Mende

Africahorticulturalists
Map
expand_more Description

The Mende are a group of people who live primarily within the southern third of Sierra Leone in West Africa. Historically, they are rather recent arrivals to this area, appearing no earlier than the sixteenth century as invading forces advancing from the south. Their language (also called Mende) belongs to the Niger-Congo group of languages. Traditional Mende economic life mostly revolved around rice farming in uplands and gardening around homesteads. With the increasing migration of young men to towns, the Mende have come to rely on the cultivation of economically sound and labor saving commercial tree-crops such as cocoa, coffee and palm trees.

Identifier
Region
  • Africa
Subregion
  • Western Africa
Subsistence Type
  • horticulturalists
Samples
Countries
  • Liberia
  • Sierra Leone
External Links