Afro-Algerians

Afro-Algerians are Black Algerian citizens who speak Arabic as their mother tongue. Most live in the oases of the Algerian Sahara (the Oued Righ around Touggourt, Ouargla, the Mzab, the Touat, Gourara and Saoura around Adrar, Timimoun and Béchar, and Tamanrasset), with smaller communities in Algiers, Oran and other northern cities. They have two overlapping histories. The Haratin (singular hartani) were the oasis cultivators who worked the palm gardens and underground water channels (foggaras) as sharecroppers (khammas) for Arab, Berber and marabout landowners; their origins are debated, partly ancient Saharan, partly freed slaves. Others descend from West and Central Africans brought across the Sahara as slaves until the French abolished slavery in Algeria in 1848, and whose memory lives in the diwan brotherhoods of Sidi Bilal. They share Arabic and Sunni Islam with their neighbours; what sets them apart is colour and descent. Black Algerians report slurs such as kahlouche ('blackie'), 'abd and khadim ('slave', 'servant'), being treated as foreigners in the north and asked for their papers, a ceiling in jobs, and above all the refusal of marriage by 'white' families. Black Algerians who speak Berber (in Ouargla, the Gourara and the Mzab) or Tamahaq (the Iklan among the Tuareg) are described in those language groups. No source counts Black Algerians: an often-quoted 10% (3.5 million in 2009) has no basis given and covers every language.

Oasis families have lived in their own quarters (often the lower or outer parts of the ksar), working gardens of date palms, vegetables and henna, maintaining the foggaras, and building in mud brick; many now work in the oil and gas industry, the army, construction and trade. The diwan, Algeria's form of the music of the Gnawa, is their best-known heritage: night ceremonies (derdba) of the Ouled Sidi Bilal, named after Bilal, the freed Ethiopian slave who became Islam's first muezzin, with the three-stringed gumbri lute and iron castanets (qarqabou), possession trance and saints' days; Béchar, Adrar, Ouargla and Algiers have well-known troupes. Black women have traditional roles at weddings and in bath rituals, and at shrine festivals (ziyara) Haratin carry water for the guests, roles that honour and set apart at once. Most marry within Black families. In 2019 Khadija Ben Hamou, from Adrar, became Miss Algeria and faced a wave of racist abuse online, which she answered by saying she was proud to represent the south.

Afro-Algerians are Sunni Muslims of the Maliki school like their neighbours. Many families also keep the diwan brotherhood: ceremonies that invoke Sidi Bilal and other saints, with music, incense, animal sacrifice and trance in which spirits are said to be calmed or healing obtained; eastern Algeria's diwan honours Sidi Merzug. Orthodox scholars and Salafis look down on these rites as folklore or innovation, while the state presents diwan music as national heritage. Belief in baraka (blessing), the evil eye and jinn is strong; some 'white' Algerians treat Black people as lucky charms, which Black Algerians see as another form of exclusion.

Scripture, the JESUS film and audio recordings exist in Algerian Arabic, and the complete Bible in Standard Arabic. No outreach or believers among Black Algerians are documented. Most live in the Saharan wilayas, far from the house fellowships of the north, under the same laws that restrict non-Muslim worship and proselytism.

Afro-Algerians speak the same Arabic and practise the same Islam as other Algerians, but colour and descent from slaves or Haratin sharecroppers keep them apart: other families rarely accept marriage with them, servile-status names and colour slurs are common, and they meet police checks and a ceiling at work. This barrier of acceptance is documented by a human-rights report (Minority Rights Group, 'Black Algerians') and by the first-hand testimony of a Black Algerian anthropologist (Salim Khiat, Arab Reform Initiative, 2021), with the analysis of Stephen King (2021) and press reports of the racist abuse of Miss Algeria 2019. Black Algerians who speak Berber or Tamahaq are described in their language groups.