP:REDFLAG and I believe at WP:FRINGE, which I suggest you read). At most, the Egyptian theory would be a minority view. And according to Wikipedia policies, the way we represent scholarly opinions must reflect and be in proportion to the degree that they are accepted by relevant experts. Neither minority nor fringe views should be represented as though they are more accepted than they are. Again, please read WP:UNDUE; I have posted it but I am not sure you have read it. The Egyptian origin theory is at best a minority view, but you have represented it inaccurately as though it were the definitive and broadly accepted consensus. It is not. It might be possible to include it as a view suggested by a minority of researchers (though so far, the only one you have mentioned who could perhaps be seen as an expert is Gadalla - although his expertise is in Egypt and he has no expertise on the cultures of sub-Saharan Africa which should be preferred). But it should be made clear that it is not the dominant view and that most researchers do not propose or forgive credence to any such connection. Skllagyook (talk) 22:14, 28 September 2022 (UTC)

Dr. Toukam studied linguistics at Dalhousie University. The quote by Gadalla addresses some academics prior to the 90s. Current researchers are beginning to release articles that compare the languages, while past linguists ignored it without actually exploring the languages nor the people. The few academic articles that I've found from the past that categorize it as a Niger-Congo language provide no explanation nor research for the actual classification. Meanwhile, researchers like France's Department of Culture, Dr. Toukin, and Moustafa Gadalla actually provide linguistic and historical reasoning with their research. Also, the one pdf isn't the only citation behind the paragraph. It was only citing because it led me to additional reputable sources on the subject. It can be deleted. GuinanTheListener (talk) 22:37, 28 September 2022 (UTC)

Behind the pdf citation, there are also citations for France, ministère de la Culture, Délégation générale à la langue française (DGLF). July 1999. "Bamileke." [Accessed 27 Dec. 2022] and Canada: Immigration, as well as Refugee Board of Canada, Cameroon: Treatment of members of the Bamileke tribe by the authorities, and the language spoken and written by this tribe, 8 December 2000, CMR35757.F. The “Histoire et anthropologie du peuple bamiléké,” article by Dr.Toukam and "Exiled Egyptians: The Heart of Africa" by Moustafa Gadalla are also sources that I will be adding. GuinanTheListener (talk) 22:53, 28 September 2022 (UTC)

@GuinanTheListener: You do not seem to be listening or engaging with much that I have said. Please WP:LISTEN.As explained, Toukam is not an expert and thus not a reliable source (according to Wikipedia policy). And your edits as they are now are WP:UNDUE because they represent a minority opinion (that is possibly also fringe) as though it were the dominant view when it is not (which is against Wikipedia policy). Your material is disputed and in my opinion problematic. Please do not add anything else until we reach WP:CONSENSUS. You can link any additional sources here. Again, please listen to what I am trying to explain. Thank you. Skllagyook (talk) 23:05, 28 September 2022 (UTC)

@GuinanTheListener: Again, the Egyptian theory is not consensus and the way you have framed it is undue, even if one were to include it as a minority opinion. I also see that you added two refs:

Canada: Immigration and Refugee Board of Canada, Cameroon: Treatment of members of the Bamileke tribe by the authorities, and the language spoken and written by this tribe, 8 December 2000, CMR35757.F, available at: https://www.refworld.org/docid/3f7d4d7134.html [accessed 28 September 2022]

and

France, ministère de la Culture, Délégation générale à la langue française (DGLF). July 1999. "Bamileke." [Accessed 27 Dec. 2022]

The first is not a study on linguistics and includes no link or any way to verify its content. The second one also does not include any way to verify it. Can you provide links so that it can be verified that they contain the arguements by specialists that you have stated they do? Thank you.Skllagyook (talk) 01:54, 29 September 2022 (UTC)

@GuinanTheListener: Linguists such as Roger Blench, who affirm that Bamileke is Niger-Congo, is prominent in the field of African ethno-linguistics and is cited multiple times by other scholars. Toukam is not an Africanist and I can not find any evidence that he is an ethnolinguist (here he is referred to as a translator and editor but not as an ethnolinguist https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Dieudonne-Toukam and as the other user above said, his LinkedIn profile also describes him as a translator https://ca.linkedin.com/in/dieudonn%C3%A9-toukam-11519336). And Gallada is an Egyptologist but that is a different discipline from the study of the history of sub-Saharan Africa (and its language and cultures). Kaze seems to have no relevant qualifications at all. You have still not produced an actual scholarly source (that can be verified) from cited by France's Department of Culture that argues that Bamileke deacends from Egyptian beyond a single enigmatic line in a pdf and your asserting that it does. (Can you link a source here that can be read?. You also have not replied to my last few posts. As I said, even if the sources (or some of them) were admissable, they do not represent the consensus of specialists in the topic (e.g. Afrianists, ethnolinguists) and you the article should not portray the Egyptian theory as though it were the mainstrean and dominant view among those specialists. Please engage with what I have said. I would rather not open an ANI report. Thank you. Skllagyook (talk) 04:41, 30 September 2022 (UTC)

You are not being ignored. I simply have responsibilities outside of Wikipedia that are of more importance, so I had to step away. I assure you that I will reply as I have the opportunity to log in to Wikipedia, which is not 24/7. But I actually am listening. Please WP:LISTEN to me as well. Dr. Toukam is definitely an expert in the field and is renowned in Africa, France and Canada for his command and study of language. His LinkedIn says that he's exploring an additional PhD in another area of linguistics right now from the same university. He also spent a significant amount of time in specific regions to learn the languages from the ethnic groups, which I believe additionally qualifies him as an expert.

These are not minority opinions, nor are have they been challenged or disproven. The industry no longer cites Cameroon as the origin of the Bamileke specifically because this research has cultural and linguistic merit. Linguists Roger Blench specifically said he "proposes" that certain languages like Bamileke and Tikar are Niger-Congo. He also says "the poor levels of documentation of Bantoid and the lack of plausible mesolevel reconstructions is hindering the study of the relationship with both Benue-Congo and Bantu." He stated that the issue he faces was that he noticed that the current language classification system and the linguists before him had no justification for the grouping of most African languages. The field hasn't been able to correct this yet. While Bamileke and Tikar are now proposed as Niger-Congo and Bantoid, he also admits that they are "very remote" from the classic Bantu system of nouns. He states this in "The internal structure of Bantoid and defining the border with Bantu." So even Roger Blench, another expert in the field, admits that there are key differences in the structure of these languages in compared to the Bantu languages of neighboring peoples that linguists still can't explain.

As for Gadalla, he actually began to study central African peoples once the same similarities in their ancient writing systems and those of Egypt. His article defines those connections and explains the significance of them. He also confronts past linguists who ignored those connections, by citing the same thing that Roger Blench said, which is that there is no justification for what you are considering to be the majority view. I believe these edits are not WP:UNDUE nor WP:FRINGE. I believe they have scholastic merit and are relevant to the subject.

