On Becoming Muslim: The Construction of Identities among the Lafofa of the Sudan

While doing fieldwork among the Lafofa Nuba in Central Sudan I was struck by the way people presented themselves as being Muslims. Any Lafofa would claim to be Muslim, but there was no agreement among people that their neighbours actually deserved that label. Older people would talk about the old way of life that they left long ago, when they went without clothes and when they kept pigs. But today they claim to be Muslims although they still treasure the memory of those bygone days. ¹ Younger Lafofa men argued strongly that the elders were still holding on to the pre-Islamic customs, that they were ignorant and did not understand the modern world. Meanwhile, the non-Lafofa in Liri, in conversation with me, would hardly recognize any Lafofa as being a Muslim. They recognized the fact that some of the young people were trying to renounce their old ways and become Muslims, but few of them were known to pray and even fewer undertook to fast.