Comorian is a Bantu language spoken on the Comoro Islands, a small archipelago between the East African coast and the northern tip of Madagascar. It is usually grouped within the Sabaki languages together with Swahili, Mwani, Elwana, Pokorno and Mijikenda (Nurse & Hinnebusch 1993: 4-19). Internally Comorian is divided into different dialects. In congruence with the four main islands, four dialects of Comorian are usually distinguished in the linguistic literature (Ahmed- Charnanga 1992:13; Nurse & Hinnebusch 1993: 18): Shingazija on the island of Ngazija (Grande Comore), Shimwali on Mwali (Moheli), Shinzwani on Nzwani (Anjouan) and Shimaore on Maore (Mayotte). These four dialects are arranged into two dialect groups (Shingazija/ Shimwali vs. Shinzwani/Shimaore) which are supposed to reflect peculiar linguistic similarities and differences. Although, in general, the greatest morphological differences between the Comorian dialects are within the TAM-markers, the past tense is morphologically quite homogeneous. Therefore dialectal differences do not play a dominant role for the subject of this paper. Two different past tense forms frequently used in everyday speech will be treated here: one morphological simple (one word) form and one compound (two word) form combining the auxiliary -ka (be) with the main verb. They will be discussed first from a formal point of view demonstrating the rules to create the morphosyntactical form. After this they are treated with regard to their semantic contents. The results presented here are based on a one year dialectological research on the Comoro Islands 1996-97. Interviews were made in 56 towns and villages on all four islands of the archipelago.

The history of Waswahili in Germany before the end of World War II, their life histories and living conditions have not as yet been subject of scientific research. In the period before the colonial occupation of Africa Africans came to Germany in small numbers voluntarily or as victims of violent abduction (Martin 1993). The Germans were interested in the exotic looks of the foreigners, but did not care about their regions of origin. Africa was the unknown black continent, terra incognita, its inhabitants indiscriminately `blacks´ or `negroes´. Their homelands and ethnic or linguistic identities remained obscure, relevant only to a small group of researchers with an early interest in the continent and its peoples. Concerning the so-called Swahili people from Eastern Africa who came to Germany from the colonial period on, one has to keep in mind that until the end of the forties their identities were usually defined by their knowledge of Kiswahili, not by their actual ethnic or linguistic origins. In this article some stories are told about Swahili- speaking people from the former colony of German East Africa, now Tanzania, who came to Germany temporarily or permanently and for different reasons left traces in written records, which help us to reconstruct parts of their biographies.

In this paper, I invoke a sociolinguistic approach to complement the historical record in order to examine the use of the word utumwa itself as it has changed to reveal distinct class and gender connotations especially in northem Swahili communities. To explore utumwa is difficult. There is no consensus with regard to what the word and its derivatives mean that applies consistently, yet it is clear that there has been a meaning shift since the nineteenth century. This paper examines the construction and transformation of a non-Westem-molded form of service in Africa. Oral traditions and terminological variation will be brought to bear on an analysis of utumwa `slavery, service` as an important concept of social change in East Africa and, in particular, on the northern Kenya coast What this term, its derivatives, and other terms associated with it have come to mean to Swahili speakers and culture bearers will be seen to mirror aspects of the history of Swahili-speaking people fi-om the 1Oth-11th century to the present.

This article deals with the communicative uses of the printed wrap cloth kanga. Specifically I will show how the kanga is constituted as a communicative sign and is at the core of ambiguation processes that are pervasive to this communicative genre. Because of its high degree of ambiguity the question arises whether we can, for communication by way of kanga, still speak of communication in any sense. In my opinion, we can only do so if it is possible to analyze the communication process within existing models of communication. Starting from the hypothesis that the kanga indeed has communicative potential communication is understood as social interaction, whereby the focus is not solely on meanings in a pragmatic or semantic sense, but rather on social meaning, i.e. the negotiation of relationships between the interactants in an area of tension between individual, social and cultural interests (within which meaning in a linguistic sense does play a role, too) (Anderson & Meyer 1988, Burgoon et aL 1996). This will be shown in the fust part of the analysis. In the second part of this article I will describe and explain the role of the medium kanga within this process of ambiguation. This article is based on material collected during two field periods in 1994/ 1995 and 1996 in Mombasa and, from 1995 onwards, in various archives in the Netherlands and Switzerland.

In the last two decades, Swahili chronicles have been thoroughly re-evaluated by historians of the East African coast, and their usefulness as historical sources subject to serious doubt and criticism. Typical of this new attitude were the words of Gill Shepherd: `Such chronicles are less objective histories than annotated pedigrees of a single ruling lineage`. Given such a perspective, the question may be asked whether the chronicles are a suitable guide to the search for historical identities of coastal societies.

Iba Ndiaye Diadji, a Senegalese professor of aesthetics, sees water as intrinsic to African ontology. He also argues that water is the most important substance to inspire African artists. (Diadji 2003: 273–275.) Water certainly has a significant role in Swahili poetry, written traditionally by people living on the coast of the Indian Ocean. Swahili poems have used aquatic imagery in expressing different ideas and sensations, in different contexts and times. Water imagery can be found in hundreds of years old Islamic hymns as well as in political poetry written during the colonial German East Africa. This article discusses water imagery in traditional Islamic Swahili poetry.

