Outcast Castes in Somalia

Outcast Castes in Somalia.

Beyond the subclans are a series of minority low caste lineages within each clan that are ethnically Somali but are outcast family lineages that are shunned and regarded as undesirable, despite their necessity in the socioeconomic system. Their low caste stems from historical precedent, often created because of their socioeconomic placement as people who provide needed services that are considered ‘unclean’ or even dirty by both nomadic and sedentary clans. Examples include cutting hair, metalwork, hunting, circumcision & female genital mutilation, and the like. Often, the outcast families’ connection to their original outcast reason is vague, but the outcast lineages serve as a type of ‘dirty-other’ used by the sedentary and nomadic clans to positively compare themselves to.  Examples of these types of outcast lineages are families descended from the Yibir, Midgaan, Bon, and Tumal lineages. The members of these families bear no

identifying physical traits, that separate them from other ethnic Somali’s, but they are known and generally treated as second-class members of the clan their lineage is descended from. This is because they play an important, albeit dysfunctional and unwanted, role within Somali life as the psychosocial ‘outgroup’ that helps define and valuate the rest of the clan’s families as the psychosocial ‘ingroup.’ The non-outcast family lineages in each clan ‘use’ these outcast lineages as psychological tools to cast-off unwanted traits, actions, thoughts, or attributes. This type of psychological projection is referred to as ‘trait dissociation’ and is part of every human community psychological housekeeping function. In communities such as the Somali clans, the outgroup to their ingroup are family structures that are formally designated to be on the receiving end of the dissociation of unwanted traits, and their maltreatment serves to help the ingroup disavow their projections as they disavow the outcast families. The significance of this relationship is such that no non-outcast lineage would

ever falsely ascribe themselves and their family as outcast because the internal psychological alienation and shame that accompanies such a reality would be more than they can bear. These outcast families carry the psychological baggage that the rest of the clan lineages have deemed unworthy. Impure. Dirty. These outcast families have restrictions on their expectations of resources, protection, and leadership and are considered ritually impure. Noble clan families will not even share food or lodging or intimacy with them. The clan to which they belong extracts diya or blood compensation payments from them but are not allowed to ask for diya assistance themselves. They are rarely compensated for injury or death at the hand of their clan’s non-outcast members and are without protection when nomadic pastoralists destroy their crops with livestock. The relationship between the clans and their minority outcast lineage is one of disenfranchisement and exploitation and considered to be an internal clan-family matter that is not subject to interference by outside authority.

Outcast families do not choose to be outcast; they have descended from outcast lineages for longer than their family remembrances. Parents do not speak of their outcast status openly with their children as doing so deepens the feelings of alienation and shame. Children learn of their membership in an outcast family lineage not from within, but from without. Every non outcast family of the clan will ‘sharpen their value’ against the outcast outgroup by reminding them of their low status. Figure 8 offers a look into the variations in phenotype of Somalia’s ethnic groups.