I will look for a shareable link to the article by France's Department of Culture to link here. GuinanTheListener (talk) 17:06, 30 September 2022 (UTC)

@GuinanTheListener: That the exact position/branch Bamileke belongs to within Niger-Congo is uncertain is not what I am disputing. Some linguists argue that it is closer to Bantu than others, and its relationship with Bantu in particular is indeed disputed by linguists but not that it is Niger-Congo. There are many diverse and deeply-rooted branches of Niger-Congo and Bantu is only one small and relatively young branch (of Niger-Congo). That uncertainty is a far cry from the theory that it could be Afro-Asiatic or related to Egyptian (which is totally unrelated to the Niger-Congo family). Roger Blench does not anywhere express doubt or dispute that Bamileke is within the Niger-Congo family regardless of its more precise placing within that family. The common scholarly view consensus is that Bamileke (and Tikar and other Cameroonian Grassland languages) are Niger-Congo. What subfamily they belong to within that family is what is uncertain. And though Toukam has written books, his writings on Bamikeke language and history do not appear to be in peer-reviewed journals relevant to those disciplines nor do Gadalla's writings on the Bamileke seem to be. Non-peer reviewed writings on an academic by topic by non-experys on that topic would not be WP:RS. And again, your edits treat the Egyptian claims (which are radically at odds with the accepted idea that Bamileke is Niger-Congo) as though they were the established consensus or the dominant opinion in the field and they are not. I have raised this point several times and you still do not seem to be addressing it. The Egyptian theory is not the dominant one and your edits treat it as though it is.

It is against Wikipedia policy to cite non-experts on a topic outside of their expertise, especially in a way as definitive as you have done.

Whether or not Toukam is pursuing a degree in linguistics, he does not currently have one and has not published as an expert in linguistics journals. This makes him a non-expert. His "having a command of language" as you wrote, does not make him an expert in the field of linguistics or ethnolinguistics. He is a translator and that is a very different occupation. And what he has published he has published in non-peer-reviewed books as a non-linguist and non-historian without qualifications in those areas

Regarding Gadalla, you say he engaged with the arguments of linguists but if that's true, he seems to have done so, again, in non-peer-reviewed books. And is there any evidence that his arguments were accepted by those in the field of ethnolinguistics? Are his ideas about the Egyptian origin theory cited favorably in scholarly publications by relevant experts? Again, it is important that if you think so, you can actually link sources that show that and can be verified rather than simply stating that they are without providing any verifiable/shareable sources. Skllagyook (talk) 17:49, 30 September 2022 (UTC)

Roger Blench does not anywhere express doubt or dispute that Bamileke is within the Niger-Congo family, but there are many linguists who do. Blench even explicitly states in articles that this is a proposal that is not wildly accepted. He even says this on his website and reiterates it in his work. His proposal is not the common consensus by any means. It's just Blench's theory, which he even he states has inconsistencies because there is still a lot that he doesn't understand about the languages and their formations.

Also, the term "Africanist" is not a term in anthropological nor linguistic studies and shouldn't be used to judge a researcher's merit. Blench doesn't identify as an "Africanist" either. Toukam is regarded as an expert of African languages in Canada, France and Cameroon. He speaks a plethora of the languages, including Bamileke, and has the ability to translate between those languages. How is someone who speaks a language and has studied the language and the people at a collegiate level not considered an expert? There is no need for me to defend his education, as his degrees and studies speak volumes. He is relevant in the field, as is his work, which is why he's cited in other articles I've found.

The Egypt origin theory alsp appears to be dominant theory. I've spent the last few days looking at present research on the Bamileke, from the Jstor to websites to the world atlas, and everything I've found so far states that the Bamileke split from the Tikar and lived along the Nile in Egypt. If this belief was fringe, I do not believe it would be apart of the Bamileke oral tradition nor be cited as the main origin across research that I've been able to find online.

Blench stated that he's unsure and that he knows the languages are "remote" from Bantu languages. He also admitted that his proposed language categories are controversial. Can you present current research that proposes a different origin and proves that this belief is WP:UNDUE nor WP:FRINGE? GuinanTheListener (talk) 20:32, 3 October 2022 (UTC)

"Roger Blench does not anywhere express doubt or dispute that Bamileke is within the Niger-Congo family, but there are many linguists who do."

I also need to correct this sentence, because he states on his website that the field doesn't have all the information to conclude that languages like Tikar and Bamileke are in the Niger-Congo family. But because there is a lot they still doesn't know about these particular Grassfield languages, the Niger-Congo family is the only place he could categorize them in the language system that we currently have, which he regrets is still modeled after his predecessors, who were unable to explain their categorization of most African languages.

Also, Bamileke's categorization as a Niger-Congo language is not what I'm disputing (Though it is disputed in the field). I'm questioning what it's categorization as a Niger-Congo language by one person has to do with the origin of the Bamileke people, especially when the person behind its categorization says that it's different from the Bantu languages? GuinanTheListener (talk) 20:47, 3 October 2022 (UTC)

@GuinanTheListener: You wrote:

" he states on his website that the field doesn't have all the information to conclude that languages like Tikar and Bamileke are in the Niger-Congo family."

I would be best if you could provide a quote and a link to exactly where he says this rather than simply asserting it.

You wrote: "Also, Bamileke's categorization as a Niger-Congo language is not what I'm disputing (Though it is disputed in the field)."

The only people who seem to dispute it are people with no credentials in linguistics (such as Toukam and Gadalla). You have provided no sources that demonstrate otherwise though I have asked more than once.

You wrote: "I'm questioning what it's categorization as a Niger-Congo language by one person has to do with the origin of the Bamileke people, especially when the person behind its categorization says that it's different from the Bantu languages?"

As far as I am aware, based on the sources by actual specialists in the field of linguistics, it has been categorized as Niger-Congo by all specialists that have studied it (in the modern era). And if it is Niger-Congo, it cannot descend from Egyptian, which belongs to an entirely and unrelated language family (Afro-Asiatic). Nor do the linguists that have studied it (some of whom are cited in the article) make any suggestion or give any credence to the idea that it comes from Egyptian or even has any Egyptian influence. Based on the peer-reviews sources by specialists in the field, the Egyptian theory is not given credence. It is not mentioned anywhere and makes no sense if Bamileke is Niger-Congo, which most linguists seem to agree that it is. The Niger-Congo family is (at least within many millennia) native to the area of West Africa)

Regarding Bamileke being different from the Bantu languages, as mentioned, it does not have to be Bantu to be Niger-Congo. The Bantu languages are only one branch of the very large and very ancient and very diverse Niger-Congo language family (see Niger-Congo languages)). All Bantu languages are Niger-Congo but only some Niger-Congo languages are Bantu. There are many branches of Niger-Congo that are not Bantu and that are substantially different from Bantu and from each other. Most West African languages are in non-Bantu branches of Niger-Congo. It is believed that the Bantu languages split off from an older branch of Niger-Congo somewhere around Cameroon. And some suggest that Grassland languages like Bamileke belong to a branch of Niger-Congo that is related to the ancestor of Bantu but is not Bantu and is still different from it. But either way, it is generally agreed (by linguists) that it belongs somewhere in the Niger-Congo family. It seems that it may be best to involve a third party in this issue. Skllagyook (talk) 22:24, 3 October 2022 (UTC)

Again I ask, can you please present current research that proposes a different origin and proves that this belief is WP:UNDUE and/or WP:FRINGE? You say that it is disputed, but you haven't provided the sources by experts that you claim possess "the definitive mainstream academic opinion."

