Black African, general

"Black African, general" is Joshua Project's catch-all for Africans from south of the Sahara living in a country where they are not counted in a people group of their own. It names no single people: it holds students, workers, refugees and migrants of many nationalities and languages, from Côte d'Ivoire, Guinea, Mali, Senegal, Burkina Faso, Cameroon, the Congos, Nigeria, Sierra Leone and elsewhere. Most speak French or English beside their own languages (Dioula, Malinke, Pular, Bambara, Wolof, Lingala, Yoruba and others). Splitting it into nationality or language groups is a recommendation, since no source counts them by nationality.

Life is organised by nationality: embassy-linked community associations, student unions, church and mosque congregations, and WhatsApp networks for news, housing and safety. Food, music and dress follow home countries (attiéké and alloco among Ivorians, rice and sauce dishes, Congolese rumba and Ivorian coupé-décalé). Many are young men; women and children are a growing share of those on the move.

Muslims among them, mostly West Africans of the Maliki school with ties to Sufi orders such as the Tijaniyya, pray in Tunisian mosques or in their own prayer rooms. Christians, Catholic, Pentecostal and evangelical, have revived Tunisia's churches since the African Development Bank moved to Tunis in 2003 and private universities drew African students: they now make up most of the churchgoing population, and Nigerian and Congolese Pentecostal congregations meet in Tunis.

Most can use French or English Scripture, and their home languages have Bibles, audio recordings and the Jesus Film. Christian migrants and students are themselves a church presence in North Africa, and churches in Tunis, Sfax and Sousse serve them; Muslim West Africans are reached mainly through Christian Africans of the same languages.