Tribe:Nuer

1. Tribe:Nuer Sonia Fraga Liza Gonzalez Period 4 IB Anthropology

2. History • Form one of the largest ethnic groups in East Africa • Located mostly in Southern Sudan • Popular geographic feature is Nile River • Language is a Nilotic language • The language is uniform with no definable dialects • Most of Nuerland consists of open savanna and is subject to considerable flooding

3. Beginning • God is Spirit in the sky (Kwoth nhial ) • Nuer believe that all life comes from Kowth & returns at death • Nuer believe in the coming of God through rain, lightening and thunder, and that the rainbow is the necklace of God • The sun and the moon as well as other material entities are also manifestations of God, who after all is a Spirit • When a man or a woman dies, the flesh, the life and the soul separate. The flesh is committed to the earth, while the breath or life goes back to God. • The soul that signifies the human individuality and personality remains alive as a shadow or a reflection, and departs together with the ox sacrificed, to the place of the ghosts, wherever that place is.

4. CATTLE • Dearest possession is cattle • Life depends on cattle and a Nuer will risk life to defend them or to raid his neighbor's cattle • Worldview is built around the herds and prestige is measured by the quantity and quality of the cattle a man owns • Men and women take the names of their favorite cow and are greeted by their cattle names Focus of Nuer life

5. Religion • They pray for health and well-being, offering sacrifices of cattle in hopeful expectation that their sentiments may be realized • Cattle play an important part in Nuer religion and ritual

6. Marriage • Legal unions are recognized through exchange of bride-wealth • Marriages must be outside one's own clan & are made legal by the payment of cattle • Standard ideal of forty head of cattle is the expected number of cattle to be received by the bride's family • Marriage is not finalized until the bride has at least two kids • A man may have multiple wives, they don’t live close to each other, but by the husband's clan • Women desire to have six children

7. “Ghost Marriage” • Several forms of "ghost marriage"  • A man may marry a woman as a stand-in for his deceased brother • The children that are born of this union will be considered descendants of the dead • This allows the continuation of his family line and succession to an important social position • Married Nuer women traditionally have no significant wealth--it belongs to their husbands

8. FOOD • Their culture is organized around cattle • Grains and vegetables supplement this diet • None of the food are produced for market purposes • Meat is eaten at important celebrations when an animal is sacrificed

9. Economy is a mixture of pastoralism & horticulture • Weather that affect floods & droughts • They move to another site when land is in unlivable conditions • Live in huts

10. Death • They don’t believe in a place of afterlife for spirit • Do believe the spirits of the dead can affect their current life • Recently deceased have more influence • Nuer honor and appease the spirits of their ancestors  • Cows are dedicated to the ghosts of the owner's lineages and any personal spirits that may have possessed them at any time • Nuer believe they establish contact with ancestor ghost/spirits by rubbing ashes along the backs of oxen or cows dedicated to them, through the sacrifice of cattle