Paper short abstract:

The paper analyses the transformations of the marginalization suffered by the Gaboye of Somaliland from the point of view of their relationship with the town of Hargeisa: from the colonial time urban settlement to the forms of their current presence in the physical and economic space of the town.

Paper long abstract:

The aim of the paper is to analyse the relationship between urban settlement and the re-shaping of the social positioning of a minority and marginalized group within the Somali territories. This contribution is based on a fieldwork research carried out in the town of Hargeisa, in the self-declared Republic of Somaliland, on a cluster of groups known as Gaboye. In the past, the latter suffered an institutionalized form of marginalization that integrated ascribed status, professional and marriage segregation, and a vaguely articulated condition of impurity. The trajectory of the Gaboye's presence in Hargeisa is delimited by the starting point of their settlement in the town and their present day concentration in certain neighbourhoods of Hargeisa. The urban settlement was the result of a rural-urban migration started in the 1930s, when Hargeisa had just been established as an urban centre and was growing rapidly under the framework of the politico-economic transformations triggered by the British colonial penetration. This process is related to the 'emancipation' route that redefined the institutionalized configuration of Gaboye's marginalization and endowed them with socio-political institutions they lacked in the past. On the other hand, the current situation of the Gaboye urban community displays some manifestations of the past marginalization's legacies; in particular, the persistent association with certain professional tasks despised by the rest of local population and the occupation of 'degraded' urban areas. In the analysis of the relationship between urban settlement and the transformations of Gaboye's marginalization, both discontinuity and continuity are relevant analytical coordinates.