Socio-religious cohesion Social cohesion

7.3.5 Economic cohesion

Since the Tongwe are spread out over a large area with few roads, they use more than one economic center. The town of Kigoma is the largest center in the region, with people travelling there from afar, although for many this is difficult and costly. Kigoma is the economic center for at least four ethnic groups, so Swahili is used for communication. As the Tongwe share many points of common identity with the Bende, Mpanda is another economic center for them. The Tongwe consider it safe to travel to Mpanda as the area is scarcely populated or is, at least in part, inhabited by the Bende. Similar to Kigoma, Mpanda is populated with a mixture of different ethnic groups, so Swahili is generally used for communication. Except for Chakulu, all the villages visited each have a market, which makes travelling to larger economic centers less necessary. People from Chakulu use the market in Uvinza. In Ilagala the market is open three days a week, while in all the other locations, it is open every day. In the economic dimension, the Tongwe are not a socially cohesive community.

7.3.6 Socio-religious cohesion

According to the responses given during the group interviews, the Tongwe are mostly Muslim. Some are Roman Catholic Christians. Many of the Muslims and Christians also follow the traditional religion. Reportedly, there are some Tongwe in Kashagulu who are part of a Pentecostal congregation. From individual interviews, 30 1446 of the participants in Kashagulu said they are Christians and 67 3146 are Muslim. One individual followed traditional religion. All of those who claimed Christian affiliation in Kashagulu are Roman Catholic, and 79 1114 said they attend church four times per month. Christian and in two cases, Muslim leaders were also asked about the religious composition of the villages where the research was done. Table 20 summarizes the responses received. Table 20. Religious composition according to religious leaders Village Christian Muslim Traditional religion adherents Tongwe Christians Tongwe Muslims Tongwe adherents of traditional religion Ilagala ½, ½ ½, ½ few, none few, 10 nearly all maybe some Kalya ¼, ½ ½, ¾ few few, ¼ ½, most all few, ¼ Kashagulu ½, ¾ few, ¼ few, ¼, 25 ¼, ½ ¼, ½ ¼, ¼–½ Rukoma ⅓, ½ ¼, many ⅓, many few ¾, many few, ¼ Uvinza ¼, ¾ ¼, ½ few, ¼ few few, most ¼, most The more uniform a community is in terms of its socio-religious institutions, the more cohesive it is. If there are multiple religions or multiple denominations, the community will be less cohesive than where one religion or one denomination dominates. In all the villages visited, the great majority of the Tongwe are Muslim, with some also following traditional religion. Therefore, they are considered cohesive in this dimension. As shown in table 20, even though the villages where the Tongwe live have a significant number of Christians, among the Tongwe themselves, the great majority are Muslims. As previously mentioned, Watters 1989 considers different dimensions in order to determine social cohesiveness. The Tongwe are a community, socially cohesive in some dimensions—linguistic, cultural and socio-religious—but not so cohesive in others—political, geographical and economic.

7.4 Openness to development