We are getting old, so the Somali RPCVs are assembling our photos and collections for safe keeping. Since we were all over the country before much development took place, together we have probably the largest extant collection of photos of traditional and 60's Somali life that remains. Some of this is at the Somali Museum in Minnesota and some is at Stanford. More is at Indiana State in the US and Bush House in the UK.
On Apr 25, 2018, Marty wrote:
From what I saw in Mog when I was there in 1993 as part of Operation Restore Hope, there is little likelihood that any records of the Somali Government survived the civil war that engulfed the city. Government buildings were in ruins, shelled and fought over, the National Museum had been ransacked …
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Letter from John Johnson, 4-26-2018:
"My serious academic involvement in Somalia began when I went to London in 1969 to study with B.W. (Goosh) Andrzejewski. I took a Ph.M. degree (SOAS calls it am M.Phil.) in Somali Oral Poetry. While I was in London, the Siyaad Barre coup took place, and all RPCVs were declared persona non grata, a diplomatic designation, meaning not welcomed. David Latin went to Somalia shortly after this, maybe 1970, to do grad school research, and was expelled after only a few days, when they learned that he was an RPCV, so the diplomatic ban on us was real. This was the main reason I went to West Africa, specifically Mali, to do my Ph.D. research.
In 1979 (or was it ‘78?), when the Somali Studies International Society was founded by a group of us scholars at an annual meeting of the African Studies Association in Philadelphia, I was named Secretary for Research and Documentation for the society. I thus collected materials about and from Somalia for over 45 years. It was decided at the Philadelphia meeting that the society would name Indiana University as the official preservation site for Somali documentation. Why did the members decide this? I think everyone had the foresight to realize that Somalia was not a stable place for holding materials about the country. This feeling was oddly shared by members of the Somali bureaucracy, principally the Ministry of Education, which later split into two ministries, one for grammar school, the other for higher education, and which supplied me with numerous documents over the years.
These materials are safe in our library, archives of traditional music, the I.U. art museum, and the African Studies Office. We have holdings of Somali language school books, manuscripts, political posters, cassette tapes, government publications, and three large collections: the papers of Andrzejewski and the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) Somali Section Archives, the creation of which I raised a large grant to create. One copy is here and the other at Bush House, home of the BBC in London. Along with that archive, the BBC also reproduced very numerous tapes of Somali poetry from the two radio stations in Somalia, one in Hargeysa, the other in Muqdishu. The third collection came from a woman who worked in Muqdishu during the Operation Restore Hope period begun after the “invasion” of Somalia by the first Bush administration.
Moreover, my friendship with three Library of Congress East African representatives, as well as with Rori Todaro, who worked for the Somali Governments for years, meant that I received numerous Somali government publications for years after I left Somalia. I also collected straight runs of about 8 Somali newspapers while I lived in the North and in Muqdishu, and bundles of one newspaper were sent to me in London by a Mennonite friend, who ran a bookstore in Muqdishu and later in northern Indiana. This woman has recently donated her large collection of Somali materials to Indiana University as well. The newspapers were all put of microfiche and distributed to the African Studies Programs in 8 universities which make up a consortium supported by the African Studies Association in the United States.
Over the years, a number of people have sent me documents and books related to Somalia, the latest being the papers of Mohamed (“Mo”) Jaamac, who was one of the IV’s language instructors in our training program in New York. Needless to say, my large collection of Somali research and publications are also here.
Marty is right about the collections and photos of RPCVs being valuable, and I would urge anyone who wishes to place their collections in a safe place for access and preservation to send them to me. And, anyone wishing to conduct research on Somalia is of course, welcomed to come to Indiana University, especially since travel in the south is not so safe."
On Apr 25, 2018, Marty wrote:
From what I saw in Mog when I was there in 1993 as part of Operation Restore Hope, there is little likelihood that any records of the Somali Government survived the civil war that engulfed the city. Government buildings were in ruins, shelled and fought over, the National Museum had been ransacked …
--
Letter from John Johnson, 4-26-2018:
"My serious academic involvement in Somalia began when I went to London in 1969 to study with B.W. (Goosh) Andrzejewski. I took a Ph.M. degree (SOAS calls it am M.Phil.) in Somali Oral Poetry. While I was in London, the Siyaad Barre coup took place, and all RPCVs were declared persona non grata, a diplomatic designation, meaning not welcomed. David Latin went to Somalia shortly after this, maybe 1970, to do grad school research, and was expelled after only a few days, when they learned that he was an RPCV, so the diplomatic ban on us was real. This was the main reason I went to West Africa, specifically Mali, to do my Ph.D. research.
In 1979 (or was it ‘78?), when the Somali Studies International Society was founded by a group of us scholars at an annual meeting of the African Studies Association in Philadelphia, I was named Secretary for Research and Documentation for the society. I thus collected materials about and from Somalia for over 45 years. It was decided at the Philadelphia meeting that the society would name Indiana University as the official preservation site for Somali documentation. Why did the members decide this? I think everyone had the foresight to realize that Somalia was not a stable place for holding materials about the country. This feeling was oddly shared by members of the Somali bureaucracy, principally the Ministry of Education, which later split into two ministries, one for grammar school, the other for higher education, and which supplied me with numerous documents over the years.
These materials are safe in our library, archives of traditional music, the I.U. art museum, and the African Studies Office. We have holdings of Somali language school books, manuscripts, political posters, cassette tapes, government publications, and three large collections: the papers of Andrzejewski and the British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) Somali Section Archives, the creation of which I raised a large grant to create. One copy is here and the other at Bush House, home of the BBC in London. Along with that archive, the BBC also reproduced very numerous tapes of Somali poetry from the two radio stations in Somalia, one in Hargeysa, the other in Muqdishu. The third collection came from a woman who worked in Muqdishu during the Operation Restore Hope period begun after the “invasion” of Somalia by the first Bush administration.
Moreover, my friendship with three Library of Congress East African representatives, as well as with Rori Todaro, who worked for the Somali Governments for years, meant that I received numerous Somali government publications for years after I left Somalia. I also collected straight runs of about 8 Somali newspapers while I lived in the North and in Muqdishu, and bundles of one newspaper were sent to me in London by a Mennonite friend, who ran a bookstore in Muqdishu and later in northern Indiana. This woman has recently donated her large collection of Somali materials to Indiana University as well. The newspapers were all put of microfiche and distributed to the African Studies Programs in 8 universities which make up a consortium supported by the African Studies Association in the United States.
Over the years, a number of people have sent me documents and books related to Somalia, the latest being the papers of Mohamed (“Mo”) Jaamac, who was one of the IV’s language instructors in our training program in New York. Needless to say, my large collection of Somali research and publications are also here.
Marty is right about the collections and photos of RPCVs being valuable, and I would urge anyone who wishes to place their collections in a safe place for access and preservation to send them to me. And, anyone wishing to conduct research on Somalia is of course, welcomed to come to Indiana University, especially since travel in the south is not so safe."