"Regarding Bamileke being different from the Bantu languages, as mentioned, it does not have to be Bantu to be Niger-Congo." True, but according to Blench, it does have to be considered Bantu to be considered a native language to the region, which is why he referred to them as "remote" and considers them "Bantoid" rather than Bantu. He makes the clear distinction.

In addition, I was able to get into contact with France's Department of Culture. I was informed that the Egypt origin of the Bamileke is indeed the current belief in the field by historians, cultural anthropologists and researchers across Africa, France, Canada and China. They referred me to the work of Toukam and Dr. Célestine Colette Fouellefak Kana, who are believed to be the leading researchers of the Bamileke people. Their research is believed to have considerable merit. I was given their sources and will be working my way through them and providing new sources here as I read them. GuinanTheListener (talk) 22:51, 3 October 2022 (UTC)

One additional scholarly, peer-reviewed source is: Djoukwo Tsanetse Majolie Carine, Aihong Wang, Elise Limunga Linda. Designing the Kè symbol from the Chinese Bagua Symbol: The Case of the Bamilekes of Western Cameroon. English Language, Literature & Culture. Vol. 6, No. 2, 2021, pp. 24-26. GuinanTheListener (talk) 22:52, 3 October 2022 (UTC)

@GuinanTheListener: From what I can tell. Célestine Colette Fouellefak Kana is also not a linguist. None of the authors of the paper on the Ke symbol seem to be proposing and Egyptian origin of the Bamileke (I will try to find the full version to further verify) and they also do not seem to be linguists or historians, based on what I have seen of the abstract (apparently the link is blacklisted by Wikipedia so I could not post it). (But Djoukwo Tsanetse Majolie Carine belongs to the International College Department, Aihong Wang the Department of Products Design at the Jingdezhen Ceramic Institute, Jingdezhen, China, and Elise Limunga Linda to the Department of Environment Science, China University of Geoscience, Wuhan, China.) The paper seems to be focused on the comparison of symbols in Bamileke and Chinese culture.

But again, if you believe there are peer-reviewed sources by specialists arguing that the Bamileke and their language are of Egyptian origin, please link them and quote where they actually argue that (and/or provide links and page numbers) rather than simply stating that it is the case and posting names. There need to be verifiable reliable sources. What an organization may or may not have communicated to you is not WP:RS. There need to be reliable specialist sources. I have explained that more than once

Bantoid is considered to be a branch of Niger-Congo related to Bantu (hence the name). If it is Bantoid it is clearly Niger-Congo. Just as I previously explained, some argue that Bamileke belongs to branch of Niger-Congo related to Bantu but distinct from it. Bantu is a branch of Niger-Congo. Niger-Congo itself is not Native to the region of Cameroon specifically, but is native to West Africa (and it's not related to Egyptian). Bantu and Bantoid are Niger Congo varieties that migrated south and diverged in the general Cameroon/southeast Nigeria region. Skllagyook (talk) 23:11, 3 October 2022 (UTC)

Dr. Célestine Colette Fouellefak Kana is a renowned historian, cultural anthropologist and professor. Her work centers on the Bamileke people. Why would she need to be a linguist to affirm the origin of a people?

The article by Djoukwo Tsanetse Majolie Carine, Aihong Wang, Elise Limunga Linda cites the commonly-believed origin of the Bamileke in it. It's published in a peer-reviewed scholarly journal.

And yet again I ask, can you please present current research that proposes a different origin and proves that this belief is WP:UNDUE and/or WP:FRINGE? You say that it is disputed, but you haven't provided the sources by experts that you claim possess "the definitive mainstream academic opinion." I will not providing you with any additional sources when you have yet to do the same. Your sources also need to be verifiable reliable sources from reliable specialists, as you stated mine should be. I've asked you twice already and you've yet to provide them. GuinanTheListener (talk) 23:35, 3 October 2022 (UTC)

Please do not make any changes to the page until you are able to provide scholarly, reliable sources that explicitly disprove the Egypt origin. GuinanTheListener (talk) 23:38, 3 October 2022 (UTC)

@GuinanTheListener: You have still not provides a single specialist scholarly source that argues for the Egyptian origin (rather than mentioning it in passing in a paper that is about something else), and whose arguments to that effect have been given credence by other relevant specialists (e.g. in the form of scholarly citations). You have given no evidence that the statistically of Bamileke as Niger-Congo Niger-Congo disputed by actual specialists. The obligation is not to disprove a fringe theory. Fringe theories are often not engaged with by the mainstream. Instead, you would have to provide sources like what I described above. Also, your edits were disputed and, having been challenged, should never have been reinstated without first forming a WP:CONSENSUS here on the Talk page. See WP:ONUS. Skllagyook (talk) 23:46, 3 October 2022 (UTC)

Negative. You claimed the Egypt origin was WP:UNDUE and/or WP:FRINGE. To make such as claim, you also have to present current research that proposes a different origin and proves that this belief is WP:UNDUE and/or WP:FRINGE? You say that it is disputed, but you haven't provided the sources by experts that you claim possess "the definitive mainstream academic opinion."

Again I ask that you provide your sources. And we can move forward in this discussion once you do. GuinanTheListener (talk) 00:08, 4 October 2022 (UTC)

Also, I linked 3 scholarly sources that argue this origin. They are widely accepted in the field and are cited by other scholars in the field. I have yet to receive even one scholarly source from you that argues otherwise. GuinanTheListener (talk) 00:10, 4 October 2022 (UTC)

I'm not sure if you were able to get access the new source I cited yet.

Djoukwo Tsanetse Majolie Carine, Aihong Wang, Elise Limunga Linda. Designing the Kè symbol from the Chinese Bagua Symbol: The Case of the Bamilekes of Western Cameroon. English Language, Literature & Culture. Vol. 6, No. 2, 2021, pp. 24-26

It states:

"The current Feelahins / Copts are largely recognized as Baladis converted by force, but still retaining huge parts of their ancestral culture. Leaving from Upper Egypt in the 9th century AD [9], the Baladis-Bamileke arrived in the Tikar region in the 12th century. The people of the Grassfields, who spoke a single language and had a single chief, dissolved about 1357 when their last supreme ruler, King Ndeh, died. Yende, the first prince and future king, turned down the role as the new paramount ruler and established Bafoussam across the Noun river."

