{{Short description|Pejorative term used to refer to Third-World countries}} {{Use dmy dates|date=June 2024}}
In British English, '''Bongo Bongo Land''' (or '''Bongo-bongo Land''') is a pejorative term used to refer to Third-World countries, particularly in Africa, or to a fictional such country.
==Possible origins== The origin of the term is unclear but it may come from one or both of the following: * Bongo drums believed to be played by African natives<ref>{{cite book|url=https://archive.org/details/nicknamesofplace0000room|url-access=registration|quote=Bongo Bongo Land.|first=Adrian|last=Room|year=2006|title=Nicknames of places: Origins and meanings of the alternate and secondary names, sobriquets, titles, epithets and slogans for 4600 places worldwide|publisher=McFarland & Company}}</ref> * A parody of African place-names or languages, particularly those in Bantu languages. Bantu languages avoid consonant clusters except with nasals, almost all words end in vowels, and reduplication is commonly used to mark intensity or frequency.
There is a reference to "Bongoland" in the English translation by Ellen Elizabeth Frewer of a book originally in German by Georg August Schweinfurth, published in 1874 in English as ''The Heart of Africa''.<ref>{{Cite web |url=https://archive.org/details/heartofafrica02schw |title=The heart of Africa|first1=Georg August|last1=Schweinfurth|first2=Ellen Elizabeth|last2=Frewer|date=3 February 1874|publisher=New York : Harper & brothers|via=Internet Archive}}</ref> Schweinfurth locates it as lying between 6-8 degrees North and in the south-western region of the Bahr-el-Ghazal (South Sudan). The Belgian explorer Adolphe de Calonne-Beaufaict also refers to the 'Bongo of the Bahr-el-Ghazal' in his 1921 study of the Azande people.<ref>de Calonne-Beaufaict, A. Azande, Bruxelles,Instituts Solvay</ref> The English anthropologist E. E. Evans-Pritchard published a description of the Bongo in 1929, in which he pointed out how their way of life was systematically destroyed by the Arab slave and ivory traders from the North.<ref>{{Cite journal |last=Evans-Pritchard |first=E. E. |date=1929 |title=The Bongo |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/41719404 |journal=Sudan Notes and Records |volume=12 |issue=1 |pages=1–61 |issn=0375-2984}}</ref>
The 1947 song "Civilization" by Bob Hilliard and Carl Sigman, recorded by various artists, contained the line "Bongo, Bongo, Bongo, I Don't Want to Leave the Congo". A variation of this was adopted for a poster produced by the fascist Union Movement bearing the chant "Bongo, bongo, whites aren't going to leave the Congo".<ref>Prison Sentence And Fines in Ritz Hotel Case Defence Speaks Of "An Awful Error" (Law) The Times Saturday, 13 Aug 1960; pg. 4; Issue 54849; col F</ref> In the 1970s, the cinema advertisement for Silk Cut cigarettes parodying the 1964 film ''Zulu'' was supposedly set in "Mbongoland".
The word "bongo" is also the slang nickname of the Tanzanian city of Dar es Salaam, and the kind of music which originated from Dar es Salaam is called "Bongo Flava", a slang version of the phrase "bongo flavour". Also, some Tanzanian films are known as "bongo films".<ref>{{Cite news|date=2012-04-10|title=Kanumba funeral: Thousands mourn Tanzanian actor|publisher=BBC News|url=https://www.bbc.com/news/world-africa-17662920|access-date=2021-03-17}}</ref>
==Controversies== The term has featured in political controversies. In 1985, Alan Clark, while Conservative Member of Parliament for Plymouth Sutton, once, in a departmental meeting, allegedly referred to Africa as "Bongo Bongo Land".<ref>{{cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=Zzw9WabmmVwC&q=bongo+bongo+land&pg=PT219|title=Political Correctness: A History of Semantics and Culture|isbn=9781444360295|last1=Hughes|first1=Geoffrey|year=2011}}</ref><ref>7 February 1985 "Tory minister faces row over race remark" ''Financial Times''</ref> When called to account, however, Clark denied the comment had any racist overtones, saying it had simply been a reference to the President of Gabon, Omar Bongo.<ref>Clark, A. ''The Last Diaries: In and Out of the Wilderness'', Phoenix, 2003, p. 219.</ref>
In 2004, Taki Theodoracopulos called Kenya "bongo-bongo land" in a column for ''The Spectator''. ''The Guardian'' later criticised his use of "offensive and outdated stereotypes".<ref>{{cite news|url=https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2004/oct/21/conservatives.pressandpublishing|title=Boris Johnson: Selective spectator|date=21 October 2004|work=The Guardian|location=London}}</ref>
In July 2013, Godfrey Bloom, a member of the European Parliament for Yorkshire and the Humber for the UK Independence Party (UKIP), was filmed referring to countries which receive overseas aid from the United Kingdom as "Bongo Bongo Land".<ref name="Mason">{{cite news|url=https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2013/aug/06/ukip-godfrey-bloom-bongo-bongo-land|title=Ukip MEP Godfrey Bloom criticises aid to 'bongo bongo land'|last=Mason|first=Rowena|date=6 August 2013|work=The Guardian|location=London|accessdate=6 August 2013}}</ref> UKIP later banned use of the term. A spokesperson from Show Racism the Red Card stated that Bloom's remarks were "crude stereotypes that see Britain as a civilised place and overseas as tribal".<ref>{{cite news|url=https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/blogs-magazine-monitor-23600129|title=The other meaning of Bongoland|publisher=BBC News|date=8 August 2013}}</ref> Matthew d'Ancona wrote in ''The Daily Telegraph'': "There may indeed be some who inwardly cheered Bloom’s choice of words. But there will be many – including, crucially, some who agree with his position on aid – who felt queasy at the use of such antediluvian language."<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.telegraph.co.uk/comment/personal-view/10234039/Take-note-Ukip-political-discourse-isnt-a-free-for-all.html|title=Take note, Ukip: political discourse isn't a free-for-all|first=Matthew|last=d’Ancona|date=10 August 2013|work=The Daily Telegraph|location=London}}</ref>
In 2019 the Labour Party MP Tan Dhesi asked the prime minister, Boris Johnson of the Conservative Party, to apologise for his use of derogatory terms to describe immigrants, citing "towel-head, or Taliban, or coming from bongo-bongo land" as examples of such insults which minority communities receive; though not necessarily ascribing these terms to Johnson, the speech was made in relation to other comments made by him.<ref>{{Cite web|date=2019-09-04|title=Boris Johnson urged to apologise for 'derogatory and racist' letterboxes article|url=http://www.theguardian.com/politics/2019/sep/04/boris-johnson-urged-to-apologise-for-muslim-women-letterboxes-article|access-date=2021-04-28|website=The Guardian|location=London}}</ref>
== See also == * ''Bongoland,'' a 2003 American/Tanzanian film directed by Josiah Kibira. * Bunga bunga * Bongo (antelope), the largest forest antelope in Africa * Um Bongo, a tropical fruit drink with African-themed branding * Bongo bongo in linguistics * ''King Leonardo and His Short Subjects'', a 1960 animation series about the fictional African country of Bongo Congo
== References == {{Reflist}}
Category:Anti-black racism in the United Kingdom Category:Fictional African countries Category:British political phrases Category:Stereotypes of black people