Names of the Berber people

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The indigenous population of the Maghreb region of North Africa encompass a diverse grouping of several heterogenous ethnic groups who predate the arrival of Arabs in the Arab migration to the Maghreb.[1][2][3] They are collectively known as Berbers or Amazigh in English.[4] The native plural form Imazighen is sometimes also used in English.[5][6] While "Berber" is more widely known among English-speakers, its usage is a subject of debate, due to its historical background as an exonym and present equivalence with the Arabic word for "barbarian."[7][8][9][10] When speaking English, indigenous North Africans typically refer to themselves as "Amazigh."[11]

Historically, these groups of people did not refer to themselves as "Berbers" but had their own terms to refer to themselves. For example, the Kabyles use the term "Leqbayel" to refer to their own people, while the Chaouis identified themselves as "Ishawiyen" instead of Berber/Amazigh.[12]

The Numidian, Mauri and Libu populations of antiquity are typically understood to refer to approximately the same population as modern Amazigh or Berbers.[13][14]

  1. ^ Andrews, Jonathan (2019-04-30). The Missiology behind the Story: Voices from the Arab World. Langham Publishing. ISBN 978-1-78368-599-8. Berber: A collective term for the indigenous peoples of North Africa who predate the arrival of Arabs during the expansion of the Arab empire in the seventeenth century.
  2. ^ Skutsch, Carl (2013-11-07). Encyclopedia of the World's Minorities. Routledge. p. 211. ISBN 978-1-135-19388-1. Berber is a generic name given to numerous heterogenous ethnic groups that share similar cultural, political, and economic practices.
  3. ^ Fields, Nic (2011-01-26). Roman Conquests: North Africa. Casemate Publishers. ISBN 978-1-84884-704-0. It must be said that modern Berbers are a very diverse group of peoples whose main connections are linguistic.
  4. ^ "Berber | Definition, People, Languages, & Facts | Britannica". www.britannica.com. Retrieved 2022-12-13.
  5. ^ Aïtel, Fazia (2014). We are Imazigen : the development of Algerian Berber identity in twentieth-century literature and culture. Gainesville, FL. ISBN 978-0-8130-4895-6. OCLC 895334326.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
  6. ^ Ilahiane, Hsain (2017). Historical dictionary of the Berbers (Imazighen) (2nd ed.). Lanham, Maryland. ISBN 978-1-4422-8182-0. OCLC 966314885.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
  7. ^ Oxford Arabic dictionary : Arabic-English · English-Arabic. Tressy Arts (First ed.). Oxford. 2014. pp. 979, 990. ISBN 978-0-19-958033-0. OCLC 881018992.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link) CS1 maint: others (link)
  8. ^ Cite error: The named reference :2 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  9. ^ Cite error: The named reference :5 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  10. ^ Cite error: The named reference :6 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  11. ^ Language Diversity Endangered. Matthias Brenzinger. Berlin. 2015. p. 124. ISBN 978-3-11-090569-4. OCLC 979749010.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link) CS1 maint: others (link)
  12. ^ Goodman, Jane E. (2005-11-03). Berber Culture on the World Stage: From Village to Video. Indiana University Press. p. 7. ISBN 978-0-253-21784-4.
  13. ^ Cite error: The named reference :4 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
  14. ^ Zimmermann, K. (2008). "Lebou/Libou". Encyclopédie berbère. Vol. 28-29 | Kirtēsii – Lutte. Aix-en-Provence: Edisud. pp. 4361–4363. doi:10.4000/encyclopedieberbere.319.