Kenyan Nubians and the Myth of Nubian Resilience

Abstract Often defined and examined as a human characteristic enacted under duress, resilience receives little attention as to how, why, and for whom it is valued. By exploring resilience as a colonial myth or discursive device, this article investigates how racialized ideas of the late nineteenth century informed the way colonial actors in present-day Kenya and East Africa classified and regulated communities according to who counted as “resilient.” It traces the particular myth of Nubian resilience to illustrate how the idea of Nubian soldiers’ exceptionalism among African troops informed, authorized, and at times undermined the colonial project in Kenya as well as the political realities of Nubian soldiers. Drawing on the colonial archive, oral history of the Kenyan Nubian Council of Elders, and ethnography, this article outlines how multiple and often competing versions of the myth of Nubian resilience co-existed throughout the history of Kenya, and concludes with an analysis of how the myth of Nubian resilience is remembered in postcolonial Kenya.