ABSTRACT
JL Africa. Like ‘imperialism5, it frequently arouses emo tions which are so violent and so contradictory that they con fuse clear thinking. Yet the phenomenon persists, and must be discussed. Thus, purely as a working definition, we may accept M ay EdePs typification of ‘tribalism5 as a sense of ‘ethnic loyalty and identification5 in preference to ‘commit ment to traditional patterns of culture51 (Edel, 1965, p. 371), since that is the way in which the word is most commonly used in Uganda today. We may also accept her suggestion that among the stateless societies of that country ‘the experi ences of the recent past have acted as a catalyst for the emer gence of new and wider ethnic identifications5 (Edel, 1965, p. 367) as the theme for our discussion. In this essay we con sider some of the ways in which this ‘catalyst5 seems to have shaped ‘ethnic identifications5 among the stateless societies of eastern Uganda since the start of this century.2
