Sherbro people

This article needs additional citations for verification. Please help improve this article by adding citations to reliable sources. Unsourced material may be challenged and removed. Find sources: "Sherbro people" – news · newspapers · books · scholar · JSTOR (October 2009) (Learn how and when to remove this message)

Sherbro people

Total population
134,606[1]
Regions with significant populations
Sierra Leone (Bonthe District and the Western Area)
Languages
Sherbro • Krio • English
Religion
Christianity
Related ethnic groups
Krio, Gola

The Sherbro people are a native people of Sierra Leone, who speak the Sherbro language; they make up 1.9% of Sierra Leone's population or 134,606. The Sherbro are found primarily in their homeland in Bonthe District, where they make up 40% of the population, in coastal areas of Moyamba District, and in the Western Area of Sierra Leone, particularly in Freetown. During pre-colonial days, the Sherbro were one of the most dominant ethnic group in Sierra Leone, but in the early 21st century, the Sherbro comprise a small minority in the nation. The Sherbro speak their own language, called Sherbro language.

The Sherbro are divided into two main groups: the Sherbro in Southeastern Sierra Leone, and the Sherbro in the Western Area of Sierra Leone. The Sherbro in Southeastern Sierra Leone, which is home to most of the Sherbro population of Sierra Leone, are a close ally of their neighbor the Mende people, and most Sherbro in Southeastern Sierra Leone speak the Mende language and they have integrated large amounts of the Mende tradition along with their native Sherbro tradition. However, the Sherbro in the Western Area (in and around Freetown) are traditionally allies of the Krio people; and Sherbro in the Western Area in Sierra Leone have also integrated large amounts of Krio tradition. Unlike most Sherbro in Southeastern Sierra Leone, most Sherbro in the Western Area of Sierra Leone do not speak the Mende language. Politically the vast majority of Sherbro support the Sierra Leone People's Party (SLPP). The current president of Sierra Leone, Julius Maada Bio, is a Mende-speaking ethnic Sherbro^[2] from the Gola Rainforest region of the country.

The Sherbro are primarily fishermen and traders. They have a rich culture and have integrated some western culture and ideals. Their culture is unlike that of all other ethnic groups in Sierra Leone. The ethnic group in the nation whose culture is similar (in terms of embrace of Western culture) are the Krio people, descended largely from African Americans (known as Black Loyalists), who had been freed from slavery by the British during the American Revolutionary War, resettled in Nova Scotia, and then chose to go to Freetown in the late 18th and early 19th centuries. after the American Revolutionary War. The Sherbro and the Krio are close allies; they have intermarried since early colonial settlements in the 1790s.

The Sherbro have been an indigenous people in the territory now known as Sierra Leone. In the 18th century, they began to get involved in the slave trade and became more powerful than the European slave traders. They began to employ the Mende people to work for them to find slaves to meet the growing demand. In the 1920s, the Sherbro people were still being ruled by their own chiefs.