FOUND IN TRANSLATION
BOSTON-From his small office near the Charles River, Dr. Fallou Ngom can envision the rewriting of much of African history, including the slave trade. He knows, though, that he can’t do it alone.
Ngom, who was born in Senegal, is beginning his second year as director of the African Language Program at Boston University, where graduate students are learning to read and write five African languages in a modified form of Arabic script.
The writing system known as Ajami, from the Arabic word for stranger, is not traditionally used in language and African studies programs at other universities. Ngom has set out to teach the script so scholars can translate a massive amount of unread African texts, some dating to the 10th century. He expects they will provide new information and indigenous perspectives about the continent’s history, whose recording has been shaped by travelogues and colonial archives in European languages and Arabic.
“We are the first here in this country to teach our students in the African languages that have Ajami script,” says Ngom, 38. “Our hope is to be able to train the first generation of scholars who have access to this literature and at least bring up the voices of those who have never been heard – those about whom history has been written but have not yet given their side.”
Ajami originated as a means to spread Islam across the midsection of Africa just below the Sahara Desert, from Senegal and Nigeria in the west to Ethiopia and Kenya in the east. Later uses were more secular – history, genealogy, traditional medicine, and poetry. Today, some shopkeepers use Ajami in their business records.
This year, about 30 BU students are learning Wolof (Senegal), Hausa (Nigeria) or Swahili (East Africa) in both Ajami and the Latin script used to write English. The center also teaches Pular (Guinea) and Amharic (Ethiopia) in Ajami.
