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why calling amazigh people (native north africans) berbers is offensive — a thread
im gonna try to keep this thread short but i had to do it bc using this slur is so normalized and it's making us so uncomfortable. when you use berber you're insulting us
Amazigh are the native north africans and we have lived here for thousands of years BC we call ourselves Amazigh which literally means "free people" plural of Imazighen "free man" and we speak tamazight a language from the afro-asiatic language family written in Tifinagh
as we have existed since antiquity we have naturally experienced many people trying to take our land and the first were the romans. centuries BC when they first invaded north africa they found amazigh tribes who spoke a different language from them
and to them whoever was different from them was automatically inferior so they started referring to us as "barbarians" bc they saw us as inferior. barbarians which is what everyone calls us now "berber"
this!!!
here is a video explaining very well
a lot of invaders tried to take our land which was also an attempt to wipe out our culture definitely but our ancestors have strongly held onto it despite everything. the last invaders were the arabs when they came to introduce islam and guess what they called us?
berbers. when the arabs came to OUR land they too have called us the berbers the term that the romans first used with us and that has been stuck to us till this very day. not only did the arabs take our land but they also tried and are still trying to wipe our culture out
we're not taught our language in schools instead we are taught arabic we are considered an "arab country" and we are being ruled by arabs and till this very day amazigh are still fighting for our culture that has been through so much for thousands of years and yet is still alive
it's only a few years ago and after so many protests from amazigh that Tamazight is finally an official language here.
if you google amazigh this is what shows up. we are now known to the world as barbarians rather than the free people. every single website refers to us as berbers
and even when they know that berber is a slur and that it's offensive they keep using it bc we are the only people who know the history behind it and the only people realizing how offensive it is
here is an article to help you understand the struggle of amazigh for our culture to be recognized https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.thenational.ae/opinion/comment/don-t-call-us-berber-we-are-amazigh-1.965334
unfortunately there aren't articles about our history and the media rarely talks about it so it's very hard to know about our culture and what's offensive but i really wish people would stop calling us the name the invadors gave us and rather call us by what we call ourselves
and what we are and have always been the Amazigh the free people the people who have protected their culture desperately since antiquity
im gonna stop this thread here but if i ever find something interesting i'll add it
