Spliting up Africa and Modern Religions IN SPACE!

[sunfall_shadows]

Setting: Fandom tangental, but the only relevant part is that it's just like our world until the late 1990's, where the whole world is united basically overnight into a largely peacful magical kingdom. From there I'm taking a sci-fi route and throwing people onto multiple generation/colony ships and sending them out into the universe, never to

Comments

[channonyarrow]

Googling "Africa culture map" leads to some pretty interesting results that may give you a basis for your decision about how to handle the African colonies. It depends on whether you want linguistic groupings, or if you'd like to keep cattle herders with cattle herders and farmers with farmers, or other choices. I know I saw, a few years ago, a map that documented the Bantu language family in Africa, and it's a huge subsection of the Niger-Congo language family. Don't know how that would overlay with the idea of geography, but it might make sense, though on the other hand it's also the third-largest language family in the world, so that's a looooot of people. This also might help: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_ethnic_groups_of_Africa... )

[sunfall_shadows]

What I want is kinda wishy-washy really. I suppose what I'm looking for is a top-level kind of general culture, like 'European' and 'American.' There's room for diversity under them, but there's still a general cohesiveness. If that makes any sense. I've probably seen that link before, but I'll look again and maybe play some more with the population numbers

[channonyarrow]

Honestly, I think you're overthinking the Islam issue (I have read your replies to me and to other commenters). I mean, if you're not doing this level of thinking about Jews being unable to rebuild the Temple and fulfill the promise/prayer "next year in Jerusalem", or Buddhists being unable to visit Bodhgaya, or the loss of many other sacred sites, some of which undoubtedly have a "required" component to their devotees, that's an issue, I think. And I suspect it will be much more noticeable to say "all the Muslims stayed behind on earth!" than to not know for absolute utter certain that there is a circumstance where Islamic scholars and leaders would decide it is okay to leave Earth permanently

[sunfall_shadows]

I'm still in the planning stages really, and I do intend to give as equal treatment as I can to all the major religions, I'm just doing things piecemeal. I specified Islam because I knew for certain that there was a physical place central to the religion and one of my characters, of Persian descent, is asserting that she wears a headscarf, so I wanted to try and determine whether it could be a religious signal, or merely a cultural one. I hadn't thought about Jews and Jerusalem, which is a brain fart on my part, and I did not know at all about the Buddhists, so thank you for pointing them out

[yiskah]

I'd suggest that splitting "sub-Saharan Africa" into two broad groups isn't really okay at all. Culturally, ethnically and linguistically it's at least as complex as any other stretch of the planet that takes up one-sixth of the total human population, and is just bloody huge to begin with.Entirely agree. That said, it depends how you're splitting up other areas of the world, OP. Population of Africa is roughly 1.2bn, population of Europe is around 700m, if you're sticking all of Europe together then you could get away with splitting sub-Saharan Africa into two broad groups, but if you're subdividing Europe in more detail, you should consider doing the same to Africa

[sunfall_shadows]

Yes, I do in fact lump Europe together. And thank you for mentioning the sub-Saharan countries with more in common with North Africa. That's a third colony, so I can easily move things around.

Hm, is there any thing else supporting the Franco-/Anglo-phone split? I know it will have some impact, but I'd rather not break it up based primarily on colonial remnants.

[nyxelestia]

I'd suggest researching pre-colonial African history and culture. Culture survives through tremendous trauma and oppression where and when you least expect it, and even after the devastation of colonialism, a lot of shared historical roots could be grounds for the creation of new groups.

Calling pre-colonial African cultures "tribes" is a tremendous misnomer; they were kingdoms and empires, same as what you see in Europe, Asia, the Americas, etc. - with economic, military, and political history to match. This list of pre-colonial African kingdoms is a good place to start, as is this rundown of African empires.

[nyxelestia]

Disclaimer: I am not Muslim. I have Muslim friends, some family members, and regularly studied Islam within the context of studying history, sociology, and politics. I have very little in the way of citations, and speak predominantly from personal conversations - including similar hypotheticals with a close Muslim friend who was also a massive fantasy/sci-fi nerd. :) Take my words with a grain of salt, or as research starting points, not any kind of pronouncement on the subject. Also, Islam is a BIG religion, with many denominations and interpretations

[nyxelestia]

There is also a laundry-list of reasons one is supposed to do the Hajj. The biggest is related to a sense of unity (every Muslim is wearing and doing the same things as each other, and as their ancestors have for centuries), followed by teaching traits like perseverance, humility, etc. What's important about the Hajj is what you are supposed to take away from it to be an even better Muslim than you were before it. BUT, that won't mean anything if you end up pursuing "bad" behavior in order to do complete this "good" behavior

[sunfall_shadows]

Thank you very much! Exactly the kind of insight I needed. I knew the hajj was important, but not why.

It's entirely voluntary, and everyone will know going in that the colonies will be leaving the solar system permanently; there will be no coming back ever. I don't think arranging for someone to go on the hajj in their place will hold up.

Do you think it's reasonable for the spacegoers to modify their version of Islam to keep to the spirit? There will be a complete break from Earth, so attitudes there won't really matter in the long run. Or will most choose to stay on Earth, and it becomes a question of cultural influence rather than religious?

[nyxelestia]

Most likely? Muslims traveling into space would find a way to established new traditions in the spirit of Islam. Some Muslims back home would find these new traditions valid and consider these out-of-system followers to Islam as still being Muslims. Others will decry it and say these ones are not "real" Muslims.

I mean, to put in perspective, right now, there are people who think Muslim women who don't wear a hijab aren't "real" Muslims. This extends to all religions. Right now, American sociopolitical culture is tremendously divided on who or what are "real" Christians due to the cultural emphasis of this year's election. Catholicism is technically a denomination of Christianity, yet many Christians insist Catholics are heretics, not Christians, and basically the equivalent of being another religion entirely (on par with Jews, Muslims, etc.) - and this conflict was happening even before Mormons came into the pictures. Some people consider Mormons to still be Christians; others don't. Are Catholics who don't follow the Pope still

[thekumquat]

Kim Stanley Robertson's Red Mars trilogy has a bunch of Arab Muslims joining the nascent colony on Mars after it becomes clear that Mars is a liveable option and not comparable to suicide. The characters checked for the location of Earth before prayers, to point in the approximate direction, and IIRC some went on hajj before going to Mars.

Regarding grouping Africa, religion (Islam, Catholicism, evangelical Protestantism, animism) may well be a useful tool for you, especially if the people in different groups can come from places with overlapping geographic spread?

[sunfall_shadows]

Mars is still 'in the neighborhood' so to speak; they, and their descendants, can always return to Earth for the hajj. My setting has them leaving permanently. There's no chance to return for them or, perhaps more importantly, their descendants.

I'll keep religion in mind, but three of the four you named are decidedly foreign in origin, and I'd like to support the indigenous cultures as deciding factors more than maybe-no-so-voluntary conversions by colonial powers.

Thanks though.

[marycatelli]

On the Muslim side of things, you may want to discuss this fatwa:

http://world.time.com/2014/02/27/islamic-watchdog-issues-fatwa-against-joining-the-mission-to-mars/

[channonyarrow]

OP mentioned that in their post as a big part of why they're hesitating.