GuinanTheListener (talk) 00:23, 4 October 2022 (UTC)

To continue the conversation here:

I posted on the ANI page, "Also, it appears we've been debating two different things. I was under the impression that we were discussing the origin theory of the Bamileke people as a whole. If your stance is that there is no concrete evidence of where exactly the Bamileke language began, I agree with that stance. Even Blench states that experts in the field can't state with certainty where it and some of the other Bantoid languages originated."

For clarity, my stance is that current scholarly research and oral tradition suggests that the Bamileke people immigrated Cameroon from the Nile River, particularly in present-day Egypt. This is not an attempt to imply that they are "the" Ancient Egyptians nor that they are genetically linked to present-day Egyptians. The research only maintains that the Bamileke people were an ethnic group that lived in Upper Egypt and that it is possible that their culture and language were in-part influenced by their time in Upper Egypt. GuinanTheListener (talk) 20:16, 4 October 2022 (UTC)

About the linguistic affiliation of the Bamileke languages: do you seriously believe that it's only Roger Blench who classifies it as Niger-Congo? You mention Blench all over the place, but many other scholars have firmly placed Bamileke among the so-called "Grassfield" languages which are quite closely related to the Bantu languages. The exact cladistic divisions still remain a matter of discussion, since the internal classification of Niger-Congo as a whole is highly complex, but these details do not open the door for fringe views about links between any one of the Niger-Congo languages and Ancient Egyptian. –Austronesier (talk) 20:22, 4 October 2022 (UTC)

Add Here are some sources from mainstream linguistics:[3], [4]. See also the long list of mainstream references sources cited there. –Austronesier (talk) 21:01, 4 October 2022 (UTC)

@GuinanTheListener: As I understand, we have both been debating two distinct, but not necessarily entirely unrelated things: the origin of the Bamileke as well as the affiliation of their language. I may have made the error of over conflating the two in my earlier posts. But nonetheless, mainstream scholarship does not seem to support the view that either the Bamileke (and other Cameroonian Grassfields peoples) nor their language(s) came from Egypt.

Regarding non-linguistoc sources, here are a few on the history of the Cameroonian Grassfield peoples by archaeologists and anthropologists, referencing other research in those fields as well as that in linguistics. None of them make any mention or give any credence to a migration from Egypt nor the idea that the Bamileke or other grassfeild peoples are of Egyptian origin. They seem to agree that Grassfield cultures (including those of the Bamileke, Tikar, etc.) developed natively in the area.

The Settlement of the Grassfields:Archeological Research in the West of Cameroon by archaeologist Pierre Lavachery (see here for some of his publications: https://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C33&q=Lavachery&btnG=)

https://www.sciencegate.app/document/10.21825/af.v14i1.5599

And a section of it here (though in French) discussing the various stages of settlement and cultural development in the region, including the establishment of Bantu-related agriculturalists from the region of West Africa. No mention is made of a migration of Egyptians into the area.

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/322983852_The_Settlement_of_the_GrassfieldsArcheological_Research_in_the_West_of_Cameroon

Another source here: Kingdoms of the Cameroon Grassfields by anthropologist IAN FOWLER (SEE HERE https://www.anthro.ox.ac.uk/people/dr-ian-fowler here: https://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C33&q=IAN+FOWLER+CAMEROON&btnG=)

The link:

https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/00938157.2011.624994?journalCode=grva20

"Cameroonian Grassfields Civilization" (by the anthropologist Jean Pierre Warnier see here: https://materialreligions.blogspot.com/p/jean-pierre-warnier.html and several of his highly-cited arcticles here: https://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C33&q=John+Pierre+Warnier&btnG=) reviews the research on the history of "Grassfeilds civilization. In teh chapter discussing population history in that region, it is argued that the languages of Grassfield peoples belong to a family not unrelated to Bantu and that their history in the area has a time depth of several millenia going back to the early Niger-Congo peoples who settled the area farmed native crops such as the African yam and oil palm, which was followed by partial isolation between local Benue-Congo-speaking agricultural groups and multidirectional mixing. No mention is made of a migration form Egypt in the formation of the Bamileke or any other Grassfield group.

A summation of some of the points made on page page 23 (of the first chapter that begins on page 15)

"The hypothesis I have advanced on the basis of arcchaeological evidence, linguistic classification and regional economic history can be recapitulated as follows: under the late Stone Age, the high plateaux were already occupied by a population of negroid type. Some six millennia ago or so horticulture...was introduced... The population of horticulturalists spoke proto-Benue-Congo languages, doubtless close to proto-Bantu. Multidirectional mixing and several millennia of diversification produced the complex situation we have today." (page 23)

Link here: :::https://www.google.com/books/edition/Cameroon_Grassfields_Civilization/YUrMKzjvyEcC?hl=en&gbpv=1&dq=Cameroon+Grassfield+civilization&printsec=frontcover

The article by Djoukwo Tsanetse Majolie Carine, Aihong Wang, and Elise Limunga Linda seems to have no citations (see Google scholar). I could not find Wang at all. The other two seem to have few articles indiclvidually and none are cited. Nor is it clear that any of them are archaeologists, anthropologists, or historians. Skllagyook (talk) 20:42, 4 October 2022 (UTC)

Djoukwo Tsanetse Majolie Carine, Aihong Wang, Elise Limunga Linda. Designing the Kè symbol from the Chinese Bagua Symbol: The Case of the Bamilekes of Western Cameroon. English Language, Literature & Culture. Vol. 6, No. 2, 2021, pp. 24-26 is complete with citations, footnotes and references. They are researchers in China, who study the correlations between natural resources, art, spirituality and culture. English Language, Literature & Culture is also a reputable, international peer-reviewed journal that you can read about here: https://journals.indexcopernicus.com/search/details?id=33692.

The Settlement of the Grassfields:Archeological Research in the West of Cameroon by archaeologist Pierre Lavachery https://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C33&q=Lavachery&btnG= This link doesn't link to a specific source about the Bamileke people. I'm unsure about its purpose. Is there a particular article that challenges the Egypt origin of the Bamileke people?

https://www.researchgate.net/publication/322983852_The_Settlement_of_the_GrassfieldsArcheological_Research_in_the_West_of_Cameroon This source you mentioned doesn't seem to mention the Bamileke people at all nor provide any evidence of a proposed origin. It also appears that the author's, Philippe Lavachery, work seems to center on archaeology and stratigraphy.

I was able to access Kingdoms of the Cameroon Grassfields by Ian Fowler on academia.com, and this article is specifically about the Mankon, Bali-Nyonga, and Oku kingdoms.

