Dinka people


The Dinka people are a Nilotic ethnic group native to South Sudan, but also having a sizable diaspora population. They mostly live along the Nile, from Bor to Renk, in regions of Bahr el Ghazal, Upper Nile and jieng, make up one of the branches of the River Lake Nilotes. Dinka are sometimes noted for their height. With the Tutsi of Rwanda, they are believed to be the tallest people in Africa. Roberts and Bainbridge reported the average height of in a sample of 52 Dinka Agaar and in 227 Dinka Ruweng measured in 1953–1954. However, it seems the stature of today's Dinka males is lower, possibly as a consequence of undernutrition and conflicts. An anthropometric survey of Dinka men, war refugees in Ethiopia, published in 1995 found a mean height of. Other studies of comparative historical height data and nutrition place the Dinka as the tallest people in the world.
The Dinka people have no centralised political authority, instead comprising many independent but interlinked clans. Some of those clans traditionally provide ritual chiefs, known as the "masters of the fishing spear" or beny bith, who provide leadership for the entire people and appear to be at least in part hereditary.
Their language, called Dinka or "Thuɔŋjäŋ", is one of the Nilotic languages of the eastern Sudanic language family. The name means "people" in the Dinka language. It is written using the Latin alphabet with a few additions.

History

Precolonial history

According to oral traditions the Dinka originated from the Gezira in what is now Sudan. In medieval times this region was ruled by the kingdom of Alodia, a Christian, multi-ethnic empire dominated by Nubians. Living in its southern periphery and interacting with the Nubians, the Dinka absorbed a sizable amount of the Nubian vocabulary. From the 13th century, with the disintegration of Alodia, the Dinka began to migrate out of the Gezira, fleeing slave raids and other military conflicts as well as droughts.

As part of Sudan

The Dinka's religions, beliefs and lifestyle have led to conflict with the Arab Muslim government in Khartoum. The Sudan People's Liberation Army, led by late Dr. John Garang De Mabior, a Dinka, took arms against the government in 1983. During the subsequent 21-year civil war, many thousands of Dinka, along with fellow non-Dinka southerners, were massacred by government forces. The Dinka, led by Salva Kiir Mayardit, have also engaged in a separate civil war with the Nuer and other groups who accuse them of monopolising power.

Christianity Among the Dinka

In 1983 due to Sudan’s Second Civil war many young educated Dinka men were forced to flee from the cities where they were working, back to rural Dinka villages. Some of these men were Christians who had been converted by the Anglican Church Missionary Society and they took their faith with them when they fled. Among these men were ordained clergymen who began preaching in the villages. Songs and singing were used to teach the mostly illiterate Dinka about the faith and Biblical lessons. A large number of Dinka people have converted to Christianity in great numbers and are learning how to adapt or reject ancient religious practices and rituals to match Christian teachings. The Christian conversion of the Dinka people did not only happen in the rural villages but also among Dinka refugees as they fled the war-torn country. The Lost Boys of Sudan were converted in great numbers in the refugee camps of Ethiopia.

Bor massacre

On November 15, 1991 the event known as the "Dinkas Massacre" commenced in South Sudan. Forces led by the breakaway faction of Riek Machar deliberately killed an estimated 2,000 civilians in Dinkas of Hol, Nyarweng, Twic, Bor and others in villages and wounded several thousand more over the course of two months. It is estimated that 100,000 people left the area following the attack.

Pastoral strategies

The Dinka's migrations are determined by the local climate, their agro-pastoral lifestyle responding to the periodic flooding and dryness of the area in which they live. They begin moving around May–June at the onset of the rainy season to their “permanent settlements” of mud and thatch housing above flood level, where they plant their crops of millet and other grain products. These rainy season settlements usually contain other permanent structures such as cattle byres and granaries. During dry season, everyone except the aged, ill, and nursing mothers migrates to semi-permanent dwellings in the toic for cattle grazing. The cultivation of sorghum, millet, and other crops begins in the highlands in the early rainy season and the harvest of crops begins when the rains are heavy in June–August. Cattle are driven to the toic in September and November when the rainfall drops off and allowed to graze on harvested stalks of the crops.

Dinka Tribes

The number of Dinka sub-divisions is hotly contested as the border or line between group, sub-division and sections is blurred and often difficult to determine. For example, one can divide the Atuot into Apak and Reel, Boor into Athooc and Gok, and Panaruu into Awet and Kuel and Ciec into Ador and Lou where Ador and Lou are sub-divided into Ciec Manyiel.

Rek people

The Rek is an ethnic group in South Sudan, a subgroup of the Dinka. Its members speak South-Western Dinka, also called Rek, a Nilotic language. Many members of this ethnicity are Christians. Some estimates put the Rek population at or exceeding 500,000 people.

Cultural and religious beliefs

The Dinkas' pastoral lifestyle is also reflected in their religious beliefs and practices. Most revere one God, Nhialic, who speaks through spirits that take temporary possession of individuals in order to speak through them. The sacrificing of oxen by the "masters of the fishing spear" is a central component of Dinka religious practice. Age is an important factor in Dinka culture, with young men being inducted into adulthood through an initiation ordeal which includes marking the forehead with a sharp object. Also during this ceremony they acquire a second cow-colour name. The Dinka believe they derive religious power from nature and the world around them, rather than from a religious tome.

Dinka diaspora

The experience of Dinka refugees was portrayed in the documentary movies Lost Boys of Sudan by Megan Mylan and Jon Shenk and God Grew Tired Of Us, Joan Hechts' book The Journey of the Lost Boys and the fictionalized autobiography of a Dinka refugee, Dave Eggers' . Other books on and by the Lost Boys include The Lost Boys of Sudan by Mark Bixler, God Grew Tired of Us by John Bul Dau, They Poured Fire On Us From The Sky by Alephonsion Deng, Benson Deng, and Benjamin Ajak and, "A Long Walk to Water" by Linda Sue Park. In 2004 the first volume of the graphic novel 'Echoes of the Lost Boys of Sudan' was released in Dallas, Texas, United States, chronicling in art and dialogue four lost boys' escapes from the destruction of their hometowns in South Sudan.

Notable Dinka