Wolof

The Wolof are the largest people of Senegal and a major people of the Gambia and southern Mauritania, and their language is the common tongue of most Senegalese whatever their ethnic origin. Their history runs through the Jolof empire (14th-16th centuries) and its successor kingdoms of Waalo, Kajoor, Bawol and Jolof, which traded and fought with Portuguese, French and Moors along the coast. Society was traditionally ranked into freeborn (geer), hereditary artisan and griot castes (ñeeño: smiths, leatherworkers, griots or géwël) and descendants of slaves (jaam), and caste still shapes marriage. From the late 19th century the Wolof turned en masse to Sufi Islam, above all the Mouride order founded by Cheikh Ahmadou Bamba, whose followers built Senegal's groundnut economy and later spread as traders from Dakar to New York, Naples, Paris, Madrid and Istanbul.

Wolof life prizes teranga, generous hospitality, and family ties extended across compounds and the diaspora. Ceebu jën, rice cooked with fish and vegetables, is the national dish, and attaya, strong sweet green tea brewed in three rounds, structures conversation. Sabar drumming, the mbalax music of Youssou N'Dour and others, griot praise-singing, and laamb wrestling are central entertainments. Marriage is often polygynous and arranged with attention to caste and family; naming ceremonies (ngente) take place on the eighth day after birth. Many households depend on remittances and trade from relatives abroad.

Almost all Wolof are Muslims who follow a Sufi brotherhood. Mourides pledge allegiance (njebbel) to a marabout, chant the poems (xasida) of Cheikh Ahmadou Bamba in weekly dahira circles, and make the Grand Magal pilgrimage to Touba each year; Tijanis look to Tivaouane and Kaolack. Work is regarded as worship among Mourides, and dahiras collect money for Touba and for members in need. Belief in charms (gris-gris), protective amulets and spirits (rab, jinn) persists beside orthodox practice, and marabouts are consulted for healing and success.

The complete Wolof Bible, Kàddug Yàlla gi, was finished in 2020 after five decades of work by an evangelical team and is online at kaddugyalla.com; an Arabic-script (Wolofal) edition has also been printed. The JESUS film and Global Recordings audio exist in Wolof. Evangelical believers number only a few thousand in Senegal, and the strong identification of Wolof identity with Sufi Islam and the brotherhoods makes conversion socially costly.