"Cameroonian Grassfields Civilization" by Jean Pierre Warnier centers on the period before Semi-Bantu peoples entered Cameroon. On pages 10-15, he talks about the earliest inhabitants of Cameroon and their formation of the Bantu languages. They are believed to have inhabited Cameroon 800 years before the immigration of present-day ethnic groups like the Bamileke and Bamum (page 51) GuinanTheListener (talk) 21:49, 4 October 2022 (UTC)

I cannot find your Warnier quote on those pages. But the source does not preclude there being more than one wave of Niger-Congo peoples from West Africa into the Grassfields region. Either way, Warnier explicitly tplaces the origins of present-day Grassfields groups to Bantu-related proto-Benue-Congo speakers (not Bantu but Bantu-related) that arrived in the region millennia ago. Again, he says:

"The population of horticulturalists spoke proto-Benue-Congo languages, doubtless close to proto-Bantu. Multidirectional mixing and several millennia of diversification produced the complex situation we have today."

The situation we know today, including prominent Grassfields groups like the Bamileke and Tikar that make up the present ethnic landscape of the Grassfeild region.

Lavachery, as mentioned, traces the archaeological history of the region. Agriculture there is associated with the arrival if Bantu-rekated horticulturalists. There is no mention anywhere of a migration from Egypt in the archaeology of ethnic history of the region, which if it were considered likely (especially if it were the origin of important ethnic groups there), would have been a significant event worth covering.

Mainstream sources are generally unlikely to directly/by name challenge a theory that is not taken seriously in mainstream scholarship. The Egyptian theory is thus not especially likely to be engaged with in mainstream archaeology, anthropology, or linguistics. As I understand, the WP:ONUS is on the person wishing to add it to demonstrate that an idea is considered notable enough in mainstream scholarship (among relevant experts) and given some kind of credence by them to be treated as WP:MAINSTREAM and not undue, rather than there needing to be reliable sourced directly refuting every fringe idea proposed.

Here are are some excerpts from WP:FRINGE.

"Material such as an article, book, monograph, or research paper that has been vetted by the scholarly community is regarded as reliable, where the material has been published in reputable peer-reviewed sources or by well-regarded academic presses."

Also, from the WP:FRINGE page

"The notability of a fringe theory must be judged by statements from verifiable and reliable sources, not the proclamations of its adherents. Additionally, the topic must satisfy general notability guidelines: the topic must receive significant coverage in reliable sources that are independent of the subject. Even reputable news outlets have been known to publish credulous profiles of fringe theories and their proponents, and there continue to be many completely unreliable sources masquerading as legitimate."

Regarding notability, the Fringe page explains that a fringe theory may sometimes be mentioned porportionally in context to the degree that it has been engaged with by the scientific community (its notability). But, in cases of fringe theories without notability, the Fringe page also says, "Fringe theories may be excluded from articles about scientific topics when the scientific community has ignored the ideas."

From: WP:REDFLAG that seems to apply here):

"Any exceptional claim requires multiple high-quality sources. Warnings (red flags) that should prompt extra caution include:

Surprising or apparently important claims not covered by multiple mainstream sources..."

Also see the section of Fringe etitled "Unwarranted promotion of fringe theories". It states:

"A conjecture that has not received critical review from the scientific community or that has been rejected may be included in an article about a scientific subject only if other high-quality reliable sources discuss it as an alternative position. Ideas supported only by a tiny minority may be explained in articles devoted to those ideas if they are notable."

The Egyptian theory of Bamileke origins (either linguistically or ethnically) does not appear to be considered notable by mainstream scholarship and is for the most part not covered by archaeologists, linguists, or anthropologists (but it would contradict what they hold regarding the origins if Grassfield peoples). The source you mentioned again in your last reply has not been cited by any specialist research as far as I can tell (one way to gauge that is in Google Scholar, see herehttps://scholar.google.com/scholar?hl=en&as_sdt=0%2C33&q=Djoukwo+Tsanetse+Majolie+CArine&btnG=) And it is unclear what the credentials or specializations of the authors are. Even a paper written by an expert can be fringe if it is at odds with the mainstream and has not received significant engagement from the mainstream (as described above). Skllagyook (talk) 22:20, 4 October 2022 (UTC)

"The population of horticulturalists spoke proto-Benue-Congo languages, doubtless close to proto-Bantu. Multidirectional mixing and several millennia of diversification produced the complex situation we have today."

This quote is not specifically about the Bamileke. It's about the earliest inhabitants of Cameroon. The Bamileke weren't able to successfully establish their horticulture until 1900 due to fleeing the Fulani after they enter Cameroon between the 12th and 14th century.

WP:ONUS is on me to provide the sources. I do not disagree with that. However, you volunteered sources that I read through, only to discover the information isn't even related to the Bamileke people. None of it even remotely implied that the Bamileke have another origin.

I also have an additional source. Once I was able to translate it, I was able to find it in English via the JSTOR.

RUPPEL, Oliver C., and Katharina RUPPEL-SCHLICHTING. “CAMEROON IN A NUTSHELL – HUMAN AND NATURAL ENVIRONMENT, HISTORICAL OVERVIEW AND LEGAL SETUP.” Environmental Law and Policy in Cameroon - Towards Making Africa the Tree of Life | Droit et Politique de l’environnement Au Cameroun - Afin de Faire de l’Afrique l’arbre de Vie, edited by Oliver C. Ruppel and Emmanuel D. Kam Yogo, 1st ed., Nomos Verlagsgesellschaft mbH, 2018, pp. 52. JSTOR, http://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctv941sr6.7. Accessed 5 Oct. 2022.

It states:

"The Bamileke is a semi-Bantu community in Cameroon with origins from Egypt. The Bamileke occupy the northwest and western highlands of Cameroon."

I am still working on translating the other articles and searching for the English versions. GuinanTheListener (talk) 20:24, 5 October 2022 (UTC)

Environmental Law and Policy in Cameroon - Towards Making Africa the Tree of Life – This doesn't look like a source which is primarily concerned with the history of Cameroon's ethnic groups. The chapter by Ruppel & Ruppel-Schlichting presents a country overview profile, but again isn't really a specialist source. The text flip-flops between characterizing the Bamileke as a "semi-Bantu community" or "Bantu community". If you dig deeper, you will find that they mention the source "Sawe (2017)" in footnote 3. "Sawe (2017)" is in fact a page in "WorldAtlas". And behold, the text by Ruppel & Ruppel-Schlichting is a complete verbatim ripoff of Sawe's page. This totally discredits Ruppel & Ruppel-Schlichting's chapter. As for Sawe's overview in WorldAtlas, it doesn't cite any academic/scholarly sources, so it's a dead end. (Although I am pretty sure that Sawe's claim – even if not explicitly sourced – leans on Toukam's book.) –Austronesier (talk) 20:51, 5 October 2022 (UTC)

I get the feeling that no matter what scholarly references I present, there will be an attempt to discredit the researchers, despite no other origin alternatives presented. So there's no need for me to keep presenting evidence. On this particular consensus, I yield. GuinanTheListener (talk) 16:52, 7 October 2022 (UTC)

