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ABSTRACT: Individuals claiming Fula ethnicity are indigenous to some twenty African countries. Their diaspora has spread across theglobe. Historically, Fula culture has centered on a code of conduct called pulaaku. Pulaaku indicates a way о/life aimed in part atpreventing shame. Pulaaku reflects shared images o/Fula archetypes. Academic literature has presented pulaaku as afiindamental component ofbeing Fula. Yet, contemporary Fula living in modern urban settings, whom Ba Konare'calls "Fulapolitans" (see Selasi 2005) are rarely Jami liar with a pastoral way of life. This article attempts to delineate the concept 0/pulaaku in contemporary urban settings, with reference to interviews. The results ofěr grounds to critique the contemporary understanding and experience of pulaaku among Fulapolitans and to highlight recent situational uses and re-appropriations 0/the concept.
KEYWORDS: cultural psychology, ethnic identity, ethnicity, Fula, Fulaness, Fulani, group psychology, identity, pulaaku, shame
Culture, Psychology, and Identity in the Global Pula Diaspora
Honor and nobility are concepts often heard when Fula persons talk about other Fula and what it means to be Fula.1 In this article, the authors address these themes, making their own particular contributions from different disciplinary standpoints. Dougoukolo Ba Konare (DBK), a clinical psychologist, collected and analyzed the original survey data from ninety-nine respondents which ground this contribution. Joseph Hellweg (JH),2 a cultural anthropologist, further synthesized DBK's psychological analysis with relevant anthropological and historical literature. JH also edited the text in close consultation with DBK. Together, the authors intend this article as a work of both psychology and cultural anthropology and as an attempt to combine insights from both fields.3 Here we explore the self-perceptions of Fula individuals and communities and how such perceptions shape Fula people's emotions, thoughts, and behaviors in the global Fula diaspora. We investigate how Fula experience their Fulaness, or pulaaku, as a factor in their social interactions and in how they search for in-group emotional resilience through identity-building. We consider contemporary Fula ideas of shame and pride as central to these dynamics.
As a psychologist, DBK concentrates on the mind and emotions and how their interactions shape life experiences. Hence, he inquires into what it means to be Fula, into the shame and honor attached to that experience, and into how both shame and honor shape the subjectivities of people who identify as...