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Abstract
Amin Amir is the most popular and prolific political cartoonist in modern Somalia. His work is disseminated digitally and in print across the Somali territories on a daily basis. His appeal to such broad audiences is remarkable given the extreme political fragmentation of the media environment and that his renderings of broad themes of Somali political discourse (as well as highly localised developments) are all transmitted digitally into the region from the diaspora. This article explores certain recurring discourses in these ‘texts’, including corruption, political violence, ‘clanism’, and endemic external interference in Somalia. Building on theories of popular geopolitics and diasporic civic agency, it argues that analyses of such material must be attentive to the particular political, linguistic and socio-cultural features of the cartoon form within distinctive media settings. Considering the technological context of these texts’ dissemination into dynamic public spheres of Somali political debate, it argues that the artist collapses conventional distinctions between diasporic production and local consumption. The cartoons – being both ubiquitous in and spatially detached from on-the-ground realities of political change – epitomise the wider transnational character of the global Somali public sphere. This facilitates the reproduction of particular tropes of shared cultural, ethno-nationalist or religious identity of the ‘Ummadda Soomaaliyeed’ (the Somali Ummah) across multiple political boundaries.
Amin Amir est le caricaturiste politique le plus populaire et prolifique en Somalie moderne. Son travail est diffusé tous les jours numériquement et dans la presse à travers les territoires somaliens. Son attrait pour des auditoires si larges est remarquable compte tenu de l’extrême fragmentation politique du contexte médiatique, ainsi que du fait que ses interprétations des grands thèmes du discours politique somalien (de même que des évolutions très localisées) sont toutes transmises numériquement dans la région par la diaspora. Cet article explore certains discours récurrents dans ces «textes», y compris la corruption, la violence politique, le «clanisme», et l’ingérence extérieure endémique en Somalie. En s’appuyant sur les théories de la géopolitique populaire et de l’agentivité civique diasporique, il fait valoir que les analyses de tels contenus doivent être attentives aux caractéristiques politiques, linguistiques et socio-culturelles particulières à la forme de la caricature dans des milieux médiatiques singuliers. Compte tenu du contexte technologique de la diffusion de ces textes dans les sphères publiques dynamiques du débat politique somalien, cet article soutient que l'artiste rompt les distinctions classiques entre production diasporique et la consommation locale. Les caricatures – étant à la fois omniprésentes et spatialement détachées des réalités du changement politique sur le terrain – incarnent le caractère transnational plus large de la sphère publique somalienne mondiale. Cela en soi facilite la reproduction des tropes particuliers de l'identité culturelle, ethno-nationaliste ou religieuse partagée au sein de la «Ummadda Soomaaliyeed» (Oumma Somalienne) à travers de multiples frontières politiques.
Acknowledgements
I am grateful to the University of Mogadishu, Puntland State University (Garoowe, Puntland State of Somalia) and Gollis University (Hargeysa, Republic of Somaliland) for their welcome and assistance to me during my periods of fieldwork in those cities. I would like to thank my friend and former colleague Mohamed Yerow in Muqdisho for his proof-reading of my translations, and journalist Liban Ahmad for his comments on a draft version of the paper. I am also grateful to Ismail D. Osman for facilitating my contact with the cartoonist, and I would like to thank Amin Amir himself for his permission for his cartoons to be reproduced in this paper. Naturally, I take responsibility for any errors contained within.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.
Notes
1 News story originally published on Jowhar.com:‘Dhalinyarada 17-ka degmo ee gobolka Banaadir oo isu soo baxay uga soo horjeedaan Al Shabaab ka dhigay Muqdisho’ [Youth of 17 districts of Benaadir region demonstrate together against Al Shabaab in Muqdisho] webpage no longer active, pictures in writer’s archive. 26 August 2014.
2 Interview with Radio Ergo staff (13 May 2015, Nairobi). This Somali language broadcaster had recently undertaken language training for journalists across Somalia with support from international donors.
3 This is not to suggest that written print culture (e.g. book writing) does not exist, and the holding of book fairs in Hargeysa and Muqdisho demonstrates a desire to promote written Somali cultural production. These events hold political significance both in regard to processes of state-building and the role of literacy and ‘cultural’ expression for societal development (see Heritage Institute report: http://www.heritageinstitute.org/successful-book-fair-highlights-need-for-libraries-in-somalia/). It remains fair to say, however, that the novel is not a prevalent form of cultural expression consumed widely by people across the Somali territories.
4 Between 2009 and 2011, I was employed by the University of Hargeysa and between 2012 and 2014, I worked as an interpreter for an international humanitarian organization, primarily in south-central Somalia and Puntland.