If you think that rejecting sources that plaigiarize (Ruppel & Ruppel-Schlichting) or state things out of the blue (Sawe) is just an attempt to discredit the researchers, you might need to look again into our policies about WP:reliable sources. –Austronesier (talk) 09:34, 8 October 2022 (UTC)

The Sudanic origin of the Bamileke and other peoples in Western and Northern Cameroon is not challenged by mainstream academia. If the overwhelming majority of linguistic genetic and archeological evidence validates that a large number of these Sudanic populations in Cameroon came from the Yellow Nile aka Wadi Howar diaspora, I dont understand how any of this becomes controversial. Scholar editor 477 (talk) 07:23, 15 February 2023 (UTC)

I have never come across any mainstream prpfessional Bamileke historian or lecturer that doesn't consider Toukam a credible source on the Bafoussam migratory testimonies. Not including his research in this article is severely questionable to say the least. Scholar editor 477 (talk) 07:34, 15 February 2023 (UTC)

Recent additions

@Skllagyook: I haven't removed the two paragraphs because they actually deserve a more differentiated approach than entirely dismissing them as you did.[5]

Coia et al. (2004) were terribly misquoted (starting from "autosomal" to "Bantoid"), but they have some valuable information. They write Unfortunately, the Bamileke and Ewondo are of little use to test this hypothesis since they are of Sudanic origin and acquired the Bantu language much later than the Bantu expansion, citing Spedini et al. (1999) who devote a half-paragraph to the origins of the Bamileke.

I also don't see how Rowlands (2003) promotes "outdated hamiticist view" and why he is "not a specialist in African cultures of history". Again, the problem lies that the source was misused. Rowlands did not conduct "an analysis of kingship and material cultural commonalities between the Bamileke and Ancient Egyptians", but rather takes Bamileke chiefdoms as an examplary "model for sacred power in precolonial [sub-Saharan] Africa", which he then links to the depection of royal power in Ancient Egypt. He doesn't claim an Egyptian origin for the Bamileke at all, but on the contrary wants to show that Ancient Egypt is culturally deeply rooted in [sub-Saharan] Africa. To sum up: potentially a useful source for articles about Ancient Egypt, but not here. Austronesier (talk) 22:08, 15 February 2023 (UTC)

@Austronesier: My concern with Rowland was that he was an anthropologist but not a specialist in Africa, and as such, should be treated with caution if he was making the kinds of claims I (seemingly mistakenly) thought he was. But I may to have been incorrect about Rowland according to your message above. Thank you for the information. But the paragraph I removed sourced to him would seem to have been a pretty major mischaracterization of his views. And neither it nor his actual statements would indeed not belong on the Bamileke page (since the latter are, as you say, more relevant to ancient Egypt. Should it not then be removed (though apparently I did remove it for the wrong reasons)?

When I read the Coia et al. paper I did not see the passage you excerpted above. But if it is there, I can add the paragraph back to the article (perhaps with some modifications). One concern is that the term "Sudanic" might be misleading and be assumed by the general reader to mean the region of the modern country Sudan along the Nile in the context of certain other material recently added, when the term can also refer to much of the general Sahel and Savanna zone of Africa (including both Sudan the country places like Chad, and all the way to the so-called "western Sudan" of the Mali, Guinea, Gambia, Senegal, Niger, northern Nigeria, etc. region). If is unclear which "Sudan" the study refers to. Skllagyook (talk) 22:20, 15 February 2023 (UTC)

Ad Rowland: removing was ok, my only concern was the rationale.

Here's a full text repository link to Spedini et al.: https://www.academia.edu/25623343/. The material on p. 147 makes a nice addition to what we already have about the northern origins of the Bamileke. I agree about "Sudanic". Linking to Sudan (region) and making it also explicit somehow in-text might help. –Austronesier (talk) 22:41, 15 February 2023 (UTC)

@Austronesier: Thank you. I will read Spedini when I get the chance. Skllagyook (talk) 23:00, 15 February 2023 (UTC)

The Sudanic in that article referencing the autosomal ancestry of the Bamileke refers to the area in the Lake Tchad region where both the Bamileke and the Ewondo migratory testimony says that their ancestors originated from. This would be the Central Sudan. The article is not speaking about the Western Sudan. The study is limited to Central Afrika. Scholar editor 477 (talk) 00:04, 16 February 2023 (UTC)

On what basis is Michael Rowlands' analysis of the kingship commonalities between the Bamileke and the Nile Valley illegitimate.

First it was claimed that he was a Hamiticist even though every single author in the text referenced disagrees with Hamiticism.

Then it was stated that he is not an expert in African history even though he is published in multiple peer reviewed journals on Afrikan history.

Removing that addition makes absolutely no sense. Scholar editor 477 (talk) 00:06, 16 February 2023 (UTC)

If there is genetic anthropological and archeological evidence of partial filiation between Nile Valley groups and West/Central African group that evidence needs to be taken into consideration from a balanced perspective.

Calling Trans continental commonalities "Hamiticism" without thoroughly analyzing the evidence is not rigorous and misleads readers about the intent of the scholarship. Scholar editor 477 (talk) 00:08, 16 February 2023 (UTC)

Please see the part of this topic thread that discussed Rowland. I initially mistakenly thought he was arguing for something he was not (based in part in the very misleading language of the paragraph you added). What he apparently did argue however (that Ancient Egyptian civilization had African cultural roots which may have derived, at least in part perhaps from older African cultural sources similar to cultures found in other parts of Africa - not that the Bamileke or their culture or model of kingship derived from Egypt) is not fringe but not particularly relevant to an article on the Bamileke. Its focus on the possible roots of aspects of Egyptian culture would be more appropriate, as User:Austronesier said, in articles on Ancient Egypt. Skllagyook (talk) 00:41, 16 February 2023 (UTC)

I won't repeat why Rowland does not analyse "kingship commonalities between the Bamileke and the Nile Valley". This is a misinterpretation of Rowland's theoretical approach.

The remaining text that was added earlier, however, was not just a misinterpretation, but entirely unsupported by the source: "From this he observed a Nile Valley prototype that could have spread to Central Africa prior to the expansion of Bantu languages. This is in complete contrast to earlier models of Hamito Semitic ethnography and supports future research into transcontinental connections between the Nile River in East Africa and the Wadi Howar diaspora into Western and Central Africa. According to Rowlands these close connections are evidence of filiation between the two groups that warrant further research. Nothing of this is in Rowland's text, absolutely nothing. –Austronesier (talk) 01:03, 16 February 2023 (UTC)

Dr. Michael Rowlands in his own words:

The incentive to explore the possibilities of arriving at a schema that would be applicable comparatively to the whole of sub-Saharan Africa is unashamedly political. It is justified in so far as it responds to the call for a revitalization of a sense of African unity. The role of embodiment and containment of life giving/destructive forces that we gloss by Europeanized notions (such chiefs as witchdoctors, diviners and prophets) has, I argue, a certain relevance for understanding the distinctive features of the politics of contemporary Africa. If such a recognition of the fundamental questions being discussed recently constitutes an endorsement of an Afrocentrist position which seeks an African renaissance to construct a new African history, identity and culture and to reassert the notion of Africanness, then so be it. Scholar editor 477 (talk) 09:36, 20 February 2023 (UTC)

Part of the problem here among the editors is with reading comprehension.

