Desperately seeking ‘the Merina’ (Central Madagascar): reading ethnonyms and their semantic fields in African identity histories

This article is an exploration into what a temporally and semantically ‘deep’ reading of African identity names reveals not only about the shifting meanings of ethnic naming over time but about the nature and definition of ethnic identity itself. Scholars have long recognized that identities are socially and historically constructed yet failed to sufficiently account for continuing shifts and transformations of identity consciousness within named corporate groups. Taking the case of the Merina of central Madagascar this article demonstrates that Merina identity is both an historical product of the early nineteenth century and that that identity was, at origin, a political consciousness that later became ethnicized. These conclusions are reached through a careful reading of the meanings of vernacular identity names in Malagasy language texts. By drawing comparisons between Merina and Zulu identities of the early nineteenth century, the article suggests that precolonial ‘ethnic’ identities generated through the process of state formation followed a common trajectory from political to ethnic. It further argues that care should be exercised in terming named corporate groups ‘ethnic’ when the consciousness that binds them together may be of an altogether different nature. Finally, the article argues that studies of ethnogenesis and ethnic identity transformation must be extended into Africa's precolonial past and greater attention paid to the agency of Africans in identity politics. Careful ‘readings’ of African names of belonging will play a pivotal role in these projects.