5 See Cabdullahi Ibrahim Cumar’s 8 June 2014 editorial: ‘Taageerayaasha SNM iyo SSDF oo fuliyey balanqaadyadii ay la galeen Xabashida’ [SNM and SSDF supporters fulfil the promise they made with the Xabashi] Keyd Media: http://www.keydmedia.net/editorial/article/taageerayaasha_snm_ssdf_oo_fuliyey_balanqaadyadii_ay_la_galeen_xabashida/
6 Human Rights Watch statement 18 August 2015, https://www.hrw.org/news/2015/08/13/somalia-au-forces-linked-wedding-killings)
7 Radio Muqdisho, 5 February 2013, ‘Maxkamada G/Banaadir oo xukun ku riday Wariye Koronto iyo haweeney loo haystay faafinta kufsi been abuur ah’ [‘Benaadir Regional Court passes sentence on Journalist Koronto and woman held for spreading false news about rape’] http://radiomuqdisho.net/archives/maxkamada-gbanaadir-oo-xukun-ku-riday-wariye-koronto-iyo-haweeney-loo-haystay-faafinta-kufsi-been-abuur-ah/
8 See Foore Newspaper, Hargeysa, 30 April 2015, ‘Qurbe joogta reer Awdal waxay 90% aaminsan yihiin Somalilandnimada: Madaxweyne Ku-Xigeenka’ [Vice President: 90% of the Awdal diaspora communities believe in Somaliland], the transliterated term ‘maynoorati’ here refers to those who are not valued or given attention and are in the numerical minority in regard to their political stance (i.e. part one community’s attitude toward Somaliland’s nationalism). The other example is taken from the Heritage Institute’s December 2014 report on attitudes towards democracy in the city and the term in Somali: The English and Somali versions of the report are available from: http://www.heritageinstitute.org/attitudes-towards-democracy-mogadishu/
9 The northern-centred Maxaa Tiri dialects were institutionalized as ‘standard’ Somali in the creation and promotion of Somali orthography in the 1970s.
10 The list could go on: one could consider those groups that are geographically detached from wider kinship networks and find themselves in minority in a given territory, and also the caste-type occupational groups often referred to under the collective label of Gabooye, who may be affiliated or bonded to dominant pastoral clan groups.
11 Interview, businessman, Muqdisho, 8 February 2015.
12 Interview, anonymous, Muqdisho, 31 January 2015.
13 BBC Somali.com, 7 May 2010, ‘Amin Amir wuxuu BBC ku yiri “Facebook anigu ma lihi”’ [Amin Amir tells the BBC that he does not have a Facebook page]. This has since changed and the cartoonist now links to his Facebook ‘opinions' page via his website Aminarts.com.
14 See National Union of Somali Journalists (NUSOJ) Annual Report 2014 ‘Press Freedom at Risk in Somalia: Murder, Imprisonment, Censorship and Bad Laws’: http://www.ifex.org/somalia/2015/01/13/somalia_annualreport_2014.pdf
15 Interview, former senior INGO local staff member, Muqdisho, 31 January 2015.
16 See Xog Doon newspaper, Muqdisho, 13 April 2015, ‘Maxaa laga dheefey mashruuca QUEST?’ [What was gained from the Quest program?], a critique of UNDP and IOM programme to bring ‘Qualified, Expatriate, Somali, Technical Support’ to Government institutions.
17 Somalimemo.net, 28 February 2015, ‘Sheikh Cali Dheere: Duulaanka dhanka akhlaaqda ah ayay gaaladu kusoo qaaday shacabka magaalada Muqdisho’ [Sheikh Cali Dheere [HMS Spokesman]: ‘The infidels are leading an assault on good conduct against the population of Muqdisho] http://somalimemo.net/articles/2270/ShCali-Dheere-Duulaanka-Dhanka-Akhlaaqda-ah-Ayay-Gaaladu-Kusooo-Qaaday-Shacabka-Magaalada-Muqdisho
18 Keyd Media, September 26, 2014, ‘Wasiirada DFS oo curyaaminaaya mustaqbalka hablaha soo kacaya – dhaqan xumo!’ [SFG Ministers compromise the future of girls – bad behaviour!] Article refers to Ministers who have come from the diaspora and have young female aides. http://www.keydmedia.net/news/article/wasiiradda_dfs_oo_curyaaminaaya_mustaqbalka_hablaha_soo_kacaaya_-_dhaq
19 For a (rare) critique in the Somali public sphere of doctrinal orthodoxy or the restrictions of religious debate see Bashir M. Xersi’s 10 October 2014 opinion piece ‘Wadaaddadii Soomaaliyeed ma UMAL ayaa ka haray?!’ [Of the Somali clerics is it only Umal who is left?!] https://bilediraac.wordpress.com/2014/10/03/wadaaddadii-soomaaliyeed-ma-umal-ayaa-ka-haray/
20 Universal TV, Interview with Amin Amir, uploaded onto UTV Youtube channel, 19 June 2012: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RIAMIDFZpeY, the version of this interview uploaded on Saafi Films’ Youtube channel (30 October 2014) includes the footage of Amin Amir at home: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SNR_b9n7ubQ