When Rowlands makes inferences that warrant further research, he is affirming that a connection is there and needs to be elaborated further.

This is a basic example where he negates a synchronic connection(ie direct contemporaneous link)while opening the door for further diachronic analysis(ie historical connections).

"Since the Ancient Egyptian case relates to a period before Bantu expansion in sub-Saharan Africa, it is clearly difficult to suggest any kind of synchronic comparison. But the elaboration of principles in the cases discussed in this chapter suggest certain basic commonalities."

This is clear as day and the early suggestion that Rowlands is a "hamiticist" shows unnecessary bias among certain editors of this article.

Scholar editor 477 (talk) 09:41, 20 February 2023 (UTC)

Scholastic Malpractice & Unethical Editing

So far in my interactions with other editors on this page I have come across scholastic mal practices and unethical editing.

Genetic evidence is completely withdrawn out of hand without any legitimate reason for it and scholars who affirm Nile Valley commonalities are dismissed outright and labeled "Hamiticist" without any thorough analysis or investigation of their literature.

This is not a proper way to edit and present unbiased information to readers. Without considering alternative peer reviewed sources that detail the genetic and cultural ancestry of the Bamileke and related groups in Cameroon readers are left assuming that these questions have not been answered even though they have been studied and published in great detail. Scholar editor 477 (talk) 00:14, 16 February 2023 (UTC)

Adding text that is largely or completely unsupported by the references pasted to it also counts among the things that you denote as "malpractice". –Austronesier (talk) 20:23, 19 February 2023 (UTC)

Just because you feel uncomfortable with peer reviewed sources that validate information on a subject matter doesn't mean that those sources are wrong. Scholar editor 477 (talk) 09:34, 20 February 2023 (UTC)

Hamiticism

One charge that I see thrown around on African history articles is "Hamiticism". This is especially the case when a scholar makes a connection between a West and or Central African group and Nile Valley populations.

The reason why this charge is erroneous is because scholars in African universities generally do no believe in the physical existence of Hamito-Semetic populations.

This is especially the case in the past 50 years of African scholarship. If you consider this fact calling any African scholarship that studies intra continental filiation between different African groups "Hamitic" is anachronistic, unethical and misleading.

If you disagree with a scholars research on a subject matter, state why. However just removing information from an article because you disagree is scholastic/editing malpractice.

This prevents readers from viewing alternative perspectives about African populations. Scholar editor 477 (talk) 00:19, 16 February 2023 (UTC)

Alternative perspectives should come from reliable sources, and not from WP:original research (Wikipedia's nice term for "fabricatrion") based on sources which don't say the things they are claimed to say by using them as "references". E.g. here[6], where the part "From this he observed a Nile Valley prototype that could have spread to Central Africa prior to the expansion of Bantu languages. This is in complete contrast to earlier models of Hamito Semitic ethnography and supports future research into transcontinental connections between the Nile River in East Africa and the Wadi Howar diaspora into Western and Central Africa. According to Rowlands these close connections are evidence of filiation between the two groups that warrant further research" is entirely made up. –Austronesier (talk) 20:31, 19 February 2023 (UTC)

Dr. Michael Rowlands in his own words:

The incentive to explore the possibilities of arriving at a schema that would be applicable comparatively to the whole of sub-Saharan Africa is unashamedly political. It is justified in so far as it responds to the call for a revitalization of a sense of African unity. The role of embodiment and containment of life giving/destructive forces that we gloss by Europeanized notions (such chiefs as witchdoctors, diviners and prophets) has, I argue, a certain relevance for understanding the distinctive features of the politics of contemporary Africa. If such a recognition of the fundamental questions being discussed recently constitutes an endorsement of an Afrocentrist position which seeks an African renaissance to construct a new African history, identity and culture and to reassert the notion of Africanness, then so be it. Scholar editor 477 (talk) 09:31, 20 February 2023 (UTC)

None of that implies that the Bamileke or their customs are of Egyptian/Nile Valley origin. Hamiticism involved the claim that all civilizations in sub-Saharan Africa must derive from some Near Eastern, Egyptian, North African, or Eurasian influence (regrettably, versions of that idea, centering Egypt, influenced some Afrocentrist-leaning writers as well). However, as I explained, my initial impression of Rowland was incorrect. He does not argue that at all. As was also explained, Rowland argues that certain cultural traits In ancient Egypt had African roots and thus commonalities elsewhere in Africa. And uses the Bamileke as an example of an African culture exhibiting some of these (widespread African) cultural traits. He is not making statements about the origin of the Bamileke or their culture (other than they are African and follow a widespread African pattern) let alone claiming that their practices derive from Egypt. Thus the material you added was not appropriate for this page. Adding statements/ideas that are not explicit in the source is original research and against Wikipedis policy. Skllagyook (talk) 19:50, 20 February 2023 (UTC)

Rowlands affirms that the Bamileke and the ancient Egyptians share the same proto cosmology. That is an explicit reference in his text. If two populations have the same proto cosmology they obviously share a common origin. Rowlands stated that more research is needed to understand the connections between the two cultures. His research is a valuable addition to the article. Scholar editor 477 (talk) 21:37, 20 February 2023 (UTC)

I'm afraid that assumption is WP:OR, if statements about Bamileke origin are not explicitly made in the source. But his statement that Egyptian cosmology has African roots is more of an explicit statement about Egyptian culture, and is more appropriately incorporated into articles on ancient Egypt than here. Skllagyook (talk) 21:49, 20 February 2023 (UTC)

Here are the key statements by Rowland and Obenga:

• Rowland: "To make a link with Ancient Egypt, I may posit analogues between Egypt and sub-Saharan Africa as sharing a proto-cosmogony."
• Obenga: "Le “Maître des Animaux” est un thème de la mythologie royale africaine développé dans la vallée du Nil égypto-nubienne, au Cameroun et au Nigeria, et dans d’autres royaumes africains précoloniaux."

Obviously, neither of them want to give special prominence to individual peoples in West-Central Africa. Rowland takes the Bamileke as an example, Obenga mentions Bamileke, Edo and Yoruba, but clearly doesn't stop there ("et dans d’autres royaumes africains précoloniaux"). Nowhere does Rowland say that "that more research is needed to understand the connections between the two cultures", because his objective clearly is not to support pipe dreams of an Egyptian origin of the Bamileke, but to establish Ancient Egypt as deeply rooted in the African cultural context. –Austronesier (talk) 22:00, 20 February 2023 (UTC)

Editors are not supposed to insert their own personal interpretations into a text or remove a text because of personal bias. Based upon your assertions no data regarding Bamiléké cosmology or creation should be inserted in this article because of the "Hamiticist boogeyman" even though both Rowlands and Obenga explicitly disagree with Hamiticism.