Als Bestandteil des Großraums Indischer Ozean wurde die ostafrikanische Küste über Jahrhunderte besonders an ihren Schnittstellen - den `Ankerplätzen` und Hafenstädten - durch kulturelle Austauschbeziehungen geprägt. Diese führten einerseits zu translokalen Anpassungs- und Überlagerungsprozessen, andererseits aber auch zu Konflikten der Ab- und Ausgrenzung. Die Ab- und Ausgrenzung kultureller Gmppen bildet den Ausganspunkt der folgenden Überlegungen. Am Beispiel des swahilisprachigen Pressetextes Biashara (Handel) aus der monatlich in British Tanganyika herausgegebenen Zeitung Mambo Leo (Zeitgeschehen) sollen mit textlinguistischen Mitteln sprachliche Mechanismen der Ab- und Ausgrenzung aufgespürt und ihre Funktion hinterfragt werden.

Dealing with the bibliographies and publications about and by J. L. Krapf, especially in the archives of the Basle Mission I was astonished and I got the feeling that such an amount and such a variety of work could not have been done by one person only. At fist, Krapf was a missionary by profession. He and Rebmann were called the pioneers of the East-African mission. Beyond this, however, different missionary societies were encouraged by the publications and proposals of Krapf to work in East Africa, e.g. the Church Missionary Society in the service of which Krapf and Rebmann started their work in Rabai Mpya, the Swedish Evangelical mission, the Methodist Mission, the St. Crishona Mission, the Hermannsburg Mission and the Berlin Evangelical Mission. Though all biographers cannot avoid to state that Krapf did not convince more than two (some biographies speak about only one) persons to the Christian belief during all of his missionary life there is no doubt that Krapfs visions influenced missionary work in East Africa. We can say that he was a strategist of Christian mission in East Africa

Fotografien aus den Kolonien sollten um 1900 auch in Sachsen die Realität in Deutschsüdwestafrika oder Deutschostafrika aufzeigen. Dabei wiederholten sich die Motive: Farmleben, koloniale Architektur, das Leben der Herrnhuter Brüdergemeinde in den Missionsstationen, aber auch Bilder der Chagga oder Motive aus Dörfern der Nyakyusa sollten zuhause Erfolg oder Notwendigkeit von Kolonisierung und Zivilisierung belegen. Diese klaren Deutungssrahmen wurden selten durchbrochen. In Sachsen wurden diese Bilder in illustrierten Zeitschriften und Rahmen von Reklame rekonstruiert und trugen damit zu einer Normalisierung des Kolonialismus bei. Aus kolonialhistorischer und postkolonialer Perspektive können diese stereotypen Darstellungen heute dekonstruiert und hinsichtlich ihrer Authentizität befragt werden.:1. Einleitung 2. Forschungsüberblick 2.1. Der Kolonialrevisionismus der Weimarer Zeit 2.2. Dekolonisierung und kritische Kolonialgeschichte 2.3. Geteilte Geschichte aus postkolonialer Perspektive 3. Postkoloniale Annäherungen an eine sächsische Perspektive 3.1. Über den Rand der Welt: afrikanische Grenzziehungen 3.2. Koloniales Wissenscharchiv und kulturelle Hegemonie 3.3. Zur Hybridität kolonialer Zeichen und Bilder 4. Koloniale Deutungsrahmen und ethisches Moment: eine bildtheoretische Herangehensweise 5. Fotos für das kolonialgeographische Institut der Universität Leipzig 5.1. Repräsentierte Orte: Das Beispiel Tanga 5.2. Voraussetzungen der Kolonialgeographie: Hans Meyers Kilimandscharo-Expedition und die DOAG 5.3. Hybride Fotos I: Hans Meyers Fotografien der Chagga 6. Fotografien der Herrnhuter Mission 6.1. Repräsentative Orte: Das Beispiel der Missionsstation Rungwe und der Dörfer der Nyakyusa 6.2. Die Herrnhuter Mission und der Kolonialismus 6.3. Hybride Fotos II: Fotos von Missionaren, Konvertiten und den Nyakyusa 7. Mediale Sensationen aus den Kolonien in der 'Leipziger Illustirten Zeitung' 8. Exotische Genussversprechen Dresdner Unternehmen 9. Schluss und Ausblick Verwendete Literatur Verwendete Zeitschriften Abkürzungsverzeichnis Abbildungsverzeichnis Selbstständigkeitserklärung

Comorian is a Bantu language spoken on the Comoro Islands, a small archipelago between the East African coast and the northern tip of Madagascar. It is usually grouped within the Sabaki languages together with Swahili, Mwani, Elwana, Pokorno and Mijikenda (Nurse & Hinnebusch 1993: 4-19). Internally Comorian is divided into different dialects. In congruence with the four main islands, four dialects of Comorian are usually distinguished in the linguistic literature (Ahmed- Charnanga 1992:13; Nurse & Hinnebusch 1993: 18): Shingazija on the island of Ngazija (Grande Comore), Shimwali on Mwali (Moheli), Shinzwani on Nzwani (Anjouan) and Shimaore on Maore (Mayotte). These four dialects are arranged into two dialect groups (Shingazija/ Shimwali vs. Shinzwani/Shimaore) which are supposed to reflect peculiar linguistic similarities and differences. Although, in general, the greatest morphological differences between the Comorian dialects are within the TAM-markers, the past tense is morphologically quite homogeneous. Therefore dialectal differences do not play a dominant role for the subject of this paper. Two different past tense forms frequently used in everyday speech will be treated here: one morphological simple (one word) form and one compound (two word) form combining the auxiliary -ka (be) with the main verb. They will be discussed first from a formal point of view demonstrating the rules to create the morphosyntactical form. After this they are treated with regard to their semantic contents. The results presented here are based on a one year dialectological research on the Comoro Islands 1996-97. Interviews were made in 56 towns and villages on all four islands of the archipelago.