It is interesting to see the goal post shift. First no information about the peopling of Cameroon can be added that does not specifically reference the Bamileke.

Second no information can be added that does not speak about the Bamileke alone without referencing any other population. If this standard was applied to every African history article there would be no more African history articles on wikipedia.

Rowlands text explicitly compares the Bamileke and ancient Egyptian cultures in order to establish that the two populations share a proto cosmology. Contrary to the previous assertion that Rowlands is a Hamiticist he considers proposals from multiple paradigms of analysis and explicitly details the need for further research about the historical interaction between different groups on the continent.

According to Rowlands:

"The idea of cultural unity across a continent evokes the important questions of what is meant by being ‘African’ and what we mean by ‘origins’. The problems that these questions bring to mind –studies of ‘culture areas’ and diffusionist arguments – whilst central to the Afrocentrist thesis, are largely ghosts of an unwanted past for most archaeologists, historians and anthropologists. Whilst some may see in this advocacy of cultural interaction a welcome antidote to the autocthonism of processual/post-processual archaeologies, they would not be convinced by the vague language of modified diffusionism, and they require instead a more thorough exploration of the relationship between population movements, linguistic change, and ideas from evolutionary biology as a more rigorous basis for understanding cultural change."

That last part of this quote is clear as day. He doesn't endorse the Afrocentrist model proposed by Diop but expresses the need for more research. It is write there in the text on page 39.

Rowland also says:

"The incentive to explore the possibilities of arriving at a schema that would be applicable comparatively to the whole of sub-Saharan Africa is unashamedly political. It is justified in so far as it responds to the call for a revitalization of a sense of African unity. The role of embodiment and containment of life giving/destructive forces that we gloss by Europeanized notions (such chiefs as witchdoctors, diviners and prophets) has, I argue, a certain relevance for understanding the distinctive features of the politics of contemporary Africa. If such a recognition of the fundamental questions being discussed recently constitutes an endorsement of an Afrocentrist position which seeks an African renaissance to construct a new African history, identity and culture and to reassert the notion of Africanness, then so be it."

This quote is in the context of his comparative analysis of Bamiléké and Ancient Egyptian culture/kingship in an article called 'The Unity of Africa'. Trying to twist his words to push a personal narrative work.

According to Rowlands:

"Pharaohs, O’Connor suggests, also apparently shared in the possession of negative and highly dangerous powers that could be put to ‘good use’ in maintaining order and protecting social order from intrusive chaotic forces which threaten that order and well-being at every level, from the individual through the state to the cosmos. It is pharaoh also that authorizes executions and, like a Bamileke chief, mediates between principles of violence and legitimacy and who therefore is a figure of avoidance as well as ambivalence."

Rowlands explicitly states that there are commonalities between the functions of the Pharaoh and those of the Mfon. This section was deleted earlier because it makes certain editors personally feel uncomfortable.

Theophile Obenga does the same thing in his analysis of the Master of animals motif. Though Obenga does not solely compare the Bamileke with the ancient Egyptians he cites them along with other African groups to establish that they exist in thr same cultural matrix.

Creation stories are a fundamental part of the Afrikan worldview. Leaving that research out of this article is just unacceptable and shows blatant bias among the editors. The majority of the historical narratives of the Bamileke list an origin along the Nile. The Bamileke are derived from the Tikar who are derived from the Mbum who are Sudanic in origin. The migratory origin of the Bamileke and other grassfields people in the Lake Tchad area along the Wadi Howar and Sudanic Nile is not challenged on any major level in the academy. Scholar editor 477 (talk) 01:31, 21 February 2023 (UTC)

The reason the material is unsuitable for this page is not that Rowland is a hamiticist. He is not a hamiticist (that was a mistake). You now seem to be using that as a straw man. I (and User:Austronesier) have explained the actual reason repeatedly in this and the other section on this Talk page and you do not seem to be engaging with what I am trying to explain.

You wrote: "your assertions no data regarding Bamiléké cosmology or creation should be inserted in this article because of the "Hamiticist boogeyman" even though both Rowlands and Obenga explicitly disagree with Hamiticism."

No. That is not the case. Adding material comparing Bamileke to Egyptiam cosmology in a section about the "history" of the Bamileke as though it implies an Egyptian origin is OR. No one said there was a problem with was adding information about cosmology. That is also a straw man.

Whether or not the Bamileke are of Sudanic origin is irrelevant to whether adding Rowland is appropriate if Rowland makes no mention of that (adding Rowland on that basis is WP:OR, i.e. based on your own personal interpretations, of his writing). There are already sources on this page arguing that they are of Sudanic or Tchadian origin that actually state that (I assume - perhaps they should be checked later) and which, if they state it, are fine to include. But Rowland does not do that. Skllagyook (talk) 02:33, 21 February 2023 (UTC)

Feyou de Happy=

This book is cited several times, but following through the in-article link to the Amazon page shows it's a self-published volume, and the summary is less than reassuring with regard to the quality of the work, frankly. For reference, this is: "In this amazing odyssey based on recorded data father and son scholars Alexis and Joseph Feyou de Happy bring new light to the history of “The people of Ka” (Bamileke). For generations important elements were transmitted through a line of gifted individuals. The great saga of an amazing journey going back 3900 years ago. The diaspora of people connected by culture that extends to the continent and beyond. The book was written in mid 80's and took about thirty years to finally be published. Unfortunately HH Joseph Feyou de Happy, devoted scholar and statesman left us in 2010. His great scholarship includes the first volume of Bana history, the first French/Bamileke dictionary and other works. In the seventies working with colleagues from CNRS (French National Center for Scientific Research) and ONAREST (Cameroon National Organization for Technical and Scientific Studies) he published with Mr Barbier the first record of Bamileke Medieval music. Prince Joseph Feyou de Happy was distinguished in the sixties as Knight of the Legion of Honor (highest medal in the country). He risked his life many times to save others. This amazing scholarship is quite enlightening. We learn for example that antibiotics were used in Cameroon over one hundred years ago. We discover a monarch orticultor and general at the same time. A trench war fought in 19th centuries. Quite a fascinating book indeed! Essential to the understanding of African history and world’s history at large. If we have one regret it is that the book is self published. After thirty years of waiting it is comprehensible that Alexis who endured some kind of persecution as well as numerous episodes of hacking finally decided to self publish his father’s work. We hope that brave editors out there will see the value of this book. Essential in our view to the understanding of world’s cultures and civilization." Given the work is self-published, no doubt this also derives from the author, hence the perhaps somewhat overblown assessment of the quality and value of the book. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 92.24.233.246 (talk) 04:42, 4 March 2024 (UTC)